# Simplifying Shades inside Revit Plugin for IES-VE

**URL:** <https://discourse.pollination.solutions/t/simplifying-shades-inside-revit-plugin-for-ies-ve/29422>\
**Category:** Revit Plugin\
**Tags:** feature-request\
**Created:** [August 26, 2026, 12:36pm UTC](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/t/simplifying-shades-inside-revit-plugin-for-ies-ve/29422 "2026-08-26T12:36:53Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![sramas](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/user_avatar/discourse.pollination.solutions/sramas/32/9640_2.png) [@sramas](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/u/sramas)\
**Post date:** [August 26, 2026, 12:36pm UTC](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/t/simplifying-shades-inside-revit-plugin-for-ies-ve/29422/1 "2026-08-26T12:36:54Z")

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![image](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/uploads/default/original/2X/1/18781aa8e8d4b2e6a20dbe32004ef69134b73be0.png)

Hi Mostapha,

I don’t know if this is the right place to ask as I am not sure if it’s an issue with how IES handles shades. I came across these two threads [Revit to Rhino to GEM to IES-VE Adding Thickness to Shading Elements](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/t/revit-to-rhino-to-gem-to-ies-ve-adding-thickness-to-shading-elements/2021)

> [@New Improvements to Export to IES VE Routine](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/t/new-improvements-to-export-to-ies-ve-routine/2701):
>
> Hello Pollination Community, particularly those who use the CAD plugins to create models for IES VE! We have implemented two new improvements to the export routine to make your life easier: Rooms with holes are now automatically handled. The default thickness for shades is now set to 0. You will need Pollination Rhino v1.28.2 or higher and Pollination Revit Plugin v2.148.1 or higher. Rooms with Holes One of the remaining limitations of the export to GEM was handling rooms with holes. [VE doe…](https://discourse.pollination.cloud/t/do-i-need-to-intersect-the-rooms-before-export-the-file-as-an-ies-gem-file/1423/4)

and wanted to know what the consensus was.

1. Does IES Suncast still ignore planar faces if it’s imported via Pollination?
2. I tried one of the workarounds in the thread which was to apply “Heal Geometry”, but that made the shading geometry worse. So had to undo it.
3. These are my current settings for Shading elements. I believe Pollination used to have a “Pick Faces” option for Shades, if I recall correctly, although I may be misremembering. Was that removed because IES was ignoring zero-thickness planar surfaces in SunCast, or was that unrelated? Is there currently a way to select/export only one representative face from a Revit shading element rather than bringing in the entire 3D solid?  
 ![image](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/uploads/default/original/2X/f/f0722fb8d850a42e02747ed1be7650c21ce3eb91.png)
4. What would you recommend as teh best workflow to address this issue?  
 ![image](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/uploads/default/original/2X/7/750510883f1b11db27ab64f2ae99cd8d030a5723.png)  
As you can see in the image, a single architectural shading component is imported into IES as several individual Local Shade elements. The model currently has roughly 2,000 Local Shade objects, and it is significantly slowing down the model.Is that expected behavior when exporting Revit shading solids through Pollination/GEM?

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**Author:** ![mostapha](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/user_avatar/discourse.pollination.solutions/mostapha/32/5761_2.png) [@mostapha](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/u/mostapha)\
**Post date:** [August 26, 2026, 2:19pm UTC](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/t/simplifying-shades-inside-revit-plugin-for-ies-ve/29422/2 "2026-08-26T14:19:42Z")

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Hi @sramas, good question.

> [@sramas](#):
>
> 1. Does IES Suncast still ignore planar faces if it’s imported via Pollination?

I’m not sure about this. I was under the impression that using “Heal Geometry” fixes this issue. We have removed the automated workflow to add thickness to shades.

> [@sramas](#):
>
> 1. I believe Pollination used to have a “Pick Faces” option for Shades, if I recall correctly, although I may be misremembering. Was that removed because IES was ignoring zero-thickness planar surfaces in SunCast, or was that unrelated? Is there currently a way to select/export only one representative face from a Revit shading element rather than bringing in the entire 3D solid?

We removed `Pick Faces` feature because it was confusing the users. I felt having only one way to do it is going to be easier to communicate but I see your point about having many faces. We can bring this back.

> [@sramas](#):
>
> 1. As you can see in the image, a single architectural shading component is imported into IES as several individual Local Shade elements. The model currently has roughly 2,000 Local Shade objects, and it is significantly slowing down the model.Is that expected behavior when exporting Revit shading solids through Pollination/GEM?

My first suggestion is to increase the tiny face area in the settings, so it removes many of the smaller faces.

I have been using a Grasshopper script to convert these shades into a single face, but we should be able to provide a similar routine in the Model Editor to remove them.

Can you share the Revit model and the PoMF with me privately? I will use the script to clean up the shades for you so you can move forward with this project, and then we will work on:

1. Investigate why shades are not grouped together as a single solid anymore.
2. Add the pick from face feature to the new version.
3. Potentially provide an additional simplification routine to remove the shades.

For anyone who might be interested, here is the logic in the Grasshopper script. We should be able to implement a better version of this logic in Model Editor.

 ![image](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/uploads/default/original/2X/9/9af47204aebbe17ba55adbba6b30afc67fb608e9.jpeg)

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**Author:** ![mostapha](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/user_avatar/discourse.pollination.solutions/mostapha/32/5761_2.png) [@mostapha](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/u/mostapha)\
**Post date:** [August 26, 2026, 4:26pm UTC](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/t/simplifying-shades-inside-revit-plugin-for-ies-ve/29422/3 "2026-08-26T16:26:58Z")

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Hi @sramas, I sent the model with simplified shades to you.

 ![image](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/uploads/default/original/2X/7/78e20c4082133cff22d1c5bb1c154ab78c988c3c.png)

Let’s keep this topic open so we can address the other items on the list.

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**Author:** ![mostapha](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/user_avatar/discourse.pollination.solutions/mostapha/32/5761_2.png) [@mostapha](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/u/mostapha)\
**Post date:** [September 18, 2026, 3:02pm UTC](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/t/simplifying-shades-inside-revit-plugin-for-ies-ve/29422/4 "2026-09-18T15:02:58Z")

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Hi @sramas,

We added 4 different calculation types for shade objects that allows you to simplify the shades using the Revit plugin. This will be available in the upcoming release which should be out in a couple of weeks.

The default is to include all the faces.

 ![Multi-Face](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/uploads/default/original/2X/c/cfc69bcae6a86161b842a8e6c0be8f058a785b3c.png)

But you can choose to only get the largest faces.

 ![Largest Face](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/uploads/default/original/2X/1/14a596bd7155919fb5fe509690d3c4e148d153a5.png)

The bounding box.

 ![Bounding Box](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/uploads/default/original/2X/0/029c719f5a8bd5e681edaeab7f9efc16ff34094e.png)

And the largest face of the bounding box.

 ![Bounding Box Largest Face](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/uploads/default/original/2X/4/42ab1a3794a9c6009e65dfb594e82c2fef3bb97c.png)

It also works for more complex shades with many faces.

 ![Multiface](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/uploads/default/original/2X/1/15d7633ee0c9daee104202d3f12dc62f61a85f24.png)  
 ![Largest face](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/uploads/default/original/2X/e/efe99dcb8183b60558167a5021b281e221bb139f.png)

For reference, this is how the shades will look like now after applying the calculation methods.

 ![image](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/uploads/default/original/2X/f/fab7e394660b1ed7a0ad87bfef8263a175a2486b.png)

I believe this should also make adding the feature to pick a face less critical but let me know otherwise.

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**Author:** ![system](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/uploads/default/original/2X/2/2aaa76577df2c10e0c2fd664092e7c4ffe8f917c.png) [@system](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/u/system)\
**Post date:** [September 20, 2026, 3:03pm UTC](https://discourse.pollination.solutions/t/simplifying-shades-inside-revit-plugin-for-ies-ve/29422/5 "2026-09-20T15:03:17Z")

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Closed on September 20, 2026, 3:03pm UTC

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