Technology we use and work with on a daily basis today has evolved immensely over the past few years. This can be seen throughout the world in all shapes and sizes, from Apple launching the first iPad in 2010 (yes, only 7 years ago), favouring Apps over software, fridges that text you a photograph of their contents to assist you with your weekly shop and virtual reality headsets being sold in regular high-street shops to fully electric, next-generation cars that think, brake and park themselves. Take a step back, before this way of life became the norm, experiencing some of today’s technology years ago would make you think you’d stepped into a fictional land filled with impossible creations, mind boggling occurrences and spell binding magic. Today the construction industry is no exception to this and has recently been propelled into the era of technology and science with it’s own little piece of magic, BIM (Building Information Modelling).
BIM level 2 is the new revolution of collaborative design, allowing intelligence to be infused and embedded within a product model before being shared, this abstract concept means that a 3D CAD model can be designed by one individual, shared with another individual or company using a completely different system yet the data combines and allows the users to interrogate, manipulate and modify the design at their will as if it was their own, creating a small slice of reality within their designs. Imagine the ability to access a construction site before the build has even begun, problems can be eliminated before designing has been completed, construction teams can highlight issues at the design stage (a stage they would normally have no involvement in), less problems no doubt mean less time, manpower and money spent rectifying avoidable situations.
So whether you’re an Architect looking for a model package complete with metadata allowing you to manipulate, adapt and alter designs for your own needs, view specifications, limitations or the ability to perform parametric modelling; or a Client requiring a true representation of a completed build before the build even begins, including layout, finishes and an array of other useful intelligent data, you’re going to look back in several years’ time and find it hard to imagine life before BIM. So what’s next? Earmarked for our future is ‘mind power’, technology you can operate by simply thinking about it. Imagine your next construction build coming to life as a design with you sitting in your favourite armchair, imagining how it would look and work, watching as the design unfolded before your eyes, it sounds impossible now, but just how long will that be the case?
Here at Solinear we stay at the forefront of technology and ensure we can meet all client and architect’s needs regardless of how complex they may be, all our Designers are BIM trained and all Solinear projects are capable of BIM level 2 compliance. So, next time you’re designing a build an want to inject some magic, just remember, the thing-a-ma-bob that does your job, is bibbidi-bobbidi-BIM!
