Create walkthrough in Revit

With the help of Revit, you can create really nice renderings and animations with surprisingly simple means. Of course, the possibilities are not quite as varied as in 3ds max, but I think the results are quite impressive!

In this short tutorial, I explain how you can quickly create a walkthrough in Revit and then output it as a movie.

To the tutorial: 

Creation of the walkthrough 

- Call up the Walkthrough command in the site plan or floor plan (View > Expand 3D view > Walkthrough)

- Roughly draw the path (each click generates a key frame. At the beginning, only create as many key frames as necessary and distribute them as evenly as possible along the path).

 

The following options are available during path creation:

- Perspective is active by default, as walkthroughs appear rather unnatural in orthogonal display. This option can be deactivated if required.

- The offset from the plane means the 'viewing height' of the walkthrough and is 175 cm by default.

 

Edit / customize the walkthrough

Once the walkthrough has been created, it appears in the project browser as a separate view window. When editing the walkthrough, it is best to open the walkthrough view and a floor plan side by side.

 

Make the path editable in the floor plan:
Right-click on the walkthrough in the project browser > Show camera in view

If a path or frame is selected in the walkthrough view window, the Edit walkthrough option appears in the change bar.

The following options are available during walkthrough editing:

- Properties: The number of frames and possibly a different speed between the key frames can be set here. The total duration of the video is made up of the number of frames and the value frames/second. Revit's default setting is 15 frames/second, in practice 24 frames/second is usually recommended for a smooth video.

- Playback tools to play the walkthrough automatically, from frame to frame or from key frame to key frame. Playback does not take place in real time and depends on the graphics card performance.

 

Control elements for path processing:

- Active camera: allows the camera to be edited in terms of viewing direction and field of view. The active camera shows a viewing axis in the floor plan or section. The camera is realigned by rotating this axis.

- Path: allows you to edit the path. The key frames that have already been created are displayed in the form of points along the path and can be moved as required. If the height of the walkthrough changes (e.g. when climbing stairs), the points in the section can also be moved in height.

- Add / remove key image is used for further editing of the walkthrough. The path can only be extended by adding new key images to the existing path and moving them.

 

Graphic display and exposure

The graphic display options are available via the properties window of the walkthrough.

I used the following options for the animation in this article:

- Shading (with edges) : is a good compromise between schematic representation and 'real' rendering, as the computing times are kept within reasonable limits. In addition, the 'Render' option can be selected when outputting the walkthrough, which overwrites the graphic display options. However, it should be noted that an animation in 'Render' quality usually takes a very long time, as it consists of a large number of individual images that have to be calculated individually.

- Shadows: I always activate the options "Cast shadows" and "Show ambient shadows", as these options provide a very realistic appearance. Ambient shadows (also known as ambient occlusion) particularly benefit corners and detailed scenes.

- With lighting, a great deal can be achieved by turning up the intensity of the sun and the ambient light, as the material colors tend to be very dark, especially with a shaded display.

Exporting the walkthrough

The walkthrough can then be output under Revit > Export > Images and animations. Here you have the option of outputting an .avi file or an image sequence.

Uncompressed .avi files are very large and can hardly be played back smoothly by most computers. In this case, it is advisable to select a compression codec. You will be prompted to do this at the start of the rendering process.

 

Alternatively, it is possible to write out an image sequence (preferably .png) and then compile it into a video in a video editing area. There is also simple video editing software that is already included free of charge in the operating system, e.g. Movie Maker (Windows) or iMovie (Mac).

When rendering videos, it is also very easy to distribute the render job to several computers, as you can select the frame range to be rendered in the options. The sections created in this way can then be edited together using video editing software.

And here is the result - of course the speed and camera movement can still be improved, but the video is primarily intended to demonstrate what is possible with relatively little effort (approx. 1h + rendering).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JssnVRoZ3dk