Building Information Modeling - 4

3 Key Concepts of BIM Although BIM has far -reaching implications and can be complex and sophisticat ed in some of the wa ys it is being implemented, most of the impor tant benefits can be t raced back to three fundamental concepts: 1. Database instead of drawings 2. Not a single BIM 3. Tools + Process = Value of BIM Database As I referred to earlier, 2-dimensional drawings are still the typical wa y in whic h desig n infor mation is c onveyed. New iterations of drawings are produced continuously throughout the desig n pr ocess b y eac h of the desig n pr ofessional disciplines and are distributed for interpretation to a wide variety of individuals, some of whom gener ate additional new special-purpose drawings (e.g. shop drawings). This proliferation of design documents oft en creates version control problems among the fragments of the project team and can be traced as a root cause of much of the poor coordination and inefficiency of the overall design and construction process. In contrast, a Building Information Model is not “drawn” by this standar d pr ocess. It is c omposed of intelligent objects that carry their physical and functional characteristics in them as data. So a wall object knows its dimensions and the products and materials of which the designer intends it to be constructed. It is actually small database containing relevant geometric and non-graph- ical information about itself that, when combined with all the other elements from which the BIM is composed, represent all the physical and functional characteristics of the overall project. In this BIM appr oach, the project is a database r ather than a series of lines, arcs and text on multiple drawings and associated documents (e.g. specifications, cut sheets, etc). Once information about the project is entered into a modeling software database, it can be used t o create plans, elevations, sections, details, perspectives, renderings, animations, simulations, lists, analysis and a growing number of other extremely useful functions that pr eviously relied on h uman interaction with d ocuments t o v isually e xtract i nformation i n o rder t o perform these valuable acti vities; an e xample of what was referred to earlier as the traditional “silo” approach. In a database for mat, the physical and functional c haracteristics of a project become “digitally nimble”, able to make themselves available to numerous electronic tools to perform valuable processes. Importantly, they are also closer representations of the truth of a project rather than drawn abstractions created to serve a paper-based distribution process, which require interpretation to extract the nuggets of truth and put them to functional use. Not a Single BIM In theory, it would be most efficient to create one single, central model of a pr oject wher e e veryone w ould cr eate their aspect of the design, perform their necessary analyses and continually update so that all parties had the most current version Enabling applications extract data from design models and provide valuable analysis and simulation. Images: Burt Hill, University Mechanical of Arizona, Ryan Homes, V iew By View, Beck Group, Turner Construction, IES 4 BIM

Building Information Modeling

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Building Information Modeling