Learning revit or archicad for rhino-grasshopper, which best ? advantages and disadvantages ?
I need to help, please.
1 Like
I wouldn’t care about rhino/gh if you have to decide between archicad and revit.
As any CAD program, they are always somehow the same. If you learned one, it doens’t take much time to switch.
Personal experience:
I feel like Archicad is used a lot in small project/offices. Friendly interface, simple mechanics. But as soon as it comes to BIM and handling bigger projects, I don‘t know anybody who‘s working with it.
From my side I definitely would recommend revit.
Keep in mind, if you have to work on group projects it‘s much simpler if all of you use the same program. If your partners all work with archicad it‘s good to know it also.
Once I started to work I‘ve never seen Archicad anymore. Offices like Forster, Zaha, BIG, DSR, Populous always sent us revit models.
I mainly worked on revit during university and hadn‘t any problems.
1 Like
We just returned from the Graphisoft Key Client Conference in Budapest. ArchiCAD is certainly a robust BIM platform that is used by firms of all sizes around the world. Just take a cruise on their website and see the massive, complex buildings that are expertly modeled.
Our office of 60+ architects, engineers, planners and interior designers collaborate on projects in a shared database across multiple office locations. Our typical project size varies from a low-rise, garden-style apartment complex to high-rise mixed-use towers and everything in between. I have been using ArchiCAD for the past sixteen years. I would not consider another BIM platform. Feel free to contact me with any questions.
There is also the Grasshopper-ArchiCAD live connection tool. Check out the great blog post by the folks at enzyme. http://www.weareenzyme.com/rhino-connection-to-bim/
2 Likes
I would like to add that BIG has regularily used Archicad as well…
It is not uncommon that the use of software can depend on in which country the project takes place, as well as the firm/company you cooperate with.
(E.g. Norway has been know for mainly using Archicad, but seems like they are slowly adjusting to Revit these days… This might be a result of the increasing number of Danish firms that now have offices throughout Norway.)
Other than that, I totally agree with Tim.
Personally I would go for Revit, if you’re working within Scandinavia or western Europe, since the trend seems to move in its favor, here.
1 Like
It depends on what you are trying to produce.
In my office we use Revit, Catia, Autocad and Rhino/Gh for projects. The typical end goal being fabrication and installation on fairly large projects.
Revit is great for managing a sheet set, generating submittal drawings and maintaining/coordinating 2D details. Not so great on curved surfaces, precision modeling, fabrication unfolds etc.
Catia can do the curved surfaces, precision modeling, fabrication unfolds but is a complex software with limited Sheet Set capabilities.
Autocad is a great intermediary and at fab layouts ect, lacking in enough in the other areas to make it… meh
Rhino/Grasshopper can do anything you want it to, basically. Personally i will never go back to Revit, Catia.
The process developed by Front (Elefront plugin) gives a pathway to a complete Data Driven Model; drawings, details and all. The possibilities are truly endless.
3 Likes
Thank you very much.
much obliged to you, Do you recommend Online Course from A to Z ?
Thank you so much.
Many thanks.
Indeed, though we have recently gone in a predominantly Revit direction for future BIM projects.
Personally speaking, I think I like ArchiCad more (as a software) and the Grasshopper–ARCHICAD
Live Connection is pretty cool. That said, the black-boxed nature and the fact that scripting on the ArchiCad side is C++ is really a bummer in terms of developing computational methods and pipelines. Here Rhino and Revit are more similar (i.e. both being .NET environments with built-in visual programming and scripting interfaces in IronPython and C#) and thus lends themselves to a consistent development experience IMO.
5 Likes
Thank you so much.
What were the reasons apart from the cumbersome API?
Maybe things are going to change in the future:
1 Like
Definetly Archicad.
has better integration with grasshooper.
1 Like
Revit has built-in parametrics and features it’s own Grasshopper-style editor (dynamo). For obvious reasons there is no real need for Grasshopper interaction.
ArchiCAD has matured a lot but at the very core it’s still a 2.5D line drawing system. It has several layers of 3D and BIM pasted on.
Revit is BIM and 3D solids at the core. It also features a relatively good 2D documentation system.
It really depends on what your workflow and intended output is.
Archicad has been around since 1983 and has been 3D and BIM since before BIM was a term used by the masses. Prior to BIM the term for parametric modeling for building systems and architecture was referred to as VDC (Virtual Design and Construction). Archicad can handle larger and more complex models more easily. Leverages hyper threading. Also has the proprietary Delta Server (Teamwork 2.0), thus it has the ability to work with very low bandwith on very complex models in remote locations without great connectivity to the server. Archicad also has layers which Revit does not. The complexity that you speak of is based on the scripting language that builds the parametric objects. This is more complex but also more robust that what Revit provides.
1 Like
Archicad can handle far larger and more complex projects hands down.
I used both Revit and Archicad as a student. So my experience is much very limited to the tasks and concepts I tried to tackle back then. Project size and teamwork obviously never was an issue so I can’t judge on that. But for design flexibility I quickly abandoned Archicad.
Archicad is from way back and the whole concept of drawing and object creation is based on plans and elevations. I don’t know when Archicad introduced 3D views, but that’s not Architecture in 3D. They introduced a 3D editing plane in 2011. The first object type that was not restricted to an extrusion along at least one straight line (shell) was introduced at the same time.
I never found the lack of ACAD-Style layers in Revit a problem. Layers are a way to organize drawing appearance and object grouping. Revit has several ways to do that that are way more relatable to the actual thing you plan to build than any layer tree I have seen up to now. It was actually more confusing that Archicad had both layers in the ACAD way and object groupings like levels.
Adding my 2 cents,
@HaLo, I have been using ArchiCAD for more than 20 years right now, and your comment
if it shows anything, well you never passed the beginer level .
I used to make some work for a company in Mexico that used ArchiCAD as a GDL scripter, and one of their requirments was to take into considerations the fact that the company always had many files open at the same time by numerous users (by hundreds) each woorking from different location, with different infrastructure and capability in team work, and their files for one project was like 7-8 GigaByte as minimum.
@arch.nourali
This question will never give you the right answer, since that until now you haven’t told us what do you inted to do in Grasshopper before exporting it to ArchiCAD/Revit ?
I can say that I stand up in front of the same choice. I am testing the Grasshopper-ArchiCAD connection right now and I found some quite shocking things.
Until the latest November update of the Grasshopper connection, ArchiCAD components ignored how data is being structured inside grasshopper - it always outputted flattened list. I had to make an extra step with the use of Human plugin to reassign paths. Another thing was that Walls, Objects, Windows etc. had no geometry output in their nodes – again, fixed in the latest update. Also, the connectivity and manipulation of objects from the ArchiCAD side are better now. I am very happy that it’s fixed but also worried that it took so long – grasshopper connection came out in 2015.
This kind of connection can only work when it’s perfectly done. People will be afraid to change their workflows if there will be such obvious limitations.
I am from Poland and ArchiCAD is quite popular here, especially in the smaller studios but I think that Revit market share is growing. A number of Dynamo users are growing too.
I would love to use Rhino and Grasshopper at its full potential and for that ArchiCAD needs to make extra effort to provide tools that let people parametrize EVERYTHING and cut labor expensive processes. At the same time I want to design and not only be an expert in filling holes of underdeveloped plugins.
Rhino is not popular in Poland. I love Rhino and I am taking a huge risk as I try to specialize in it. Good for the both of companies would be if Rhino + ArchiCAD had superb quality of connection because it’s the only chance when I can go to some firm using ArchiCAD and convince people to invest in Rhino and change the workflow.
2 Likes