Image-O-Matic

Earlier I wrote that Harry started a blog (Boost Your BIM) focused on using the Revit API to enhance your projects and process. He created his first formal application, Image-O-Matic, which is now available on the Autodesk Exchange. When I first saw it I thought about using it to document testing family parameters and types.

He decided to run a contest to encourage Revit users to get acquainted with the app. He offered up a tantalizing video of Marcello Sgambelluri's work to get your creative urge going. Visit his site for all the contest details. Here's an embedded copy of the video he posted.

Revit 2013 - Sunshine

I enjoyed the bit where Scott Davis showed a single day solar study last night during the SCRUG (South Coast Revit User Group) meeting. If we advance a single frame at a time it permits us to capture a view with the sun in the view, like this.

It was funny when Randy jokingly offered a really specific time of day to use and the sun in Scott's view ended up exactly behind the top of the fireplace flue/chimney. It's was a happy accident that I couldn't replicate here.

Tip - Control Visibility of Image via Size Parameters

You can't control the visibility of an image file like you can other elements in a Revit family, such as mapping a parameter to the "Visible" parameter. Daniel Stine mentioned this the other day as another candidate for a blog post and I agree!

If you have an image in your family, say a logo for a title blog, you can turn it on/off by increasing and decreasing its "size".

Selecting the image and mapping a parameter looks like this:

It's only necessary to map one of the "size" parameters to make it "zero" high or wide even though my example has mapped both to parameters. As soon as one parameter is "zero" the image can't appear anymore. So I did double the work that I really needed to, didn't take long though, phew!

Here's a video to demo what we are attempting to explain.

Hey, happy April Fools Day! No special post for today...uninspired and lazy! Plus nobody would believe anything I wrote today anyway. The tip is for real!

Scale an Image

Responding to a post at RevitForum I created this brief video that shows how I used the Scale tool to change the size of a image file in Revit. The image in the video is based on a sketch that Cyril Verley used in his Revit training curriculum books for several years. I believe it is based on a Richard Meier building.

The video describes:

• Select the image
• Click the Scale tool (I keep calling it Resize, the old name)
• Click the Origin (or first "known" point)
• Click the Second Point (second "known" point)
• Provide the correct dimension for between the known points.
• Et Voila!

Image/DWG Import Issue

My friend David Baldacchino recently shared this with me and I can confirm the problem. If you link a dwg file that also contains an image file into your Revit project, Revit will crash when you save the file. You can link it in, but Revit will crash when you save. Ouch! This happens whether you save the dwg file in either 2004 or 2007 format. Tread lightly if you need this combination...good luck! If anyone has encountered this and found a way to defeat this feel free to share in a comment. Be certain to submit the issue to Revit support at Autodesk!