Best Option to export my revit model into VR

[novesvalentin]

I'm looking for a VR tool to show a Revit model to my client, but as it turns out there are many option available in the market.

I know it is hard to say which is the best option of a software, but in your experience which are the best options to choose when dealing with a Revit model in Virtual reality?

[JJWGallagher]

Your best option for real time VR would be Unreal Engine 4. 

If you're looking for a quick way to go from Revit to VR, this article highlights a few popular programs: http://www.aecmag.com/technology-mainmenu-35/1255-review-from-revit-to-vr. These programs tend to give less than desirable results visually, and often cost quite a lot of money. 

[Sahay_R]

Have you looked at Revit Live? I have heard that VR is a part of what it does.

[Anonymous]

Take a look at Enscape3D.com if you are thinking of Revit to Oculus or Vive

[loboarch]

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@rsahayUZMK9 wrote:

Have you looked at Revit Live? I have heard that VR is a part of what it does.

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Revit LIVE is an add in to Revit that makes it pretty easy to get to VR. It is literally only a handful of clicks, 2 really meaningful ones. One to send the model to the VR service and the other to choose a device you are going to use to display the VR.  Super easy. I have not used any others so can not say how hard or easy they are but it can't be much more simple than Revit LIVE if that is the kind of solution you are looking for.

[novesvalentin]

jjwgallagher,

Thanks for that article. We have been trying Autodesk Live, I know the graphics and interface are not match with Unreal but it is really easy to use and that is a must for us because we need to send the model to the client and he has to go through the model on his own.

Will keep digging into the other options to get the pros and cons.

Valentin Noves

BIM Manager
www.valentinnoves.com

[Anonymous]

I know this is a belated post but I have kind of/ sort of dived into this a bit.  One thing I am going to add  regarding Unreal is that it can be very time consuming.  Models can require to be optimized or rebuilt to make the files smaller.  Think gaming 3D development.  Also, in order to avoid overlapping maps and thus, flickering animation, one needs to probably unwrap and uv all of the objects.  This all can be time consuming and frankly, tedious.  This whole 3D thing is getting quite annoying since it is almost getting to a point where you need to have this vast library of 3D objects set up for still renders and then another set of models set up for low poly uses.  For the typical architect or architectural firm, this is too cumbersome and costly at the moment.  

My next investigation is to look into 3dsmax interactive.  Before I do that, I am going to check out this Revit live and get a feel for the results for me to set a baseline of sorts on the quality of the interactive experience.  Ultimately, and I would expect this is where things are going, you need Revit to be able to go into VR in a seamless way and produce pretty realistic results without requiring a super computer.  Of course we are not there yet but this is where things need to go.  Learning another program like Unreal and then spending craploads of time to get to where you want to be only to find out there are revisions from the client is not a good long term solution.

[Sahay_R]

Also - try Fuzor - it works within Revit.

[loboarch]

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@Anonymous wrote:

I know this is a belated post but I have kind of/ sort of dived into this a bit.  One thing I am going to add  regarding Unreal is that it can be very time consuming.  Models can require to be optimized or rebuilt to make the files smaller.  Think gaming 3D development.  Also, in order to avoid overlapping maps and thus, flickering animation, one needs to probably unwrap and uv all of the objects.  This all can be time consuming and frankly, tedious.  This whole 3D thing is getting quite annoying since it is almost getting to a point where you need to have this vast library of 3D objects set up for still renders and then another set of models set up for low poly uses.  For the typical architect or architectural firm, this is too cumbersome and costly at the moment.  

My next investigation is to look into 3dsmax interactive.  Before I do that, I am going to check out this Revit live and get a feel for the results for me to set a baseline of sorts on the quality of the interactive experience.  Ultimately, and I would expect this is where things are going, you need Revit to be able to go into VR in a seamless way and produce pretty realistic results without requiring a super computer.  Of course we are not there yet but this is where things need to go.  Learning another program like Unreal and then spending craploads of time to get to where you want to be only to find out there are revisions from the client is not a good long term solution.

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The time and knowledge required is a pretty big hurdle for many doing VR. This is exactly the reason Revit LIVE was created. It is essentially a "1-button" solution. You don't get massive amounts of control over things, but you are able to press one button and in a short time get something back you can use for VR and that something is serviceable for most use cases. I was asked to do a VR thing and had NEVER done anything in that area. I used Revit LIVE and it was all done in about 1hr start to finish.

[Anonymous]

Thank you for the suggestion.  This looks pretty promising with some of the features.  Are you currently using this and if so, do you mind saying what some of the pros and cons are in real use?  Pretty expensive add-on so I would be curious to know more.

[Anonymous]

Since I am now changing from maintenance to subscription, I will definitely be checking out revit live.  I am also really curious about 3ds max interactive since I tend to take revit into 3ds max but when you start linking models between 3 different applications, I get nervous.

[loboarch]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Since I am now changing from maintenance to subscription, I will definitely be checking out revit live.  I am also really curious about 3ds max interactive since I tend to take revit into 3ds max but when you start linking models between 3 different applications, I get nervous.

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Revit LIVE is a stripped down version of Autodesk Stingray.  Stingray is the back end running 3dsMax Interactive.  So it SHOULD be seemless to get from LIVE to 3dsMax Interactive.  When it was just Autodesk Stingray there was no problem getting a LIVE model into Stingray for additional controls over the VR experience.

[Sahay_R]

Whoa - you're right, it is expensive. We haven't used it, but I did learn about it at AU2017. Take a look at the course handout that I've attached.

[Viveka_CD · Accepted solution]

Hi @Anonymous

Here is a thread on 3ds max interactive and stingray

Check out these videos below:

• Interactive Visualization with 3ds Max and Stingray
• The Stingray engine extends the Revit to 3ds Max workflow for interactive BIM models.
• AEC Collection Workflow: Revit Live
• Revit 3ds Max Interactive Vr workflow (how you can have a live link from Revit to 3ds max interactive with the AEC collections)

If you find posts have solved your problem, please click on 'Accept as solution' to help others with similar questions. Kudos welcome.

Thank you,

[Anonymous]

Thanks viveka, I have another thread I started a week or so ago on the stingray forum.  I am looking forward to trying this out since my foray into unreal was shortlived after realizing the effort needed.

[Anonymous]

Rina, thanks for the help.  I’ll check out you paper.  I am also seeing a good bit about enscape.  The price point is not nearly as much but the capabilities of fuzuto are pretty intriguing.

[Anonymous]

Thanks iboarch.  I’ll let you know how things go.  I need to now upgrade everything to 2018 since I usually do not adopt latest release for almost a year to make sure things are stable and bugs minimized.  I’ve been using 3dsmax 2015 since it was a solid release and 2016 and 2017 were not.  That is my concern with working with 3dsmax interactive is I always need to be current to use the latest release of interactive.  The problem with auto desk owning all of this is the releases may not align with each new release being a quality release.  There have been some really bad 3dsmax releases amongst the better ones.

[Viveka_CD]

Thank you @Anonymous feel free to add the link to that thread to this discussion as well to benefit other users.

Let us know how it goes.

Regards,