Two announcements impacting the building design industry were showcased today at Autodesk University.  The first is an expansion of the Autodesk FormIt family of applications with a new beta version for Mac and PC web browsers (Chrome and Firefox). FormIt for web browsers joins previously available versions for Apple iPad and Android tablets, expanding the options for conceptual design anytime, anywhere.

Last year at AU, Autodesk Formit was released, making it the first BIM-based conceptual design tool for architects working with Apple iPads. Once a FormIt conceptual design is complete the model can be imported into Autodesk Revit for continued development within a BIM workflow.

This evolving product line provides architects and designers with more flexibility and options to create, collaborate, and share initial design ideas using sophisticated but easy-to-use tools and the power of Autodesk 360 cloud services.

FormIt for iPad has been redesigned to take advantage of Apple’s iOS 7. Users can now benefit from the use of Airdrop and Print functionality, plus new social sharing capabilities. New drawing features, including a spline tool, have been added to enable a larger variety of forms for users to explore.

The recently updated iPad version also includes groundbreaking mobile energy analysis tools powered by Autodesk Green Building Studio, which enable users to get a simple indication of their model’s potential building performance cost based on climate data, building type, and building size. This tool helps designers and architects bring energy analysis into the earliest stages of a design process.

Formit for iPad is now iOS 7 optimized and includes new energy analysis features that help users understand potential building performance cost.

What’s New in FormIt Mobile

Building Program in Autodesk FormIt Mobile

In addition, Autodesk today offered a glimpse of what the future holds in store for FormIt, including a demonstration of a forthcoming feature in the FormIt family of applications that supports real-time collaboration on projects. Utilizing the power of Autodesk 360 cloud services future designers will be able to simultaneously access and collaborate on models using their FormIt application of choice.  As teams work through design ideas models are instantaneously updated across all applications to reflect changes made by any user. This revolution in conceptual design will help to speed up iteration, promote creativity, and enable a smoother collaboration process between designers working in geographically dispersed offices, at home, or in the field.

See preview of forthcoming feature in the FormIt family of applications to support real-time collaboration on projects

Download the latest Autodesk FormIt offerings from the Apple App Store, Google Play, or visit www.autodeskformit.com to try it today.

In parallel with the expansion of the Autodesk FormIt family of applications, Autodesk also announced a major enhancement in computational design for the building industry with the merging of Dynamo with Autodesk DesignScript.

Announced at the AIA Conference in June 2013, Autodesk’s open source Dynamo Visual Programming environment for BIM allows designers to extend the parametric capabilities of Autodesk Revit software by adding their own custom rules and relationships. Autodesk DesignScript is a powerful, compact programming language and computational engine intended to help designers build and analyze complex geometric models that would be difficult to model with interactive techniques.

Now both are coming together in Dynamo to deliver “computational BIM.”  DesignScript’s powerful computational engine and compact language are being integrated into Dynamo’s Visual Programming environment on top of Revit. Designers familiar with Visual Programming and scripting can now control Revit models and work more closely with their BIM colleagues.

DesignScript’s powerful computational engine and compact language are being integrated into Dynamo’s Visual Programming environment to bring you computational BIM

For more about the new Dynamo 0.6.2 visit the Dynamo website.