Zoom to awesome is a newly released add-in for Revit by Phil Read (author of Mastering Revit series). It is very simple to use and a useful tool to have - it's a wonder it's not already part of the software as default! Once downloaded and installed:

1. In a zoomed out plan or 3D view select a 'far away' object you want to zoom in on.

I have just downloaded and tested the Excitech Revit Toolkit. The toolkit features 2 'main' add-ins for Revit. The first is a coordinate scheduling tool which is very useful for any project where you have a coordinates system and need precise locations of objects or elements - You add the category of elements through the add-ins tab and coordinate parameters are added to the instance properties of the selected elements. You can then view and export your coordinates schedule directly from Revit.

Paul Aubin has recently released a video showing his progress with his Corinthian columns that he is trying to model as a fully parametric Revit family. The video to the right shows the process of him modeling the decorative leaves on the column, and the methods he has used modeling to achieve such an abstract form.

Just a quick post to alert any of my readers to another great Revit tutorial video from Zach Kron who runs the buildz blog - This time he is taking on Repeat and intersect commands as well as some advanced adaptive components. If you want to see more great videos from Zach you can find his YouTube channel here. Many thanks for sharing this information!

I found a great quote whilst reading through Mastering Revit Architecture 2013 - A counter argument to anyone who is complaining about the modeling capabilities of Revit. This particular quote is related to modeling complex stair structures in Revit:

"You can use generic modeling application such as SketchUp, Bonzai, Maya, Rhino, or Autodesk 3ds Max software to model your stair and railing designs. Of course, stair and railing creation will require greater fluency compared with modeling other, more rectilinear objects. But there's a drawback. Even though you'll eventually come to understand the rules for creating and manipulating geometry in a generic modeling application, what still reains difficult is the design idea and the managing design iteration. Although many of the generic applications on the market give you the tools to design complex forms, they seldom give you the rules to manage the iteration of your design."

Vico Office is a different way of working with Building information models. Used for much more than visualization, Vico Office extends the basic 3D model with constructability analysis and coordination, 4D location-based scheduling and production control with flowline principles, and 5D estimating.

Throughout the world, Revit users and Revit professionals are coming together in groups to discuss and share their knowledge with others. These meetings are known as 'Revit User Groups.' The meetings are intended for anyone who wants to learn more about advanced skills and functions in Revit. No entrance fee is required as these are simply a way for professionals to openly share tips with each other.

This tutorial, made by Julien Benoit, is one of the BEST Revit tutorials I have seen online. This 80 minute video really helped me to understand the basics of adaptive components and divided surfaces in Revit. Julien first posted this video earlier this year in February on the RevitForum for other readers to gain a good understanding. 

This is a tool for all of you out there who don't have a subscription to Revit (cloud rendering capabilities) and spend a lot of time rendering your model. When I was in University cloud rendering was not a part of the Autodesk subscription, so therefore when our project deadline was approaching as our models were nearing completion, we needed to print out some visualisations of our work. This would maybe mean 10-12 renders - Depending on the speed of your computer this can take up to a couple of hours per render. My solution for this at school was turning on 10 computers and setting them all to render 1 view each, not ideal, and in most cases not possible.

Just a short post to share a Revit tip I have just discovered. If you want to re-arrange your tabs, or move a tab to another location on your ribbon, for whatever reason, it is possible to do this by holding down the 'CTRL' key whilst clicking and dragging one of the tabs to another location. I'm not sure when this would come in handy for the average user but I find it quite useful when screenshotting certain areas of the ribbon for the blog.. 

Dimond Architects have released this short video on their Facebook page, shared yesterday by Luke Johnson on Twitter. I just wanted to share it on my blog as I thought it was a great example of transforming a fantastic sketch into an even more fantastic looking Revit model.

I was alerted to an excellent post on the Revit Forum from 2010, with an extensive list of formulas which can be used within Revit "for every day usage". All credit goes to Klaus Munkholm, creator of the Revit Forum.