What types of building information are best portrayed in 3D views?
- Which stakeholders require 2D views, and why?
The types of building information that are best potrayed through 3D views is the architectural details, materials for flooring, walls, furniture, and for providing a sense of scale and shape to renderings. It is very difficult to fully understand what a building will feel like from a 2D rendering. The stakeholders that require 2D views are the structural engineers and contractors; it is less about how beautiful the building will be and more about how the pieces fit together which is carried about in the 2D sheets of details provided towards the end of a drawing set. As a structural engineer, the 3D views help for visualization purposes but are not as applicable when it comes to construction. It is more important for a contractor and structural engineer to see, for example, how a beam column framing connection is constructed, how many bolts this connection takes, etc.
Give examples of how the building information for a specific location in the project needs to be filtered for different audiences and purposes?
Some examples of how the building information for a specific location in a project needs to be filtered for various purposes are as follows:
- Lighting: By organizing the types of lighting, whether it be overhead, wall lighting, or basic lamps scattered throughout the space - the lighting engineer can get a better sense of how to appropriately light up the space and work with natural light to help offset the artificial lighting
- Walls: If the wall types are all organized by level, depth, and type, the structural engineer has a better sense of where columns and beams can be placed such that they do not intersect the interior, architectural walls.
- Windows: In a similar sense as above, by knowing the geometric properties of windows, such as height, width, and glazing area - the structural engineer knows exactly how big the openings should be and that a structural wall or brace cannot be placed where the opening is.
In short, by organizing/filtering various aspects of the project, there is better overall coordination for the project on all fronts. It opens a line of communication, for example, from the lighting engineer to the architect to the structural engineer to the contractor.
Should your design ideas always be conveyed through photorealistic renders?
- How does the level of detail in the rendering and its presentation affect the perception of stakeholders reviewing your design?
From an architectural perspective, I do believe that sharing design ideas through photorealistic renders is very helpful to convey the story of the building to the client. The level of detail and its presentation is the first real impression of the building from the architect to the client. If a client can fully envision, or maybe even engulf themselves in the space through VR, they have a better idea of what they like and more importantly what they dont like about the space. The more realistic the renders are, the more decisions the client can make about what the do’s and don’t’s of the space are.