3D+ RPC Creator (Beta) – Convert Your Models to RPCs for Placement in Revit

From the ArchVision blog:

Publish your own 3D+ RPCs!

MARCH 15, 2017 BY RANDALL STEVENS

Quite a while in the making, we’ve launched a new RPC Creator service that supports the creation of what we refer to as 3D+ RPCs. A 3D+ RPC means the RPC contains both texture and underlying geometry data. You’ve been experiencing 3D+ RPCs in the form of the RPC Automobiles we’ve been publishing for many years. More recently we began partnering with companies like AXYZ Design to publish their incredible people models as 3D+ RPCs. This new RPC Creator service is still in beta and can be found at labs.archvision.com.

Now you can convert your own geometric models into RPCs ready to place in your favorite modeling/visualization app such as Revit!

In order to make your own 3D+ RPCs using the new service you need to supply 3 essential pieces of information 1) geometry in the .obj format, 2) a master texture as a .jpg or .png, and 3) a 124 x 98 pixel preview image. That’s all you need. Upload each to the service and you’re handed back an RPC file in less than a minute.

Why?

In the early days of ArchVision we were in the visualization services business. One of the lessons I learned was that if you’re going for realism, the best visualizations were the ones with an inordinate amount of “detail”. For interior visualizations it was a very “inward” challenge in providing all the “stuff” other than the building itself that were needed to make the scene come alive and look “real”. For exterior scenes it was the opposite; you’d model the hell out of your building but when it came to visualizing it creating the “rest of the world” around it became a headache. Enter RPCs. RPC People were a great addition to those interiors. RPC Trees were great for creating a boundary for that exterior world (or hiding mediocre architecture 🙂 ) and RPC Automobiles helped fill those parking lots.
RPCs have some unique characteristics that have made them a popular way to add entourage and other “stuff” to your designs and improving your visualizations.

1. Convenient – with an RPC you never get a “missing texture” warning. All of the data required to render are included in the .rpc file.
2. Fast – RPCs can be optimized to carry just the right amount of geometry and texture data to make your visualizations standout without bogging down your model. In some implementation such as 3dsMax, textures contained within RPCs dynamically scale themselves when loaded which optimizes the memory footprint required to load those RPCs (ie. you can efficiently stuff more into your scene)
3. Temporal – Context matters but has always been difficult in content creation. With the new 3D+ RPC Creator service you can designate separate geometry (referred to as the “Icon”) which is placed in the model and “swapped” out at render time with the full Mesh contained in the RPC. Internally we refer to these as the “Preview Mesh” and the “Render Mesh”. This dynamic swapping of data helps optimize what you see and when you see it and challenges the “one model suits all needs” mindset of content creation. This can be especially important in workflows like Revit > Visualization where the underlying model is important for one purpose (eg. documentation) but not well suited for another (eg. visualization)
4. Versatile – RPCs are supported by the world’s leading modeling and visualization platforms: Revit, 3dsMax, Autocad, Civil3D, SketchUp, FormZ, Modo, Rhino, Photoshop and more. Publish your content as an RPC and it’s ready-to-use on any of those platforms.

We look forward to hearing your feedback and seeing your results. You can even share your RPCs with the rest of the community in Stash!

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There's more information available on the ArchVision blog, and on ArchVision Labs.