Sketchup to FormIt 360 Pro to Revit is so slow.

[skolpack]

Hi,  I am wondering how complex or lack there of Sketchup has to be for the model to be successfully converted into FormIt 360 and then into Revit within a reasonable amount of time.  When I import a FormIt model into Revit, it takes an obscene amount of time and is converting/upgrading from Revit 2009 to 2017.  Is this normal?  Or is there another reason why my FormIt imports to Revit are taking forever?  Any help is appreciated in understanding this matter.

Thanks!

[Tobias_Hathorn]

Hi there - I am happy to help debug this with you - I'll DM you to see if you can share your file. In the past we've discovered a bug with mirrored groups causing a massive slowdown - so it is very helpful when customers write in for help - we find great bugs.

The troubleshooting technique I use (for both SKP -> to FormIt, and FormIt -> RVT) is to work in chunks instead of sending the WHOLE file at once.

For SKP to FormIt

- Select relevant data in your main SKP (like a layer at a time) 

- Copy and Paste in Place into a new SKP file

- Open or Import the new SKP file to FormIt for Windows

- Save the FormIt file after the Import works successfully

- Go back to the original SKP file and choose another layer - repeat the previous steps

For FormIt to Revit

- In FormIt select relevant data (like a layer)

- Choose to Export *Selected* to AXM

- Open Revit and start a new file (or open an existing file)

- Use the FormIt converter Add-In to Import the FormIt file to Revit

- Save the Revit file after successful conversion

- Go back to the original FormIt file and select another layer - repeat the previous steps

These techniques are nice for two reasons: The conversion goes MUCH faster, and you're able to diagnose which elements are missing, or slowing the process down in a much more targeted way!

Thanks,

Tobias

[skolpack]

I think that solved it.  The sketchup model I was given was made up of a ton of components and when I broke down the file and imported them, it went much faster.  If I have any further questions, I will be sure to ask. Thanks!

[dmarchant]

Very handy thread if I may I have a question about the materials used in Sketchup they can be seen in FormIt 360 Pro when imported as .skp but when exported as an .AXM file & then imported into Revit using the Formit 360 converter "import 360 to RVT" they don’t carry over as each time I try I have no materials in the Revit file, am I doing something wrong please.

I am looking at this from a workflow point of view i.e. from Sketchup to FormIt 360 Pro & then to Revit is just what I need is there anywhere I can look for an example of how best to achieve this workflow please.

[dmarchant]

Also i have noticed when importing  .AXM into revit one can get into a cycle that there seems no way out of.

2017 Revit warning 

This family instance has too many edges.  Remove unnecessary geometry or split the instance into multiple instances.

(Is this saying I need to ungroup more ?)

But you cannot delete said element as the files hasn't been imported so all you can do is cancel which stop the import.

So how does one deal with this little issue? is there a list of how to clean up a sketchup file in formit for export to Revit?

Also Revit 2017 want to upgrade the formit .axm from 2016 to 2017 !! what going on there?

[dmarchant]

What about the the coordinates if you have multiple buildings in the file & as you say its best to split but how do i keep everything in the correct location? that's relevant to each other ?

[Tobias_Hathorn]

Lots of great questions and comments on the workflow...

- Materials from FormIt do not import to Revit (yet) this will be available when importing to Revit 2018 soon.

- Coordinates of objects in SKP and in FormIt and in Revit should all be the same relative to each other - so breaking things up and working with "chunks of objects" should work very well

- Cleaning up SKP models in FormIt before going to Revit is a bit of an art form 🙂 There are a few diagnostic tools to help you see the bad geometry - DW and DB (display watertight issues and display backfaces) will illustrate the issues in red lines and red faces - then you can delete extra lines and flip faces to be oriented the correct direction. 

- In our next release we will have a few 'automatic' clean up utilities when importing FormIt to Revit, so this should IMPROVE the situation you describe with the errors. Also if you are working in 'chunks' then you should see less of these errors, and be able to isolate the 'bad' elements easier.

I hope this helps! Happy to elaborate if you have additional questions,

Tobias

[dmarchant]

My apologies for the quick fire questions there & thank you Tobias for your excellent reply roll on 2018.

There will be more questions soon

[dmarchant]

Tobias frank question from a workflow position frank answer required 

In an architects office that hasn't yet gone BIM (but we have a couple of projects on trial) most of our early stage works bidding & presentations etc are done in sketch-up which then normally move to autocad lt for planning etc then the projects proceeds to hand over this way.

Is it going to be fair to say that by keeping our presentation corner/job winning images department so to speak in sketch up (they wont use formit/revit just yet) we wouldn't have to drastically change our workflow to much plus we can save on (whole office) revit training by training up just our Autocad technicians & architects users to take over the project from the sketch design (sketch up model) stage & move forwrds going into formit & then to revit.

Do you see any obvious issues with this workflow ...  sketch-up -formit-revit ?  would it be more pratical forgetting formit & just going sketch up -redraw in revit? personally i don't think so but am interested in anothers view of the advantages of using fomit in my hypothetical workflow.

Formit/Revit maybe the way to go in the future once we have mastered said skills but for now i am seeing this as a good way to get BIM into the office workflow.

Regards David

[Tobias_Hathorn]

Happy to have a frank discussion with you, David!

We have positioned FormIt for offices like yours that are 'on-ramping' to Revit - to get teams thinking BIM from day one. I do not see any software issues with SKP -> FormIt -> Revit. In fact FormIt very much wants to be part of that process, this is why we have a high fidelity SKP import, and an (upcoming) higher fidelity import to Revit. 

There are human issues in this process, like following best modeling practices using components / groups / creating solid geometry, not paper models - as well as knowing when to transition a conceptual design model to a Revit model, and how to work back and forth for design iterations. The software does not dictate this, experience and office wide best practices do.

There is nothing inherently wrong in 'rebuilding' a model - this can be a formalizing process. There are risks in leaving out key elements, or losing design intent - and there is the time spent re-doing work. I think a great process will be to IMPORT a FormIt model to RVT, then LINK that into a host RVT. Then use part of the FormIt model for reference only as you rebuild; use part for Wall by Face / Floor by Face; use FormIt as the Family Editor to import custom elements into specific Revit Family Templates (I've done this with Windows, I've seen others do this with Stairs, and Columns). 

One caveat with imported geometry from SketchUp and FormIt - curves, arcs, splines become faceted in Revit. This does require 'remodeling' in Revit as opposed to applying a Wall by Face - or direct import. 

Thanks for the discussion, I hope this is helpful - and please do share the pro's and con's of the process you decide on!

Tobias

[dmarchant · Accepted solution]

Thank you Tobias an excellent post am gratified you think i am not barking up the wrong tree so to speak. I will have to experiment with what turns out to be the best process for our office but your advice is most welcome may i quote you on some of what you said for a little presentation i will be give on this subject?

[Tobias_Hathorn]

David, Feel free to quote away - thanks for starting the conversation! Tobias

[dmarchant]

Thank you Tobias, i have another one 🙂

In post 2 you mention ""In the past we've discovered a bug with mirrored groups causing a massive slowdown"""

Are there any other sketchup how you draw issues that can cause problems for FormIt that we could avoid ? or any that you can mention.

[dmarchant]

& another one if i may as an experiment i have loaded up a middle sized .axm (120 meg original sketch up file was 17 meg) to A360 on the 7th March & there is no sign of a .rvt i thought this service was supposed to be automatic? but if it isn't i'd like to know how one should request an .rvt file being made from an .axm

Regards David

[Tobias_Hathorn]

Hi David, Thanks for your patience in a response - I have been traveling for work and am now getting settled  back in.

1) SketchUp modeling techniques...

You have to build in solid geometry. SketchUp is very permissive when it comes to 'paper modeling' - faces representing walls, stray edges, missing faces, etc... You would do best to model as volumetrically as possible. If you do not work with volumes then you'll most likely have 'watertight issues' that will cause an eventual import to Revit to fail!

Try to use components / groups to have discreet building 'objects' instead of a big mass of faces and edges.

You should experiment with the way sketchup windows 'cut components' come into FormIt. I don't recall off the top of my head - but I believe the 'cut' behavior is lost, so you'd need to actually remove the opening geometry in FormIt

2) A360 generated RVT files...

I would steer you away from the 'automatically generated' RVT that appears in A360. I find the Revit add-in is a MUCH more immediate, and satisfying experience. You can choose your own Revit template file, or whether you want to import FormIt geometry into an already existing RVT project. You can work with smaller FormIt files (as recommended in previous posts) when you import, then watch progress occur, and see right away if geometry fails.

3) Pertinent to both 1 and 2 above - you should get used to using Display Watertight and Display Backfaces (DW and DB keyboard shortcuts in FormIt) as these will reveal the most common geometric fidelity issues that result from SKP imports and Revit conversion failures. 

4) In Revit 2018 you will see vastly improved import behavior. So if you're not seeing FormIt geometry import to Revit today - you will see improvements soon.

Thanks, Hope this post was useful,

Tobias

[dmarchant]

Thank you again Tobias as ever most helpful.

So A360 does automatically generate .rvt ? as the A360 forum seems to think it doesn't so am a little confused. 

[akshay.korlekar]

I am sorry to sound negative, but inspite of doing all cleanup and reducing file size to a meagre 4 MB, revit is still taking ages to convert and in the end, I am simply shutting it down since it was not responding. 😞

Any suggestions please. 

[Tobias_Hathorn]

Hello Akshay! Thanks for using FormIt and going through the trouble to clean up your model - the file size doesn't actually have much to do with the conversion time - mostly it has to do with the complexity of the geometry. 

I was helping another customer with a file coming from SKP to FormIt to Revit... and the process was hanging for me too. I ended up importing 'chunks' of the FormIt model at a time into Revit... and this worked great. I was able to see progress and save the RVT as I went... and then when I saw a severe slowdown - I knew that something in that current chunk of imported geometry was causing problems. I was able to identify a complex furniture stool component (pictured below). Once I took these OUT of the import - things went very quickly and smoothly!

I'm sorry there's not an automatic way to identify which components will cause problems - but wherever you see this kind of extreme faceting (in SKP or FormIt) you're probably looking at something that will slow down the import to Revit.

[jaroslav.pancocha]

Hello, I am getting into the same troubles. I try to import FormIt Primer Project - Farnsworth House I 've made in the tutorial. It is quite a simple model, and Revit 2019 crunches around many minutes and nothing. I have FormIt last version - 17.1, Revit also last version 2019. I didn't try to export each layer separately, as it is nonsense for work. You need to export in one click, in one click load and work. Everything extra is a waste of time. 

So, where could be problem?