Hello, Pollination community!
We are excited to announce a new feature that came out of several requests for an alternative way to export analytical models to IES-VE. The latest version of both the Rhino and Revit plugins allow you to export your model as a GEM
file which can then be imported in IES-VE.
Why not just use gbXML?
Pollination already supports a gbXML → IES-VE workflow, but we found several cases where the rooms and shades from gbXML were not imported in IES-VE correctly. Moreover, the process could be slow for larger models with 1000s of rooms.
This new workflow makes the process much faster and more reliable. We tested it out on models with more than 1200 rooms and it took less than a minute to export the whole model from Rhino and import it in IES. Most importantly there was no error messages or warning during the import.
Limitations
A GEM file only includes the geometry information. This means you have to re-apply all the metadata such as construction, programs, loads, etc. inside IES. This might not be a big deal for many, since geometry is the main pain point and many IES-VE users reapply metadata inside IES anyway.
If you need to export more than only the geometry, then you should use the gbXML workflow which continues to be supported by both Rhino and Revit plugins.
Getting Started
To test this functionality, you should download the latest version of the Rhino or Revit plugins. Once you download and install the latest versions the process should be straightforward.
In the Rhino plugin, you should see the new file format when trying to SaveAs the files. Here is a video that shows the process for the Rhino Plugin:
For the Revit plugin, simply select the GEM option from the Export Model dropdown.
Enjoy the new functionality and let us know if you have any comments!
Here is the sample HBJSON file that I used in the video if you want to test the process quickly: lab_building.hbjson (2.5 MB)
Happy Pollinating!