April 2013

The Basics of making a Movie from ArchiCAD

I’d been meaning to record a video on the basics of making a movie from ArchiCAD for a long time. Yesterday a former colleague and friend was asking where she could find such a video to teach her how to make a quick fly-through movie in ArchiCAD… 24 hours later… here’s the video on Cameras and Camera Paths in ArchiCAD. As always, I’m sure I didn’t cover everything. If you

Read More

ArchiCAD Template Basics: View Map and Layout Book

Templates are a big deal. Your template can determine whether you make or lose money with BIM. A strong template can make you efficient. A poor template can win you a gold medal for Wheel Reinvention. I’m not being hyperbolic. To succeed at BIM, you need a strong template. Without that, all the other time, money, and effort you throw at BIM will be severely handicapped. I get a lot

Read More

Generation Y Unfolding – DesignIntelligence Article

In addition to all the posts on Shoegnome and BIM Engine, I’ve had the pleasure to write for some other venues this year (both print and digital). I’m proud of all of those articles, but there are two that I’m exceedingly excited about. One’s not out yet, so I can’t say anything about it (other than that it’s awesome); but I can tell you about the other. I am thrilled

Read More

Inspire a Shared Vision: Architect as Leader

I was on Twitter earlier in the week and noticed that AIA National is looking for architect bloggers to write about “architect as leader”, to help expand on the AIA 2013 National Convention theme of Building Leaders. So… what does Architect as Leader mean? The First Rule of Architecture School is Don’t Break this Rule I write about some wild stuff. I talk about monetizing BIM through micro-transactions via Augmented

Read More

I Didn’t Mean to Show that vs I don’t Know what I just Drew

This is part 3 of a series of posts This series of posts started in December 2012 and talked about different aspects of documentation during BIM implementation within a firm. Changes during the documentation process because of BIM is a huge topic, one that often gets overshadowed in the bigger discussions of BIM. And this isn’t even bringing up the idea that the ‘documentation phase’ doesn’t necessarily exist anymore. Part

Read More

Get Ready to Improve the National BIM Standard — United States

Jared’s Note: I learned about this today via an e-mail list I’m on and thought I should share. By the way, the fortune is from a cookie I got last summer in Boston. For the record the cookie is wrong. The nice thing about standards are that they make communication and collaboration within the AECO industry much easier. Viva OpenBIM and clear, defined information exchange standards for BIM. Now for

Read More

Printing Architectural Documents is a Waste of Your Time

A local Minnesota ArchiCAD (and Revit) user wrote to me about his new machine after reading my post over on BIM Engine about hardware requirements for ArchiCAD. He had this to say: “…I am testing a brand new iMac.  It’s the 27″ model and it’s completely built-to-order with the beefier hardware.  I’ve been using it for a couple weeks now and it’s really nice for ArchiCAD.  The 2560 x 1440

Read More

Skeuomorphs and Architectural Documentation

Architectural Documentation in the 21st Century There’s a good chance you’re aware of Seth Godin. He writes some pretty amazing stuff. My current favorite is this post: Skeuomorphs = failure. If you’re not familiar with what a skeuomorph is, here’s the first sentence from the wikipedia entry: “A skeuomorph is a physical ornament or design on an object made to resemble another material or technique.” I think this fits perfectly

Read More

ArchiCAD 2013 Spring Academy – May 24th and 25th in Riga, Latvia

Have you ever attended one of the ArchiCAD Schools in Europe? I haven’t. But boy do I want to! Maybe 2014 will be the year I finally make it. My life should be less crazy by then. Or maybe 2015… Well you don’t have the excuses I do. Here are the details: ArchiCAD Spring Academy 2013 is a two day celebration that will educate, entertain, and immerse you in the

Read More
Scroll to Top