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AEC Newsletter archive:
Geoffrey Moore Langdon
CADENCE AEC Tech News # 31 (August 1, 2000)
AEC Tech News 8/1/2000
In This Issue:
ArchiForma Modeler for ArchiCAD, ObjectsOnline, GDL Viewer
ArchiCAD users have eagerly awaited a freeform 3D modeler for years. The users as well as the developers of ArchiCAD know how enormously important the simplicity and elegance of the ArchiCAD interface is to its success. Most of the magic of ArchiCAD is done with just three extremely architecturally intelligent entities--walls, roofs, and floorslabs--all of which can be easily modified in certain specific ways. The software maker absolutely did not want to muck up the interface or make it confusing and complex (or lose any of that automatic architectural smartness) in order to allow it to be able to model everything possible (something they readily acknowledge is precisely the problem with their competitors such as AllPlan, ArchitecturalDesktop, and TriForma).
To model unusual design elements, then, ArchiCAD users have had several different options:
- modify the parameters of an existing GDL library object, assuming, hopefully, something close is already in the libraries
- skip modeling the element, use ArchiCAD only as a schematic modeler and sketch the element in by hand or only in the 2D CADD production drawings
- learn and use the text-based programming language called GDL, which does indeed have all the power of subtractive Boolean modeling (just not visually)
- build approximations out of pieces built with the floorslab/wall/roof tools (making use of "visual GDL")
- wait for an intrepid entrepreneur GDL expert programmer to build it for them,
- model the specific element in FormZ or Zoom, and transfer it in as a non-modifiable symbol
Learning GDL, even with the aid of the wonderful GDL Cookbook by David Nicholson-Cole, is kind of intimidating to most architects, since it feels more like programming than doing architecture. The ArchiTalk forum, one of the best internet CADD discussion forums in existence, is divided between those who refuse to touch GDL (and run into the issues of translating 3D faces in DXF/DWG files from other CADD modelers) and others who are equally puzzled why they don't just easily do such and such in GDL.
Thus, users of ArchiCAD are generally ecstatic that they are using what could be regarded as the best architectural software in the industry, but they acknowledge that the big bump in the road is in how to model unique stuff.
There are now dozens of libraries of ArchiCAD GDL objects available now via CD and online, as designers recreate the entire world--from Alvar Aalto's chairs, to palm trees, log cabin doorways, and even whole dining room place settings. Some are comprehensive libraries themselves, such as MasterLibrary (which includes some 450 fully parametric window, door, object, and lamp elements) by Willem Langelaan, the Hoshino Library of Japanese furniture, and SmartParts by Dimensions Design Group.
One of the best resources for ArchiCAD users is ObjectsOnline, where you can quickly find a specific item, such as a car, a pool table, or a special column, buy it for $15, and pop it into your CADD model.
Graphisoft has helped this process by adding free utilities to its website (such as an extrude along a path tool called Profiler) as well as to its core software (such as StairMaker). In fact they love to add some incredibly amazing stuff right into the core CADD software with little Fanfare--such as the LumberPack in ArchiCAD 6.52, which automatically does all the wood cutlists, cost analysis, and 3D framing, or the Builders Modules (predone finished residential rooms) and logwall ability. Additionally, a new tool that will aid all these exchanges of 3D objects is their new free GDL viewer for the web.
An extremely important move by Graphisoft about a year ago was releasing an open API (Applications Programming Interface), which would allow other companies to develop specialized macros for the ArchiCAD paradigm, and that initiative is now just beginning to bear fruit in the form of ArchiTerra (site design), ArchiFM (facilities management), the upcoming ArchiTiles (tile generator), and many more.
When I was in Budapest discussing the freeform 3D modeling issue with the creative geniuses behind ArchiCAD, they clearly said they had no desire to turn ArchiCAD itself into a freeform tool like FormZ, as such flexibility would inherently undermine their "prime directive" of elegant simplicity, which is what makes ArchiCAD truly unique. The API though, is what makes the 3D modeler for ArchiCAD called ArchiForma possible. What ArchiForma does then, is provide a wonderful window into an extremely sophisticated visual modeling environment for specific special design elements, while, at the same time not mucking up the normal ArchiCAD work environment, which has huge beneficial implications for the whole ArchiCAD world.
Thus, the release this month of ArchiForma, which includes visual subtractive Boolean operations such as tube (extrude along a path), ruled (blend two shapes), extrude, cut, rotate, revolve, could be the most important news in a decade to a lot of designers. From the sample images online you can see how this new tool is already being used with great imaginations, for fancy door archways, Corinthian column capitals, Victorian roof details, and comfortable-looking furniture.
David Correia, of Objects Online, Inc. says "ArchiForma is by nature very simple. A tool pallet with simple tools that together give ArchiCAD incredible power to design objects without scripting code. The working environment is literally the ArchiCAD plan plus extra tools, and in using a tool, a window opens giving the step by step directions for the user to follow."
ArchiForma is developed by the Italian company Cigraph, a reseller/trainer for ArchiCAD as well as developers of other ArchiCAD add-ons such as ArchiTerra. The software will be available from many sources, including, of course, each regional ArchiCAD VAR, and ObjectsOnline.
Links:
ArchiCAD (by Graphisoft) = www.graphisoft.com
ArchiForma = www.objectsonline.com/archiforma.html
Cigraph = www.cigraph.it
GDL Cookbook = www.nottingham.ac.uk/sbe/cookbook
Objects Online = www.objectsonline.com
MasterLibrary = www.langelaan.com/masterlibrary
SmartParts (Dimensions Design Group) = www.ddgi.com
GDL Object Viewer for Web = www.graphisoft.com/products/gdl_plugin
ArchiTalk Discussion Forum = www.graphisoft.com/support
About Geoffrey Moore Langdon, AIA
Prof. Langdon is a registered architect and is the principal of Architectural CADD Consultants, a firm that specializes in helping architectural firms with computing and CADD. He has taught Design, Solar Energy, and Architectural CADD at a number of colleges in the Boston area. He is the author of Architectural CADD: A Resource Guide to Design and Production Software Appropriate for Architects, a guest speaker at many AIA events, and the founder and organizer of the Designers 3D CAD Shootout competition. contact him at aectechnews@architecturalcadd.com, or through his website: http://www.architecturalcadd.com
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