Turn a Table into a Couch

In the previous post I covered how to edit a component by duplicating the file and changing the properties. If I'm still working with this desk, say I messed with the width and the depth a little bit, but I still don't have what I want. The next step in creating custom components is to edit the family.

Here's the definition Revit has for Families (yes, I went there):

A class of elements in a category. A family groups elements with a common set of parameters (properties), identical use, and similar graphical representation. 

Different elements in a family may have different values for some or all properties, but the set of properties (their names and meaning) is the same. For example, a family of concrete round columns contains columns that are all concrete and round, but of different sizes. Each column size is a type within the Concrete Round Column family.

Yeah, cause that's really clear. I understand it because I've been at this a while, but for the beginner, this might feel like a lot of words being thrown at you that mean nothing. In laymen's terms, the term family and the term component are basically interchangeable. The component can have several different types (like the different sizes for the desk mentioned in the last post). All those different types have the same properties excluding size. Make sense? Well, just let it soak in for a while.

So, going back to this desk. To edit the family I select the component, then a button that says "Edit Family" will appear along the top bar.

Click on that button, it will ask if you want to open it for editing, click okay.

Now I've got the Family Editor open. Thrilling, isn't it? This is where you could essentially take a table and turn it into a couch. Why you would do that, I don't know, but you could. What's great about editing families as opposed to creating something from scratch, is that this file already has parameters and properties set up for you. This is especially helpful if you're making a new countertop or casework. So much of the work is already done for you. You just have to make it look the way you want.

Before I do any editing  I want to do a "save as". Think of this as duplicating to avoid changing the original file. Once I do a "save as" I have a new file that I can manipulate without worry.

A quick tour of the family editor. In the project browser you will see several drop down menus you can use to move around the component. The ground floor (or reference level) and elevations are most important.

On the far left side are all the tools and lines and fun stuff for making components. I'm going to save those for a later date.

I click on the "Front Elevation" and decide that I want to change the look of the left side of the desk. I want more drawers. I change this by selecting the large bottom drawer and simply deleting it. Sometimes you will encounters pieces of the component that Revit won't let you delete or change because it is locked. See that little padlock there?
 

In this case, it did let me delete that portion, but if it doesn't, simply click on the padlock to unlock it. Then it will let you make changes.

Next I selected the drawers and drawer handles on the right side and copied them over. I decided I wanted a longer work surface so I selected the top of the desk and pulled on the blue arrows to stretch it to a different length. (I'm making changes like this so they're obvious to the viewer and not design choices I would recommend, ha).

Yeah, sure. That looks awesome. Next, I just hit "Load into Project" on the left hand side and the component will be loaded into my current project.

That's a beginning look at editing the family. This is a very useful stategy that I recommend utilizing. Because the next step is creating your own components. Ugh.  

Duplicate! Duplicate! Duplicate!

This is by far the issue I encounter most with students. How to make custom components? The thing is, there is about 10,000 different ways to create/edit components in Revit. And by 10,000 I mean, like four, but there are a lot of options regardless. What any experienced Revit user will tell you, is you want to do everything you possibly can before you try and make something from scratch. Why? Because Revit does not have the most user-friendly component making capabilities. Of course, like anything, with practice you'll gain speed and skill and over time your components will become more complex. The learning curve is tough though and can be frustrating. Component building can also be very time consuming, even when you do have practice. So that's why it is advised you do everything you can before you get into making your own stuff.

In fact, this post isn't even going to cover creating components from scratch. This post is going to address the first strategy to making components: Duplicate!

Let's say I'm working on a project and I decide I want a desk. I go through the Revit component library and I find a desk, but it's just not quite what I want.

The first step to changing this component to be what I want is to click on the Element Properties button. If you're not already familiar with properties, be prepared to get very intimate with the Element Properties dialog. The backbone of Revit is in the properties. 95% of the time when you encounter a problem the solution is in the properties. So, really get to know your properties dialog boxes. You're going to become such great friends.

Okay, getting back to the point, I selected the component and then selected Element Properties. This opens a dialog box. The first thing I want to look through is the Type Selector. The Type Selector is a drop down menu that list the different family types for this component. I can look through the list and decide if one of the types suits my needs.

I decide this still isn't what I want. So, I move on the next step: Editing the component. I click the Edit/New button next to the Type Selector. This opens a new dialog box where I can begin making edits. However, it's important to realize that if I make edits now I will be editing the original file. This will become an issue if I want to use this file again. You can always download the original file from the web library if you do make edits now, but that's tedious and you'll probably forget to do it, so get in the habit of hitting Duplicate after hitting Edit/New.

This will create a new file that will remain within your project. You don't have to have any fears about the edits you make to this file. It won't affect the original file at all. After you hit duplicate, enter a new name for the file. Put in something you'll actually remember. When you get deep within a project and have a hundred components loaded it becomes quite a pain to search through the list.

Now that I have my New Desk started, I can make edits. In the Edit dialog box I have the option to change the Depth, Height, Width, and Leg Height of the desk. I can also change the materials. Just to make the change obvious, I decide my desk needs to be 10'-0' wide. I click on the text after width and change it to 10'. Hit Okay twice and now I've got a fantastically insane ten foot desk.

That's the general process for duplicating components. It's the easiest process and doesn't allow a whole lot of room for customization, but it's only the first step of many.

Next for this series: Turn a Table into a Couch

Dork

Acting under the assumption that no one reads this, I'm going to admit my Revit dork crush. His name is Jeff and he runs a Revit blog called The Revit Kid. He offers lots of video tutorials and answers emails and knows stuff about computer programming that goes way over my head. His blog is also one of the only Revit blogs that posts regularly. I love his tutorials. They go really fast, which might be frustrating for beginners, but I prefer them that way.

Find him here: http://therevitkid.blogspot.com/

SketchUp, my Dumb Friend, meet Revit

I remember being told it was possible to put SketchUp files into Revit when I first began using Revit. However, for the last two years I was never able to get this to work. I always got error messages. Miracle of miracles, the other day, I actually got it to work. I don't know if a bug has been worked out in SketchUp or Revit, or if I was just doing it incorrectly in the first place, but either way I got that SketchUp file into my Revit file!

Here's the method. Go to the 3D warehouse for SketchUp and download the file you want. Depending on the complexity of the file, it may or may not work, especially if the file is very large or if it was made in a way that Revit just doesn't like. I downloaded this couch.

There are two different ways to put it into your Revit file and it's the same process as making a component. You can either make it into a new Family file or you can do a "Create in Place." I'll start with making a new Family file.

Go to file, select new, select Family. I selected "Furniture" from the list of categories. Then, go to File, select "Import/Link", select "CAD Formats", change "Files of Type" from DWG files to SKP files (SketchUp files) and select the file you just downloaded.

Depending on the nature of the object, it could have a lot of lines. This is especially true in objects that are convex or curved. Look at the puffy pillows in the couch I downloaded. It ended up with a lot of lines. If you turn on only "Shading" it will get rid of the lines, visually at least. Also keep in mind that the items you download might be way out of scale. There isn't a scale command in Revit like the one in AutoCAD.

Next, you can hit save, hit "Load into Project" (or load from the components button) and it will appear in your project.

By doing the "Create in Place" instead of creating a new family, you can get the object into your project file, but it will not have it's own individual file. It is most common that these objects cannot be edited within Revit, so it makes some sense to just put them in the project file. You can do the same thing with AutoCAD 3D files and from my experience, those work out a little better. 

I used a SketchUp model to put this in my senior project. 

It's a bear! I really wanted a dinosaur, but I haven't found one that works yet. Either way, I could never make a bear in Revit. 

Roof by Footprint

I had a question on how to put a gable roof on a house. Now I haven't seen the project so I can only offer a generic how-to. I'll demonstrate how to make the roof in this project (at least the big portion of the roof).

First, go to the "Roof" plan. Or just open one of the plans (you can always change the level). Click the Roof command and chose "Roof by Footprint". With the command open you can sketch the roof either by picking walls or drawing lines. In this case, my house is just a simple square so I'm going to use the "Pick Walls" command. 

Before I click on the walls I change the "Overhang" to 2'-0". "Overhang" can be found in the design bar above the drawing screen. Then, I click on the four walls of the house to select them.

Now I set the slope, or where the gables will be. I select the line of the front of the house, and next to where the "Overhang" option was, is the "Defines Slope" box. I check this box for the front of the house and the back. When this box is checked, a slope symbol will appear as well as the rise/run of the slope. In this case, it's 9:12. By clicking on the text you can change the slope. 

Hit "Finish Roof" and yes to the "Do you want highlighted walls to attach to roof?" question, and the roof is done. You may notice the walls do not extend to the peak of the roof like in this image:

To fix that, just select the wall. Two boxes will appear in the options bar "Attach" and "Detach". Select "Attach", select the roof, and the walls will snap to the roof. Do this for all walls that are connected to the roof. 

This is just one method to getting a roof on. As you saw in the Roof Command there are four options total. This one is the most common and easiest to use.

I Hate...sometimes...my Life

Okay, so this is my first "I hate Revit/Interior Design/my life" entry. I ran into my first snag in my senior project. It's not a huge deal, but it is incredibly irritating. Within my project I wanted to create a fire-rated exit stairwell. The kind of thing you'll find in any big commercial project. Stacked stairs. A potentially standard construction type of thing. 

Guess what. Revit can't do that. 

Revit can't make closed loop stairs. Basically, Revit can't do this:

I know what you're going to say, it looks like you made that in Revit. Actually, I got it from the RevitCity.com forums and haven't quite figured out how to incorporate it into my project. 

You will find when drawing stairs that Revit will not let you draw over the top of any lines or "form closed loop". Essentially, you can't draw stairs on top of other stairs (even though the third run of stairs is above the first run in reality). It will give you an error like this.

So far, I've only been able to find one forum thread about this. And basically it just reiterates the fact that this can't be done and how shocked and angry we dorks are about it.

This brings up an interesting point of comparison between using and learning Revit and AutoCAD. When you learn AutoCAD, you learn how to draw a line. You learn how to draw a dashed line. You learn how much you hate line type scale. The drawings you draw in CAD are purely 2D symbols. The same four lines that form a rectangle can represent a coffee table, a bookcase, a countertop, and a bed. If I were drawing this in CAD, I would draw the lines that represent the stairs and be done with it. I probably wouldn't make a 3D model of it either because we've all seen a stairwell. 

When you learn Revit, you have a completely different mode of thinking. Yes, rectangles represent all kinds of things in plan, but those lines are a coffee table, they are a countertop. Well, as much as a digital rendering can be anything. Revit users are also victim to a different set of problems. It's not, "I can't get my lines to be dashed." It's, "How do I attach a roof to a house." And because Revit creates the 3D for everything it can substantially slow down progress if you don't know how to fix problems quickly. 

Remember though, you can always put any elevation or plan in Revit into AutoCAD.

As Useful as the Nightlight on my HP

A huge difference between AutoCAD and Revit is the emphasis on learning keyboard shortcuts. When learning AutoCAD it is imperative to learn the shortcuts to speed up your work. In Revit, there is much less emphasis on learning them and I'm not sure why that is. There are a few I use constantly and they definitely speed things up. So at the risk of getting my AutoCAD and my Revit key commands further confused, I'm attempting to use use them more often in Revit. 

The few that I utilize all the time and recommend memorizing are:

• VG Visibility/Graphics menu
• VP Visual Properties menu
• When in 3D View, hit F8 to enter the Rotate/Zoom/Pan command (also known as the Dynamic View box)
• The arrow keys are nudge tools. The further you are zoomed in the smaller the increment will be that the object moves
• Hitting the ESC key will generally get you out of any command
• Using the scroll on the three-button mouse will allow you to zoom in and out. Hitting the scroll button will activate the Pan command
• CTRL Select multiple elements
• TAB Cycle through the prehighlighting of elements to select among ones that are close to one another
• When box selecting, if you drag left to right it selects only those elements entirely within the rectangle; if you drag right to left it selects elements that cross the rectangle as well
• When entering a number in feet and inches, type the feet then a space then the inches. No need to put ' and "

Some I've looked up and am trying to use more often:

• CO copy (Cntrl-C)
• RO rotate
• AR array
• MM mirror
• PR properties
• DI dimension
• AL align
• WA wall
• WN window
• DR door
• CM component
• RP ref plane
• Alt+Enter to edit the Element properties of almost everything

Of course, there are more than this. Quite a few zoom commands like in AutoCAD, but in Revit if you have the three-button mouse I find those to be about as useful as the nightlight on my HP. Completely pointless.