Learning Revit

Learning Revit

Postby fpr4 » Mon Jun 19, 2017 5:40 pm

For many reasons I would like to learn how to use Revit and it's just not going to happen at my current firm. Has anyone taught themselves thru a book/videos or an online/in person class?
fpr4
 
Posts: 372
Joined: Thu Jan 09, 2014 4:31 pm

Re: Learning Revit

Postby corbismyhomeboy » Mon Jun 19, 2017 6:27 pm

My firm sent me to a class run by ImaginIt - one of the AutoDesk certified companies. Also Microdesk has a class. These will be kind of pricy and you would probably have to take time off from work. My class covered enough to get me familiar with the basics but it was by no means enough to actually work on an intense professional collaborative project.
Less formal ways, Black Spectacles has a course that's $30 per month, and you go at your own pace. There is also a similar thing on Lynda. I have used the Lynda classes just to learn some extra skills.
I'm sure there are books out there, but I personally prefer to watch a video one on screen and emulate the procedure at the same time. I would say take a project you did in school (or a simplified version of one) and try to replicate using Revit.
corbismyhomeboy
 
Posts: 299
Joined: Thu Mar 24, 2016 10:31 am

Re: Learning Revit

Postby ekelsey15 » Wed Jun 21, 2017 8:05 am

I pretty much head up the BIM stuff at my office and I am probably the most knowledgeable person about Revit at my firm. We transitioned from PowerCadd and still use it to some extent but most new projects are done in Revit. It is pretty hard to teach yourself how to use it correctly. There are many things revit wants done a certain way and works best when done that way. That being said there are plenty of ways around things and to trick revit into doing what you need it to.

I wouldn't spend money on anything unless you have to or it's someone else's money. Youtube has a lot of content and Lynda.com is really good also. But they best way to learn it is to use it and ask it for help when you're lost. It will tell you what and how to do typically.
ekelsey15
 
Posts: 145
Joined: Tue Apr 29, 2014 8:23 am

Re: Learning Revit

Postby buckie06 » Wed Jun 21, 2017 8:08 am

my local public library has free access to Lynda.com, which has tons of revit videos. Check with your library district so you don't have to pay for it.
buckie06
 
Posts: 447
Joined: Sat Jul 12, 2014 10:18 am

Re: Learning Revit

Postby arearcher » Wed Jun 21, 2017 1:09 pm

I knew Revit basics in school for comprehensive studio. When I started at my first firm I became the BIM manager because I was under 30. Here's what helped me.

Basic working proficiency:
Mastering Revit Architecture by Phil Read.
Lynda.com videos (used mainly for family creation)

Stuff not covered in basics:
Revitforum and Autodesk University (free) courses for more advanced stuff
arearcher
 
Posts: 83
Joined: Tue Feb 10, 2015 6:06 pm

Re: Learning Revit

Postby rwwon » Sat Jun 24, 2017 8:09 am

I too have headed up the transition to Revit in our firm. Since I started the transition essentially by myself, I used what little I learned in school and started by replicating a set of plans we had at our office, then I forced myself to do the next one man project in Revit. This forced me to learn the tools out of necessity and on an as need basis. Full course tutorials are Good, but I found myself learning the program faster simply by trying to do a project and googling things along the way. I'm not an expert family creator, but I know how to put a set of construction documents together. Now we have 4 people full time in Revit, 4-5 projects in Revit, so 4 good teachers and a handful of projects to look at and learn from. Get a hold of a firm's model who will let you and just study the thing, especially how they put everything together.
User avatar
rwwon
 
Posts: 184
Joined: Sat Dec 05, 2015 11:26 pm

Re: Learning Revit

Postby nickedemus » Mon Jun 26, 2017 6:38 am

I learned Revit as the sole employee in a tiny firm. I learned by trial and error. Even though I paid $80 for a reference book, my main resources were websites like AUGI, Revit Forum, Revit City, etc. We mainly did residential renovations, so I measured and modeled buildings from the ground up, at a high level of detail. I probably did 20 of these in a 2-year period, taking many through bid documents into CDs. I modeled cape cods, split levels, old Victorian homes, custom mansions, colonials, even office buildings and a couple synagogs. Just me. It gave me a lot of respect for the program. It demands a different level of honesty and accuracy than 2D drawing, and therefore in the short run it can be slow and cumbersome. But in the long run, it is so frickin useful if you do it right. It's basically a big data bank of everything you need. And the family editor.... oh MAN so much fun.

I found this online shortly after I started that job. It turned out to be a pretty accurate assessment of the learning process:

The Six Stages of Revit - from newbie to nirvana...

Stage One - Initial Excitement!!!
"Holy Crap! Look what I can do with this thing!"

Stage Two - First bump
"Hmmmm...? Why won't it do what I want? That's not how I do it in (insert other
cad software here)!"

Stage Three - Creamy Middle
"mmm... things are going more smoothly, now......mmmmm"

Stage Four - WTF stage
The family editor "eats you up and spits you out"!

Stage Five - The Enlightenment
Things really begin to click! You understand why things are happening in your
model, and better yet how to control them and avoid problems. You have
conquered the family editor.

Stage Six - Zen of Revit
You have mastered nearly all things revit. You "know" what Revit "likes", and
what it "dislikes" during model construction, a sixth sense, really. You spend your
time exploring and tweaking advanced scheduling, OBDC, external parameters,
AR3. You have a template to beat all templates, families for every situation.

https://www.revitforum.org/tutorials-ti ... revit.html
nickedemus
 
Posts: 192
Joined: Wed Nov 19, 2014 4:43 am

Re: Learning Revit

Postby fpr4 » Mon Jun 26, 2017 1:29 pm

Are there any licenses available for home instructional use, or am I going to have to buy a full license or stay after work to use ours?
fpr4
 
Posts: 372
Joined: Thu Jan 09, 2014 4:31 pm

Re: Learning Revit

Postby corbismyhomeboy » Mon Jun 26, 2017 2:35 pm

If you have a student email address (.edu ending) I think you can download a student version that works for a year or two. Otherwise, I'd download the trial for a month or work on the work license.
corbismyhomeboy
 
Posts: 299
Joined: Thu Mar 24, 2016 10:31 am

Re: Learning Revit

Postby vrcat25 » Fri Jun 30, 2017 3:02 pm

It's hard learning revit outside of an office setting since revit relies on templates, title blocks, etc. I'm not saying it can't be done, it's just kind of impractical. I'd start out with designing a small project on your own free time and maybe take a course online or even at a local school in your area. As with anything, there's nothing better than real world office experience in learning a program like revit.
vrcat25
 
Posts: 1017
Joined: Sun Dec 27, 2015 11:19 am

Re: Learning Revit

Postby iDefy » Sun Jul 16, 2017 11:55 pm

fpr4 wrote:Are there any licenses available for home instructional use, or am I going to have to buy a full license or stay after work to use ours?

Staying after work to use office Revit would be your best choice. I have taught it to myself like that. I also subscribed to Black Spectacle software learning because they were giving a huge discount around cyber Monday last year. For me it was better to have this subscription since I wanted to learn sketchup and 3Ds Max as well. You don't have to subscribe, but it helps. There is a lot of help available online for free.
User avatar
iDefy
 
Posts: 209
Joined: Wed Sep 05, 2012 9:45 am

Re: Learning Revit

Postby Kiedys.Zdam. » Wed Aug 09, 2017 8:29 pm

I find this interesting how us, THE Architects, are being exposed to the same challenges!
I was interested in Revit since its crawling beginning when it was a really dull tool comparing to known by me Nemetschek or very well known Archicad, especially since I realized that none of these were used on this side of the pond.
However, when I tried to initiate using it in many old office it was a no no as nobody was interested, especially when we needed to coordinate stuff with other disciplines.
Here I come to my new office, the project I got for leading is in Revit and everybody uses Revit. Some of young staff know Revit and don't know CAD :roll:
With 100k+ SF building and 7 other disciplines' models linked in, I had to learn it fast. I am by no means an expert using it within few months. It took some time to understand what in the model belongs to whom, or how to upload others models or change their visibility settings and all that hierarchy. But I am now comfotably controlling what is going on out there. I still support myself with CAD for sketching, as Revit is a horrible tool to sketch things out.
The things which really helped was knowledge of other BIM/3D software, helpful people around me, time constrains, and a pleasure in doing such things. I only regret I cannot fully focus to develop my skills due to family commitments.

Bottom line:
1. I am not sure how to access Revit to excersice. I got my access with my company laptop.
1a. Real life experience is probably one of best ways to learn it. General understanding of BIM or knowledge of Other similar software is a plus.
2. Knowledge and precision of CAD will NOT help you. I would say that knowledge and precision are damaging when you see how everyone is so sloppy with putting stuff in Revit.
3. I find a general management of the work in office while working in Revit being much different. All things are generated from model, so you cannot tell someone to e.g. generate a room schedule if the model is not brought to that level of advancement.
4. Things in the model can go wrong pretty fast, some of it may be irreversible, which will automatically mess your drawings unless you make it right. Lots of control needed.
5. Your model will never be perfect! You need to have a project done so they can build the building, not a model.

Good luck.
Kiedys.Zdam.
 
Posts: 328
Joined: Mon Jun 15, 2015 9:58 am

Re: Learning Revit

Postby nickedemus » Thu Aug 10, 2017 5:07 am

Kiedys.Zdam. wrote:I would say that knowledge and precision are damaging when you see how everyone is so sloppy with putting stuff in Revit.


I agree with a lot of your points. But I don't think that knowledge and precision are damaging IN GENERAL, where Revit is concerned. It's perhaps more a function of the people you are working with, their lack of knowledge and/or precision, and a lack of uniform oversight and rigor. While no model (and no drawing) can ever be perfect (except by bizarre chance), Revit can indeed be brought to a very high level of precision, and 2D assumptions can actually be informed/corrected by its 3D rigor. I've found Revit to be quite demanding in terms of precision. However, many errors and conflicts can be ignored, so a team can go quite far without addressing them and of course problems can snowball that way. It's better to address the errors and conflicts as they arise. It doesn't take long once you learn how to do it.
nickedemus
 
Posts: 192
Joined: Wed Nov 19, 2014 4:43 am

Re: Learning Revit

Postby vrcat25 » Thu Aug 10, 2017 10:06 am

Kiedys.Zdam. wrote:1a. Real life experience is probably one of best ways to learn it. General understanding of BIM or knowledge of Other similar software is a plus.

Good luck.


I don't know how one would be able to proficiently "learn" revit without actually using it in an office setting since it involves other professional service (mechanical, electrical, plumbing, structural, etc.) We are a small firm and still use Autocad, but i have "dabbled" with Revit, but I don't think I could ever proficiently learn Revit without using it in a real life situation since it relies on the coordination of a model between the design, engineering and construction fields. I'm sure a class or studying Revit on your own time would help, but i think that Kiedy's is exactly right and there is no better way to learn than to use it in an office setting and maybe start with a small project. I'd begin by trying to match your office standards, nomenclatures, fonts, title blocks and start from there. I realize this may not be an ideal way to learn since many A/E firms and contractors don't have access. I've also found that one of the first steps is to find a good template to start from.
vrcat25
 
Posts: 1017
Joined: Sun Dec 27, 2015 11:19 am


Return to GENERAL DISCUSSION

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: acaftajodaw, aquwiriaekaz, awodhaufmisa, ebexceva, ilatexaqai, Marinabuo, oyoeyizoji, umizuwipiali and 49 guests

cron