We often talk about Blender as an essential tool for project marketing or to develop ideas that will later become an original architectural design. Those designs will require a plan, technical drawings, and more. In today's market, it is hard not to deal with technologies like BIM for project development.
The relation of Blender with BIM files is possible with the use of a file standard called IFC (Industry Foundation Classes). In the past we already wrote about Blender and IFC:
From the article titles, you will realize that we can easily import IFC files to Blender, but cannot create those files with Blender alone. You will need the help of another tool like FreeCAD.
That might change soon.
An architect and software developer called Dion Moult is in the process of developing an Add-on that will allow Blender to create IFC files using the ifcOpenShell.
The Add-on is still in the early stages of development but already shows incredible potential. You can use Blender in more than simple visualization and even have the ability to provide commercial services for companies with a full BIM workflow.
Since it is still in the beginning stages of development, I strongly recommend you to use it for testing purposes only.
Using Blender for architecture
In the meantime, you can take a look at our latest book Blender 2.8 for architecture, where we explain and show several examples of how you can use Blender for architecture.
Using the most up to date version of Blender, you will learn how to:
- Convert CAD files
- Import data to Blender
- Modeling from vector and image references
- Render with Eevee and Cycles
- Setup cameras for architecture
- Use PBR materials
Visit the details page to learn more about the book contents. You can order it in both digital and paperback formats.
