Kiana Mokrian

Journal Entry For
Module 5 - Flex Your Form
ACC Folder Link
https://acc.autodesk.com/docs/files/projects/8c5c6f0e-77ad-475c-b808-18ff440afe0a?folderUrn=urn%3Aadsk.wipprod%3Afs.folder%3Aco.RdkXx5KzQuy2yRmEv3QT5Q&viewModel=detail&moduleId=folders
Link to Student
Kiana Mokrian

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  • Your Name as the Card title
  • The link to your Module 5 folder in our Autodesk Construction Cloud project

Please also type the first few letters of your first name into the Link to Student field, then hover over your name from the list of matching records and click the blue plus sign to link this entry to your Design Journal.

Then, share your Design Journal entry here including:

  • Screenshots of your building form geometry from each stage of the assignment that you completed:

Stage 1:

  • For 2 or More Units: Creating Forms with Revit Conceptual Masses

    • Part 1

    For this part, I started by using the templates to learn how to flex and change values in Revit. From there, I created the custom node in Dynamo needed to automate the process of changing specific dimensions.

    • Created the following formulas:
        • image
    • The height values were flexed/tested, firstly by hand, and two trials are shown below:
    image
    image
    • From there, a dynamo script was used to test more values for the height and the findings are shown below. The values aligned with the ones found on Revit by hand.
    image

    Part 2

    For this part, I started with the given template but changed the shape using the editing family features to make it more interesting. From there, I followed a similar process to Part 1 to first manually test some values, and then automate them.

    • Created the following formulas:
    image
    • I decided to change/flex the ‘height’ value
    • Firstly by hand to ensure that the logic was working:
    image
    image
    • Then, using the logic/ script showed the following findings. I made sure to find values that stayed in the height and floor area limits.
    image

Point to Ponder: What’s the advantage of exporting the values to Excel?

Exporting the values to Excel allows for more capabilities allowing one to automate the process of exporting the data into a clean visual graph or other functionalities very efficiently, rather than having to do it manually. It can allow for real-time comparisons amongst different cases and values as well, and macros will allow more cohesion between Revit/Dynamo and Excel.

Stage 2:

For 3 or More Units: Creating Forms with Dynamo or Grasshopper Geometry

  • For this part, I started by first building the structure, and then figuring out how to add the flexing properties by turning the actual building of the structure into a custom node. From there, I used both the manual building structure to test some specific values for my two parameters (height and base radius) and then compared them to the values found by flexing an array of values in combination. Two flexing input parameters were building height and radius of base. The angle of rotation and the relationship between the base, mid and top radii and heights were also set using a formula, which was interesting as the values which were all correlated were also based on the height and base radius which were both flexed. Thus, there was a lot of correlation between all the values.
  • Manual Input 1: height: 200 ft radius of base: 50 ft
    • The manual entries were done to ensure that the values found align with the flexed data
    • Surface Area: 48978 SF, Volume 821593 CF
image
  • Manual Input 2: height:400 ft radius of base: 50 ft
    • The manual entries were done to ensure that the values found align with the flexed data
    • Surface Area: 97659 SF, Volume 1643937 CF
image

Point to Ponder: Which of these inputs tested has the biggest effect on creating a desirable building form?

The input that has the biggest effect on creating a desirable building form is the base radius, since it affects the floor area which needs to be within a certain range, and changes the overall surface area and floor surface area of the building more than height does. Comparing to cases, when the height is kept at 200 ft, and base radius is changed from 50 ft to 100 ft, the floor area increases by a factor of approximately 4. However, when the height is changed from 200 ft to 250 ft, and the base radius is kept at 50 ft, the floor area increases by a factor of 1.5. The relationship between the change in floor area and base radius is quadratic rather than linear.

Stage 3:

For 4 Units: Summarizing the Testing Results

For this, I added rectangular geometry which intersected with the building and created floors per the modules. This was then used to find the floor area, similar to mass floors in Revit. I summarized the values extracted from Dynamo in the table below:

image
  • red - minimum, blue - maximum, green - most desirable

Points to Ponder

Which of these pairs of input values gives the most desirable result? Which building form would you recommend to the developer and why?

Highest Floor Area:

  • Height: 450
  • Base Radius: 250
  • Floor Area: 6,323,471.100982
  • Surface Area: 643,433.257275
  • Volume: 61,804,311.700671

Lowest Floor Area:

  • Height: 200
  • Base Radius: 50
  • Floor Area: 87,082.361151
  • Surface Area: 48,978.862679
  • Volume: 821,593.165051

Highest Volume with Floor Area Below 3,000,000:

  • Height: 200
  • Base Radius: 250
  • Floor Area: 2,878,998.319997
  • Surface Area: 298,680.761126
  • Volume: 27,353,171.306985

The pair of inputs with the most desirable values that I would recommend are height of 200 ft and base radius of 250, although this is contrary to the high rise style, since this achieve a lower floor surface area needed while maximizing the volume inside the building. The shorter height also saves in construction costs.

Moving forward, I would try lower base radii and higher height values to align with the high rise style.