topic In-place mass pyramid shape in Revit Architecture Forum

In-place mass pyramid shape

Anonymous — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 18:45:14 GMT

I'm following a "Simple Mass Creation" exercise in a Revit book, which says to create a cube, a sphere, and a pyramid. It doesn't say how, though, it just goes on to the next step of dividing the masses into floors. After much research and trial and error, I figured out the cube and sphere, but how the heck do you create a pyramid? At first I was thinking of a blend, from a square to a point, but that's not an option. Then I tried to use void shapes to remove parts of a cube...and I'm getting an error message because my voids are overlapping and there's no solid to cut. There MUST be a faster and less complicated way to create such a basic form. Anyone?

Re: In-place mass pyramid shape

Anonymous — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 14:10:25 GMT

The book probably means "place mass". Those three objects are in

your imperial or metric library under mass.

Re: In-place mass pyramid shape

loboarch — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 15:41:53 GMT

A pyramid shape can be created basically as a sweep. It is a triagle shape dragged around a square base form. Below are images of the skeleton I drew and the resulting pyramid form.

Re: In-place mass pyramid shape

Anonymous — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 17:48:57 GMT

Thank you Jeff! That worked nicely. I've been struggling with this in-place massing, and there doesn't seem to be a lot written on it. (almost zero in the wiki) I keep reading in various places that in-place masses can be created like shapes in the family editor: sweeps, blends, extrusions, etc., so I was looking for buttons on the ribbon to do this, like in the family editor. All I found was the Create Form button, which has only 2 options, solid or void. Very very confusing.

Now I'm starting to understand that I just have to sketch the shapes, select them, and choose Create Form...Revit figures out how to connect them. This pyramid was a great example of that, and now I can play around with other types of shapes. Thanks!

Re: In-place mass pyramid shape

loboarch — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 17:53:33 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:

Now I'm starting to understand that I just have to sketch the shapes, select them, and choose Create Form...Revit figures out how to connect them. This pyramid was a great example of that, and now I can play around with other types of shapes. Thanks!

That is some of the "magic" in mass creation in Revit. Just sketch lines/shapes and then use the "create form" button to get what you want. It gets it right most of the time.

Re: In-place mass pyramid shape

Alfredo_Medina — Tue, 17 Apr 2012 13:01:36 GMT

That was an awesome solution, Jeff. I never thought that a pyramid could be made with a simple sweep. Brilliant.

Another way to build a pyramid, if you want to control the position of the apex point and the sides of the base by parameters, and calculate the volume of the pyramid, is shown in this video that I made some days ago in reply to a question in the Augi forums:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ct9s2ACBom8

Re: In-place mass pyramid shape

Anonymous — Mon, 22 Sep 2014 06:10:26 GMT

Is it possible to do this with a rectangular base. I can make it work with a square, but if I use a rectangle I keep getting errors

Re: In-place mass pyramid shape

loboarch — Mon, 22 Sep 2014 12:47:10 GMT

The rectangle might be creating some kind of self intersecting geometry. It most certainly will not be a pyramid at the very least. You could try your rectangular shape as a blend, drawing the 2 rings in the correct positions. of course with this method it will not come to a true "point" but it could be close.

Re: In-place mass pyramid shape

Anonymous — Mon, 22 Sep 2014 23:53:48 GMT

Thanks, i see, it sort of works. There isn;t a way jyst to pick points in space and make it a solid mass is there?

Re: In-place mass pyramid shape

Anonymous — Sun, 05 Nov 2017 10:16:37 GMT

yes, drew in sweep,but generic model instead of mass.