BlenderBIM: workflow to bring in IFC assets

Has anyone figured out a way to bring in (import, append, copy/paste, etc) IFC assets into a BlenderBIM file?
Or is that nut still being worked on?

brunopostle

Comments

  • Progress is being made and most of the foundations are now in place. You can now create a project library rather than a project, but note that knowledge of how to handle a project library is still undocumented. A project library is like a Revit file that holds nothing but Revit families (which correspond to IFC types). But it is also more than that - it can hold profile definitions only for structural analysis, or schedules of rates for sequencing and costing, or resource types for resource management, and so on. At the moment, we only support types, but the groundwork is in place to support the rest.

    However, since project libraries are rare, it is also possible to treat any regular IFC project as a library. It's not quite semantically correct, but in this case, practicality overrides semantic correctness, so ah well :) For that, you can load any other IFC project (or library, if you have one) via the new IFC Project Library panel. Right now, we only support browsing type objects, and importing (not linking just yet) into the model. A word of warning that it is assumed that the IFC version matches, as well as the units.

    Once the type is in your project, you can use it like any other type. For types with representations, you can use the "Insert Type Instance" option.

    ... and select the relevant thing to insert ...

    The next big step is to support parametric engines. Once I can reliably create objects and maintain their relationships, I will feel more comfortable in stabilising the asset management system, and we can start shipping proper walls, doors, etc compared to the poor excuse of dumb objects that we currently have :)

    bitacovirbrunopostletheoryshawJanFCyrilMeetlatbasweinJesusbillLaurensJNCoenand 3 others.
  • Awesome!
    Any plans to support copying/pasting from one file to another? You know that's peeps default mode to bring content from one file to another. :)

  • edited May 2021

    Prosaically, is it currently possible to to copy the beam circled in red below, in this metric file, over to a new imperial file, and still retain its representation IFC parameters, such as WebThickness, FlangeThickness, etc. ?

  • @theoryshaw hmm, copy pasting is difficult - since all of the BIM data would be lost in the process, so until I think of a solution for that, no. If we're lucky it stores a reference to the original file location, so potentially it's quite easy, but I haven't investigated yet.

  • edited May 2021

    Currently how do you bring content over from one file to another? Or is that not possible right now, other than types?

  • Not currently possible. I guess I haven't needed to do so yet :( Let me see what I can cook up.

    brunopostletheoryshawcarlopavJohannes990
  • ifc project library
    Are examples available anywhere?
    Documentation / tutorials?

  • Assets from other file..
    The only way I have found so far is

    • getting rid of all ifc relations..
      • save to collada
        *import collada to new file
        *Objects are now 'pure Blender objects'
        *They can now be appended to an existing BB file and classified as appropriate

    This seems to work, but cumbersome. Would like to see an easier workflow, asset browsing, ifc lib?

  • Hi @CadGiru
    there is an asset Ifclibrary, I've attached one.
    You can also make your own, and load it, that is a very efficient way to get in Ifc files

  • @Ace Have not really investigated this, but guess this is a standard ifc file,
    Can we can use building / Storey as a hierachy like transportation/trucks or transportation/lifting

  • It is a standard IFC I think, but you can load it as a library in Blender Bim:

    Here is the location of the latest IFC library:
    https://github.com/IfcOpenShell/IfcOpenShell/tree/v0.6.0/src/blenderbim/libraries
    As for trucks and such, there is another library for site equipment, a site office and a crane (with a radius) you can find it in that link above aswell^
    It's called "blenderbim-site-library.ifc"

    Maybe that is what you are looking for?

    We just had a whole conversation about the process here:
    https://community.osarch.org/discussion/comment/8793#Comment_8793
    At the bottom Theoryshaw gives an answer to making your own library, I have yet to attempt

    CadGiru
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