GenerativeComponents (GC) is a next generation product from Bentley Systems, Incorporated. The product enables architects and engineers to explore designs and geometry together in new ways. It enables ‘what-if’ scenarios to be explored either through geometry and or the relationship of building elements and forms dynamically. Vector1 Media editor Jeff Thurston met with Huw W. Roberts, global marketing director at Bentley while at the recent SmartGeometry Conference in Munich, Germany to conduct this interview.
Vector1 Media: What is the relationship of software file format standards to the design process, and how does Bentley approach this relationship?
Roberts: Interoperability is in our DNA. We believe in standards as one means to facilitate open information exchange, and we support industry standards and participate in many standards setting organizations. Examples include the Industry Foundation Classes (IFC) from the buildingSMART alliance, the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) and the International Standards Organisation (ISO) – and many others.
Standards enable and foster collaboration, increase predictability and reliability, promote smooth interactions between phases of work, enable higher interaction between disciplines and reduce error.
It is important to understand that architects and many of the folks at the SmartGeometry conference are coming from the design side of the process and are focused here on pushing boundaries. In that context some associate the use of software standards” with the idea that standards could push all solutions to be accomplished in a similar way – limiting exploration and creativity. That is not how we see it. Design professionals and architects see freedom in their process as an opportunity to create or design new approaches to solve problems and develop solutions. We see great value in both advancing innovation and supporting standard information exchange, and we’ll remain committed to both, in harmony.
Vector1 Media: So how does that concept relate to to GenerativeComponents (GC), your new software?
Roberts: You have identified one of the key advantages of GC. The software is flexible and allows architects and engineer’s to design, maintaining that creative freedom, while standardisation is included in the design process. With GC an architect can create many models simultaneously and try new approaches in many new ways, very quickly. For example, how far can a material be deformed until it is no longer structurally sound, or which design can withstand wind better than another. While not visually observable while designing, a GC design may include standardized data pertaining to materials, load bearing capabilities or environmental factors – all influencing the limitation of design changes.
Vector1 Media: Is there a limitation to GC or other Bentley software then, because of this standardisation and design interaction?
Roberts: From a software and workflow point of view there can be issues that run against standardized approaches, naturally. The more ‘standard’ activities, methods and practices are best supported with tools (software) optimized to those demands. Building Information Modeling (BIM) solutions fit that bill well. But from an architectural point of view designers are also interested in solving unique architectural problems and developing solutions that may not have as yet been interpreted or engaged more fully in conventional standardised approaches – As professions, architects and engineers push the envelope to create beautiful buildings that perform in unique ways, whether in terms of climate influences, energy consumption or visual appeal. The SmartGeometry group are some of the best minds in the world that are designing new infrastructure and buildings and tackling these kinds of challenges. And to do, they must by the nature of innovation, work outside of standardized practices. Further down the road, we may see some of today’s innovation become standardized, and used in GC more and more. To be explicit to your question – yes there is trade off between supporting the flexible innovative design interaction, and supporting the standardized practices. Our approach to this issue is to focus our support of standardized practices within our BIM tools, and the innovative design exploration and invention within GC – The good news is that they can work together wonderfully.
{sidebar id=124}Vector1 Media: When I look at GC what I see is a software that handles geometry in unique ways. As a result, it seems that GC has a bright future in the geospatial and civil engineering fields also, where we regularly deal with network topologies and geometry as a matter of roads, utilities and other infrastructure.
Roberts: You are right. We think GC will have a great future in many fields, and we’re utilizing it in our platform technology set that is shared across applications for those fields. But for the moment we are first focused on well supporting architects and engineer’s in the design of buildings. Although GC has been a few years in the making, it is only recently commercially released – and we are now beginning to implement it more deeply with the MicroStation platform and our product groups. One step at a time.
Vector1 Media: What is the challenge with GC when it comes to geometry?
Roberts: GC allows users to manipulate geometry within all the rules and relationships of the design process. This is unique because it means that several different professionals can be working within GC on the same project, at the same time for different purposes. Architects and engineer’s can be working together, and fabrication can be part of the process as well.
A challenge for example could be one of manipulating design geometry such as a glass roof over a stadium, while considering other criteria such as the dynamics of environment and the structural integrity of the design. One opportunity that immediately arises is the fact that all these people can be working together, rather than apart – more synchronised and less sequential as they iterate on desing options. This speeds up the design process, and it also means that designs become more optimised as more alternatives are tested and considered.
Geometry can be manipulated in a hybrid environment of both hands-on manipulation and scripting or programmatic editing. This enables designers to have dynamic interaction with the values and algorithms defining the form, while also supporting the intuitive approach at the same time. Pretty cool stuff. And since it’s built on a solid CAD platform and integrated with discipline-specific tools and technologies, other sub-systems, tools, and capabilities such as rendering, 3D printing and animations, reporting and drawing production can all be used.
Vector1 Media: What is the relationship of Building Information Modeling (BIM) and Industry Foundation Classes (IFC) to GenerativeComponents?
Roberts: As you know, IFC’s enable the exchange of information through standardisation. We see the current IFC work, which we are a part of, as supporting a higher level of interoperability between tools. BIM is all about providing a better informed environment for the design, delivery and operations of buildings, and today is focused on core capabilities for architects and engineers broad use. GC and BIM together is a great thing, since it unites support for both exceptional design exploration and the pragmatic needs of every building project. Even better, since Bentley BIM and GC share a There may be opportunities, for example, to create design modules within architecture that can be moved from one application to another. We expect that IFCs will lead to higher increasingly enhance interoperability between tools and systems. GC provides a great environment for extending and enhancing BIM.
Vector1 Media: How important is this role of exchanging building information?
Roberts: Bentley believes that the ability to exchange information is critical to the realities of projects today – that is why we focus on it so much. With all the specialized applications for analysis, reporting, fabrication, and more, it’s unrealistic to expect that your data can stay in any one format – let alone any one program. So Bentley supports a host of ways to exchange information – APIs, publishing our file format, supporting our competitor’s formats, advocation and supporting neutral industry standard formats, and so on. This will foster higher levels of collaboration and data exchange so that work can be done more efficiently and effectively with reduced risk and higher quality.
Vector1 Media: GC is not just focused on geometry then, it is about the design system or process?
Roberts: Exactly. With GC people are connecting systems of information together. They are integrating consideration of environmental analysis, structural analysis, geometry optimisation and so on, as part of a wider design process and interpretation. This ability to model the entire system together, provides a more robust way of solving problems and developing solutions.
With GC people will be able to look at construction and design almost like an equation. One that is long, including many pieces and professionals and disciplines, but where any piece of that equation can be changed or altered and all the others will adjust automatically to balance the equation.
Vector1 Media: It would seem then that designers will have much more freedom?
Roberts: That is a good way to look at it. The ability to play around with the model, to try things and move them, and, as we say – find your ideal design – is going to allow architects to test more and simply evaluate things that were previously hard and expensive to prototype individually. As we see today, some architects are designing 300 versions of a building and maybe creating half a dozen 3D cast models based on GC before arriving at the ‘best’ solution. And ‘best’ can mean many things to different people, and on different projects. In a sense we are putting a whole higher order of magnitude of exploration into the design process.
{sidebar id=124 align=left} Vector1 Media: I noticed that many design professionals keep their data in Excel spreadsheets as compared to database tables. Since databases incorporate rules and add robustness, can you explain that?
Roberts: Some people are using databases although many architects are using spreadsheets. MicroStation itself can be considered as a database since it is storing data and several drawings can exist within a single file.
I think you are going to see both more and more as we move into a 3D environment. Going back to BIM, it’s all about information, so it won’t be long. We are seeing many people moving to a completely 3D environment, including the data storage. I go back to the fact that GC is still in its early days, with so much potential emerging. As more architects and engineers become aware of BIM and GC benefits, and learn of projects and best practices from their peers, then we will see all the professionals we have been talking about, also move to a 3D environment faster and more fully. Many of those professions have long standing practices and focused applications and it may take time for people to gravitate to new concepts and approaches. But we’re already seeing firms consider GC and BIM as competitive advantages for their business – and nothing speed adoption more than clear business benefits!
Vector1 Media: Then BIM and GC connecting together is a goal in the near future?
Roberts: They connect already. The common technology platform of MicroStation enables this for us. As we continue enhancing these products, that integration will be enhanced as well.
Vector1 Media: I have to tell you. With GC I see Bentley’s entire portfolio connecting from one end to the other. I could not quite see that before, although I understood it from the concept of a platform.
Roberts: Yes! There is a method to our madness. You are correct. We have been developing and acquiring and merging a wide portfolio of capabilities for a while now. Maybe some people could not see the dots connecting before. Providing solutions for our users that include comprehensive functionality and cross-disciplinary integration is an important point. Enabling work from the mapping scale, to the detail of a window sill – with so much in between to all work together is a fantastic benefit to our users.
Vector1 Media: I’m curious. So where does GenerativeComponents and SmartGeometry sit in the Bentley domain, exactly?
Roberts: Well – keep in mind that the SmartGeometry group here today are not Bentley employee’s but are interested people whose work we consider valuable and important and whom we support with our GC software. They are an amazing group who we have enjoyed a tremendous relationship with during the research and ‘beta’ phases to help define and chart a formative course for GC. And we and they together and are continuing to research and develop these concepts further.
GC is now in our production group, with all the rigor, quality controls, support, documentation, learning resources and services associated with commercial software. Since GC is built on MicroStation, and an important platform technology for us, it will increasingly add benefits across the Bentley domain.
Vector1 Media: And what is the relationship to Civil and Geospatial Divisions?
Roberts: We are quite aware of the synergy between GC and BIM and recognise that this is not far removed from the synergy GC could have with applications serving either of these groups. We also see overlap here and there in terms of shared technology. We certainly believe that there is a phenomenal future for GC in these groups as well. But for the moment we are moving deliberately and first focusing on building.
Vector1 Media: Where does GC leave paper in the design process?
Roberts: If you look at places like Singapore, you will find that they have moved to digital building permits and reduced the amount and types of paper being consumed in the building process. Many project teams are increasingly using digital means to collaborate and interact. Niether of those phenomina are particular to GC, but the trend continues. As the digital models contain ever more information about the building, its design, the decisions, the performance and systems, etc, adequately representing that in a static 2d paper mode becomes less appropriate. I fully expect that need to do so to persist for quite some time, but I also expect that the direct interrogation of digital models will become more and more acceptable, and in fact increasingly preferred.
Vector1 Media: Will GenerativeComponents be bundled with MicroStation, sold separately – or?
Roberts: Yes to both! GenerativeComponents is available to MicroStation SELECT subscribers at no cost. It is also available to anyone via an incredible offer, the “GenerativeComponents Discovery Subscription” – a one year special subscription for only $250/yr*, The easiest way to learn more about how to get GC and to take advantage of special offers is to visit our website.
For more information:
www.GenerativeComponents.com
Image courtesy Bentley Systems, Incorporated
