Lego Land - UK Buildings

Some of the buildings at Lego Land where pretty cool too. Mix of lego buildings and the Star Wars exhibition definitely appealed to my geek side. Click a picture for slide show...

St Paul's and Big Ben

City Hall and London Eye

Token Northern structure

Buckingham Palace, not quite the same without Robbie Williams and Jessie J singing on stage in front

Canary Wharf and St. Mary Axe (Gherkin)

Mini-trees

Lego Land - Star Wars

Update 07/05/2013 - Scroll to bottom for more pictures from Star Wars Weekend 2013

Some pictures below from the Lego Land Windsor Star Wars exhibition. Click on a picture for the full-size slideshow.

Naboo N1 Starfighter

Jar Jar and his friends prepare for a dust up

When executions go wrong - Petranaki arena style

R2D2 and C3P0

Cantina Band

Dead AT-AT - suspect a wheeled design would have been more robust than four legs

Speeder biker

Big kid

Millenium Falcon

By all accounts a state-of-the-art modern specification system was used to specify "the Falcon"

The Gamorrean guard gets a kiss

Obi-Wan Kenobi and friends

The pilots march to their Tie Fighters upon hearing the Death Star is under attack

A post-op Palpatine in his dressing gown

On the look out for Luke

Scout Troopers ready to get their Pick N Mix from the Lego Land shop

Punishment for speaking over the allocated time at #BSL2013

And a little key ring from the shop

Czech BIM Council - BIM Day

Really quite excited to be visiting Prague in a couple of weeks to talk about all of the exciting BIM developments in the UK.
- http://www.czbim.org/
- http://issuu.com/czbim/docs/bim-day-2012-info-pro-ucastniky

In Praise of: The new LinkedIn App for the iPad

Many web applications for tablet or handheld devices are simple replications of the main website. However, the new LinkedIn iPad app is really quite nice. I have been playing around with it and it has impressed me enough to write a short blog about it. (For larger images in a slideshow - click on any of the images below).

Fig 1 - Simple welcome page

To quote Senior Product Manager Manish Sharma:
"The new experience re-imagines LinkedIn for the iPad, taking full advantage of Multi-touch and the new Retina display. We aspire to be the place where every professional comes throughout the day. A place where members come to gather important business intelligence and insights to be great at what they do."

The most impressive pages for me are within the "Updates" area of the site. This lays out a combination of stories from the web you may be interested in with stories your connections have "liked" or actively promoted. This is presented in a two column magazine style format that you can simply flick through by swiping across the tablet. There is just enough information to give you an overview and tease you in to read more. Fig 2 below shows articles on the Government Constriction Summit, Green Roofs and BIM Objects. As LinkedIn knows what subjects I am interested in and what my connections promote - it is all relevant to me.

It must be said, that the presentation of this information is completely different to what you see on your PC or Mac - it is perfect for a tablet device - and that's what makes it special.

Fig 2 - New articles you like and your connections like - newspaper style

Within the "Group" area the page design follows the same principles: Two columns in a magazine format; good use of images and author pen-pics. You can flick through the summaries and then read what is of interest in more depth.

Fig 3 - The LinkedIn Groups are a pleasure to browse

The discussions within the groups are also easy to scroll through and read opinions. This is shown in Fig 4 below...

Fig 4 - The discussion threads are laid out nice and clearly

But what LinkedIn is built on is the ability to make connections with people in your area of interest. The "connections" and "people you may know" areas are really well laid-out. Like mini-business-cards on a table that you can scan through.

Fig 5 -  Potential connections are presented like a desktop of business cards

Selecting a person will give you a nice little overview of their activities and your connections in common. The messaging system is simple too. So overall, very, very nice.

Fig 6 - The personal page gives a clear overview of any connection

So a big "well done" to the team at LinkedIn. It'll be interesting to see if Twitter, Facebook, Google+ react. All of the big social media platforms have unrivalled potential content that people want to see. It would be fantastic to see each of their design teams provide in it in the most appropriate media - whether you are viewing it on a traditional computer, smart phone or a tablet.

- LinkedIn - http://uk.linkedin.com/in/stephenhamil
- Twitter - @StephenHamilNBS

The Importance of Specification

One blog post that is definitely worth a read is the guest post on specification by Adrian Williamson The NBS: the Woes of a Specifier on Su Butcher's blog - it's a warts-and-all view on using NBS Building.

Adrian Williamson

One issue discussed by Adrian was:
"...do you write or edit individual sections clauses as you are producing the working drawings or complete the spec once you’ve have a full set of complete drawings and then cross reference them against the NBS? I’ll let you decide on what’s the preferred route; we opted for the latter."

At NBS, we do offer some assistance here. At the most basic level, you can export your clauses to "annotation" database. You will get a little exported database with the clause references and titles from your project spec or office master. These will slot into the AutoCAD or Microstation or Vectorworks CAD system and allow you to simply pick from them to annotate your sections and elevations.

So if you are annotating a window, you can quickly pick from your list of clauses. For example picking a reference such as "L10/350A PVC-U Windows Type A" or "L10/350B PVC-U Windows Type B"?

However, with the growth of Building Information Modelling (BIM), the task of putting together a coordinated set of drawings has became even easier. It is a far more robust process. At NBS, we currently have BIM plug-in tools for Graphisoft ArchiCAD and will soon be releasing one for Autodesk Revit. We also are in discussions with Vectorworks, Tekla and Bentley about integrating within their systems. In the example below I have attempted to demonstrate the benefits of the linked data models using a basic example.

Consider a design-and-build job where an architect is putting a performance specification for the client (what maybe could be considered a COBie drop 2A). If we look at a simple internal partition system, it is likely that the architect will not specify the individual products. It is likely that architect will not specify the workmanship. But they will specify the system's overall performance. The screen-shots below shows a typical project specification and the associated guidance. Key metrics such as structural, acoustic and fire performance are specified, whilst leaving the design of the system to the lead-contractor. In addition to these performance requirements, the testing requirements and submittals to verify the performance are specified.

Fig 1 - Specifying the performance of an internal partition system

Fig 2 - Pages and pages of detailed guidance and reference documents supporting the specifier

And now it's a simple job for the architect to link the "object" in the central BIM representing the partition with the "object" in the specification model also representing the same partition. The clever plug-in looks directly into the specification and allows the user to easily pick out the correct clause.

Fig 3 - Using the NBS plug-in to link objects in central BIM and specification model

Where this process has particular robustness is the ability to check that all annotations are correct prior to issuing any drawings and specifications from the complete BIM.

Fig 4 - Using the NBS plug-in to report on any coordination issues between drawings and specification

Now I could not have picked a more simple example above - imagine the performance requirements of an air conditioning system or of a complex curtain wall system. Being able to specify this in a tool like NBS Create and then link the spec to the drawings/BIM is crucial. Also, consider a fully specified system with all of the products specified (DPC, frame, plasterboard, fasteners, finish, cavity fire barriers...) and the plug-in becomes even more useful. Click the picture below to see each object in a full specification (not just performance) to see the scope of content for just a simple system:

Fig 5 - A fully designed system in NBS Create

So hopefully this article demonstrates how the links between drawn information and detailed specification information is really improving. Finally, going back to the original post that prompted this blog post, I think that Andrew Brown's summary of thoughts making the case for a well-written, robust, specification is probably the best I have ever read:

Andrew Brown

"...there really is no alternative to allowing adequate time to write the specification whatever system is used. The specification is an essential document in communicating the design intent to the contractor and should not be considered as a painful-but-necessary add-on to the drawings. As I’ve been saying for many years … when did you last hear someone say 'Are we covered on the drawings?' when something goes wrong, it’s always 'Are we covered in the specification?'. There are many times when a picture is not worth a thousand words, but a handful of carefully chosen words are worth several thousand megabytes of drawings."

Andrew Brown - 35 years experience with the likes of BDP and Sheppard Robson

BIM Roundtable Think Tank Discussion at NLA

NLA, The Building Centre

Today I am taking part in a BIM Think Tank run by the NLA discussing "What does BIM mean for the private sector?".

The brief is that the discussions will be based around three topics as outlined below. As some last minute preparation I made some notes around these issues and thought I'd share them on the blog. If anyone has any opinions on these subjects feel free to add comments below.

1. How far are developers already investing in BIM and what challenges do they face to do so?
Many clients have now seen the benefits of BIM and are insisting on its use on projects. Over the last few years I have seen many examples of this through talking with some big clients and listening to presentations at conferences. A few quick examples below:
- Gatwick Airport - Read how "It was The BIM that won it" for HOK on the web. £1billion worth of work. It's no surprise that it's the client benefits post-delivery where the benefits are expected to be seen. The Engineering Manager from Gatwick Airport is quoted as saying "We have been investigating how BIM might add value to the business, and how the model might become used as part of the day-to-day operations of the airport".
- ASDA mandates BIM through its supply chain on all new superstores that it builds. It is currently looking at its existing building stock too and generating models whenever a store is renovated/altered.
- CIRCLE hospitals have managed to produce well designed, yet incredibly efficiently built hospitals through the use of BIM and "BuildOffSite" principles. In their case studies they quote figures. £3.4K/m2 and duration of 74 weeks for first hospital. £2.5K/m2 and 67 weeks for second hospital - they believe this can come down to £2.0K/m2 and 50 weeks. Bryden Wood are now working with MoJ taking these best-in-class processes from the leading edge of the private sector into the public sector.

The Building Centre

2. What contribution does and can BIM make to meeting sustainability targets and efficiencies in practice?
Too much information behind BIM is in (a) people's heads and (b) bespoke databases. This information needs to be standardised and made available to the wider industry. BIM should allow this.
For new builds, BIM objects representing the main elements of the building should have configurable materials, and it should be possible to configure these materials based on expert financial and environmental cost guidance. This is one challenge we have set about trying to solve at NBS.
Where nationally maintained objects are used, these can be pre-populated with key cost information such as financial CapEx and OpEx, embodied carbon, water footprint, carbon in use and more general design guidance.
Where a building type is going to be built again and again. It should be possible to componentise this in the most efficient way possible to hit the financial and environmental challenges. A good example of this is with the _SpaceHus project - Space Group have a sustainable home design (level 4 to level 6) than can be built from 19 builtoffsite modules and put together to produce an affordable home that can be run with energy costs of £10 a week.
I think there is also a duty for the whole construction industry to feed information from what the have learned back into a national "central online pot". If structured correctly, the whole industry will benefit from collaboration on "lessons learned". You put in a little, but get back out a lot. Manufacturers can also help here by more publicly publishing their information so informed decisions can be made.

Building Centre model of London - now with Shard

3. How far can lessons from public sector projects be applied to the private sector?

River Thames looking West

I'd take this back one step and suggest that firstly the public sector must learn from the leading edge of the private sector. See the CIRCLE hospitals example previously mentioned. It is then the duty of the central government to learn from the best to make best use of the public finances. This information learned should then be fed back to the public sector so that the whole industry benefits.
In fairness to the UK Government it appears that this is exactly what they are doing.

The UK BIM Task Group is using a carrot and stick method (or push and pull as they prefer to call it). The carrot is the improved training, support with standards, documentation of business benefits, case studies, regional BIM Hubs. The stick is the fact that if you're in the central government supply chain and you don't use BIM, then in a few years time, you don't get on the projects. And this is completely fair, as a client, if you are spending the money then you can demand what you want for your money.

As a result of this, we will see two things
1. Better value for money for the tax payer
2. A UK construction industry that are world-leaders

Update: (following the event) A super session. A nice spread of clients, engineers and architects in the room and great to have a conversation around the big issues. A full write up will be available from the BIM area of our website in a few weeks. Chatham House Rules applied, so I'll not write up my notes - the official write up will follow.

BIM Overlay to the RIBA Outline Plan of Work

The BIM Overlay to the RIBA Plan of Work is now live and may be downloaded for free at RIBABookShops.com:
- http://www.ribabookshops.com/plan-of-work

It is edited by Dale Sinclair the owner of Dyer, Dale was previously an associate director at BDP.

The forward from Angela Brady concludes...
"I hope that this publication will help practitioners to cut through some of both the current hype and anxiety about BIM by offering some basic best practice principles, and that it will help to make the business case for investing in the training, hardware and software needed to make full and effective use of the BIM approach. BIM offers a unique opportunity; let’s go for it!"

In Dale's introduction he talks about the need for more support to construction professionals on BIM and publications such as this BIM Overlay is one way that RIBA are supporting their members...
"This document also forms part of the response from the construction industry, and in particular the RIBA, to the
Government’s commitment to have all its projects utilising BIM from the summer of 2012. Needless to say, as a result of this stated intention and the release of other key government documents there has been a growing interest in the subject, and whilst enhanced levels of BIM have successfully been used on a number of completed projects, for many designers the subject is relatively new. This increased interest has resulted in various papers, discussions and conferences on the subject, and although opinions on certain subjects are converging, there is a wide ranging set of views on others."

There is a good section defining BIM and also a section going through terminology. Finally the overlay itself has highlighted items for both BIM and sustainability with a commentary. It is all done with the government's data drop work flow in mind. So definitely worth a download and a good read!

The BIM Overlay follows the recently released Green Overlay freely downloadable also from:
- http://www.ribabookshops.com/plan-of-work

NBS Create - Office Masters

The first of three blog posts looking at some of the new functionality that is coming very soon to NBS Create users. NBS Create is the revolutionary new specification product from NBS.

As usual, lots of screen-shots, with a little commentary below. Click any of the images to see larger versions in a slide-show.

Fig 1 - Create an office master clause

Fig 2 - Complete the clause as you wish it to be used on future jobs

Fig 3 - Create multiple clause relationships

Fig 4 - The office master clause will appear in the right context within a project now

Fig 5 - Office master guidance is presented to the user as the clause is made project-specific

Fig 6 - A very quick way to create robust, concise project specifications

For information on how to update office masters and feed this information back into the project specifications please see:
- NBS Create - Updating your content
And for a little on the permissions model please see:
- NBS Create - Permissions