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Parametric design
About Rhino & Grasshopper and PARAM-O.

ArchiCAD & Generative Components (Grasshopper+Geometry Gym)

Anonymous
Not applicable
What does ArchiCAD have to do with GC's?

According to Geometry-Gym, quite a bit!

Geometry Gym develop an IFC plugin for Grasshopper,
while Grasshopper have developed the most mind boggling
generative components synthesizer for Rhino(cerous).

Being a BIM architect in this day and age and NOT knowing
of these tools means you have gone missing.
Wake Up!

My final comment is: Who will develop such tools for GDL?

Gil

Links:
http://www.grasshopper3d.com/
http://geometrygym.blogspot.com/
http://ssi.wikidot.com/start
69 REPLIES 69
Anonymous
Not applicable
Could it be possible to use rhino IO from cinema 4D and cinema 4D to transfer files from rhino/grasshopper to archicad? And is this a good way to update changes between the files constantly.
Anonymous
Not applicable
Just want to voice my interest in this area and say thank you to Jon and Gil for their work.

This is a very, very worthwhile endeavor and I really hope to see robust rhino/GH/ArchiCAD interoperability come to fruition.

I also want to address the perception that grasshopper is for complex organic geometries. While it can handle such geometries very well, it is also very useful for run-of-the-mill projects. The nodal, graphical algorithm interface is incredibly useful for a lot of standard architectural work, too. Factories, warehouses, school buildings, spec office space, data centers, convention centers, airports, many types of health care buildings are ideal candidates for modeling in grasshopper. Any building type which has a high degree of repetitive components and systems can greatly benefit from the efficiencies of model reuse during the concept design phase from modeling in a nodal interface --- specially when such models, once created, are reusable with only tweaking from project to project.

Currently, I am exploring GH's potential with respect to heavy industrial building types. It is a great way to evaluate design options. Revit has similar functionality, but so far my experience is that Revit's menu-based interface makes it more difficult to "see" the underlying algorithm and that its system is not as flexible and feature-rich as grasshopper's system (mostly because so many people are developing tools for grasshopper). Autodesk is addressing this by building dynamo --- a nodal interface for vasari and revit. I have not tried it so I cannot comment. But back to grasshopper and why there should be great interoperability with ArchiCAD.

First of all, using GH is a fast way to make adjustments to parameters and have then entire model update accordingly. Imagine a data center layout where adding one more structural bay leads the slab, walls, roof, and openings to update automatically, as well as respacing/adding downspouts or skylights, or egress walkways, etc. Or imagine if changing column types makes the slab perimeter offset and the location of exterior walls to the column grid centerlines automatically update. Or imagine if switching from an EPDM roof to a standing seam metal roof (with different slope) automatically makes the parapet heights adjust. I am not a super savvy user but after a little while with grasshopper, this is getting easy, even for me.

Second, grasshopper is very flexible and powerful in letting users identify, import and use, and then extract useful information from the models. Information may be exported for use in Excel or other CAD applications and used for budget estimating and scoping.

Third, grasshopper has an evolutionary solver (Galapagos), which means --- depending how far you refine the model --- you can for instance optimize floor to floor height based upon some matrix of lighting levels, heating/cooling systems specifics, percent openings in the envelope, and envelope performance metrics. Galapagos is fun to use and narrows down the design space to the variations which optimize the selected parameters. This can also be done by exporting data to CSV's, opening in excel, and reviewing the outputs of alternatives.

Fourth, the nodal workflow is outstanding, flexible, and powerful and now I even work out some details in grasshopper just so I can quickly run through a range of parameters and look at the implications of various sizes and placements of components. In summary, grasshopper can be a superb conceptual tool and a superb sketching tool.

Fifth, rhino/grasshopper are not competing with ArchiCAD. Rhino's biggest weakness, in my opinion, is that its documentation tools remain weak, even in Version 5. Conceptual modeling/sketching in rhino/grasshopper needs to be paired with a good design and documentation application. Once the design does move into documentation, changes and refinements will inevitably continue to be made and at that point, it is still important for the documentation tool to have all of the modeling capacities that ArchiCAD has. So these two applications really could have a very symbiotic relationship.

Fifth, as Jon pointed out, rhino and grasshopper are ubiquitous in architecture schools. And with good reason. McNeel is a great, fair, company with great products overall. But they also make rhino very attractive for students ($195 per perpetual academic license) and all academic licenses automatically convert to full commercial licenses upon graduating from / leaving school, at which point the student is on the commercial upgrade path. This means that over the last ten or so years, armies of current and future designers have been (often unknowningly) purchasing their first commercial design software and will start their careers with rhino+grasshopper as their go-to, affordable CAD/modeling tool. Also, Grasshopper is still free as of now, and rhino by itself is one of the best conceptual modeling tools around. In fact, in my case, i found it so fast and easy to learn and so powerful that i have never gone back to sketchup.

So ArchiCAD integration with rhino would tap into a huge market of curent and future designers. Currently, it appears to me that Autodesk and Bentley haven't taken much more initiative than Graphisoft seems to have taken in integrating with rhino/grasshopper (though it seems autodesk is starting to focus on rhino/gh integration now in the last year +/-). But, importantly, Autodesk's licensing and subscription policies are expensive enough that very few students will acquire personal copies of autodesk software when they leave school. Then there is the their large, heavy softwares that often require several expensive plug-ins purchased in addition to the Autodesk software in order to optimize work flows. And their resource-hungry tools often require more powerful hardware to run efficiently --- so there are a lot of additional costs associated with going the Autodesk route which makes it unlikely that young practitioners will purchase Autodesk tools as their personal complement to rhino/grasshopper. So there is a void space for some vendor to come in and claim the position of the design and documentation package most interoperable with rhino/grasshopper that is a reasonable reach for practitioners to purchase as their first legitimate commercial documentation tool. ArchiCAD is a good upfront value when compared to the other major players and their subscription service is also more reasonable.

So I hope to see this interoperability develop because it would be useful, practical, powerful, and it seems that currently there is a market void to be filled.
Anonymous
Not applicable
Hi Joe,

I absolutely agree. I haven't posted much of the progress of the IFC model exchange here, primarily I don't personally have access to Archicad to do so. With v16 out, I should at least have another trial license, and will do so (when I either get the installer to successfully download or visit the GS rep).

I do have Archicad users reporting back to me. And there is success. I'm also working on other workflows other than Grasshopper. I have clients (primarily structural and services engineers) working in Revit on projects where the architects are using Archicad. I've been concentrating on refining my Revit Addon to import Archicad IFC export with improvements on the Graphisoft offering that recognition includes aspects such as openings and generation of analytical representation.

So stay tuned to the blog http://geometrygym.blogspot.com for more details for this. You'll see a large bias in posts this year towards Revit, but primarily Autodesk have supported my openBIM efforts with not for resale provision of all their software.

I also encourage anyone wanting to support this effort to contact their GS agent or rep acknowledging an interest in this.
Anonymous
Not applicable
Looks like v16 has some nice improvements in it's IFC import.
Refer this blog post for example files:
http://geometrygym.blogspot.com/2012/08/gh-to-archicad-openbim-ifc.html

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Laszlo Nagy
Community Admin
Community Admin
Looks promising.
Do you know that now in the IFC Import Options you can set IFC to be converted into Morph elements? You may want to experiment with that option too, as in that case the element in ArchiCAD will have an editable geometry unlike in the case of converting the IFC to ArchiCAD objects.
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Anonymous
Not applicable
Wow! Looks very promising. I can't wait til the educational version of AC16 is available!
Karl Ottenstein
Moderator
jmanganelli wrote:
Wow! Looks very promising. I can't wait til the educational version of AC16 is available!
Supposedly, this has been available for download since August 9th:
http://blog.graphisoftus.com/archicad-education/start-your-semester-off-right-with-archicad-16-for-e...

I'm not sure why it hasn't been more widely announced...Maybe only the US ED version is available?
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Anonymous
Not applicable
thanks, Karl. normally archicad announces available updates with popups when i start up archicad. i wonder why there was no auto-update announcing the upgrade?

thanks!
stefan
Advisor
Karl wrote:
jmanganelli wrote:
Wow! Looks very promising. I can't wait til the educational version of AC16 is available!
Supposedly, this has been available for download since August 9th:
http://blog.graphisoftus.com/archicad-education/start-your-semester-off-right-with-archicad-16-for-e...

I'm not sure why it hasn't been more widely announced...Maybe only the US ED version is available?
Probably only US ED version... Last year I had to start teaching in r14 at the beginning of the semester in Belgium and could only upgrade after a few weeks (around end of october, IIRC). Our reseller is hinting that it would be similar this year too.


I really applaud the efforts done towards opening up the modeling from Grasshopper to Revit and ArchiCAD and going via IFC is a valid approach, as this would open up integration of Rhino and Grasshopper to an OpenBIM workflow, regardless of the tools being used.

And I applaud Graphisoft for continuing to improve IFC support in ArchiCAD.
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Mats_Knutsson
Advisor
Looking very promising. We'll investigate this soon. Is Grashopper free? Shouldn't be but I can't find any info...
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