Blurry Sheets in Revit Model

[ErikFrandsen]

Hello,

This question is geared towards looking at sheets in a Revit 2017 model on BIM 360 Team with latest Chrome browser.  I was wondering if you guys were working on making the sheets that have shading or shadows more crisp?  All the sheets with shading/shadows are very blurry when I look at them on BIM 360.  You can read it but with a lot of folks on 4k monitors now its just so blurry and looks pretty bad.  We go through so much time in our office trying to make our elevations and 3D views (with shading, shadows & color) in our drawing sets to be extremely clear (500-100 DPI) so its a professional looking job.  I am guessing the blurriness on BIM 360 is because the sheets with shading/shadows need to be rasterized?  In Revit 2017 we are able to print these sheets clearer than default by increasing the DPI in PDF print settings.  The file size gets bigger so I know there has got to be a balance between quality and speed through an internet browser.

Any plans to make these shading/shadow sheets clearer?  Is this the right spot to post this?

Thanks

[BrettWright]

hi Erik, I think you're on the right track with your Hypothesis.

• In the Forums, you'll see that this has been a topic of discussion, related to the triggering of going from Vector to Raster as soon as you enable shadows etc. on any of the sheets. See this thread HERE. 

• One tip  would be to try and disable 'ambient shadows' to see if that doesn't improve the clarity. (see below)

• This is a Revit issue, so posting to the Revit Forum will also help alert their team that this is becoming a higher priority fix that is needed. (i'll also check in with the team to see if there are plans for improvements scheduled)

• Also, is there a chance that you can share the file with us for testing via (public downloadable link?) send via private message if so.

[ErikFrandsen]

Thanks Brett for the info. I read those other threads and looks like this has been an issue for a while.  From Revit I can get crisp rasterized elevations because I can control the resolution output. When it gets uploaded and automatically translated on BIM 360 it prints/rasterizes any sheets with shading, color, shadows at a somewhat low resolution.  If there was a way to "turn-up" how the translation process determines resolution of rasterized Revit views that would fix it.  I will post something in the Revit forums as well.  I hope in the future Revit will somehow get away from rasterizing and be all vector but get the nice shading/shadows. 

[BrettWright]

Hi Erik,

Thanks for the feedback, i'll be sure to relay it to the team. As well, see the below and let me know if either provide any improvement in the end output.

• Just to be sure you have it, HERE is the link that details how Raster/Vector printing is handled within Revit. (you're likely already aware of this :), but lets be sure)
• As you stated earlier, by default, the Revit extractor outputs to high detail quality in raster for Sheets. Can you try exporting the views to DWFx and see if it's better?
• Also, Try to see if unchecking the ambient shadow box within Revit helps with the end result after reloaded into your BIM 360 Team hub.

let me know,

[ErikFrandsen]

Thanks Brett for the feedback.  I tried exporting a .dwfx of the Revit 2017 model and got the same results of blurry elevations when shadows/color/shading are turned on.  I even downloaded the old design review 2013 and opened the .dwfx that way.  Still super blurred like AD 360.  I don't have the option in Revit to control the resolution of the rasterization output for .dwfx files like I can for PDFs.  I can make PDFs super clear.  The same is true for when I upload a Revit 2017 model to AD 360 - I have no way to tell the process to rasterize any views at a high resolution.  It may just be a limitation right now that can be adjusted in the future.  I know I'm not the only one that likes to show shadows/color/shading in our construction documents.  We are seeing more and more where coloring plans/elevations and shading/shadowing 3D views/elevations conveys information in a much clearer way than black and white.

The goal of what I am trying to do is have clear colored plans/elevations/3D views with shading/shadows/ambient shadows turned on in AD360.  Turning them all (all of them not just 1) off works, but then we lose the advantages that we get from using those enhancements.  For now we may just have to use PDFs for our drawing sets, but it would be great to use the Revit model in AD360 for our sheets like it was meant to be used.

[BrettWright]

hi Erik,

Thank you for the feedback,

I'll share this back to the team, and in the meantime, can you also please post this into the Ideas Board linked HERE so that others can also add their commentary and vote it up in ranking?

Also, if there is any way that you can share the file(s) with us for testing that would be great. (via public downloadable link would be best) send as private message to me here in the forums.