Blogs

We use Revit, but we also use Macs. Since Revit is Windows-only (sadly) we have to run Windows in it's own little sandbox via what's called a Virtual Machine to use it. Probably the two best known virtualization packages out there for Macs are Fusion and Parallels. And while we're currently Parallels users, slowly migrating to Fusion (hurry up with the Beta already!), there actually is a better way to run Windows software on non-Windows systems, and that's using something called Wine, or it's better-made commercial brother, Crossover.

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Built it, and they will come:

The interior we did for Three Rings has drawn some attention in the past, but nothing like this. Our friend's interns at the Instructables got all made up as pirates, documenting it as they went in true DIY style, then crashed Three Rings and rampaged through. With Daniel's fancy swordplay, valiantly fighting them off, we can see why he's the CEO on that ship!

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Wordle is a fun java toy that takes a webpage or feed and turns it into neat graphics based upon word count. Here's our Business Plan:

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What do cities of the future, light fixtures, wearable computers, and 3D printed flutes have in common? They were all things shown off at our first Eat Food Talk Shop!

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Parametrics rock. We used Revit's parametric families to help generate these complex stairs for our new space.

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We're starting a new mini-event called "Eat Food Talk Shop".

It's kinda like a Dorkbot / Meetup / Mini-Maker Day / Pecha Kucha but with BBQ & beer and a little more fabrication-focused.

Bring something to share and something to show off (or at least some ideas or questions to talk about).

Bring your friends too!

We'll have some food and beer and cool stuff to show off and music to help get things started.

In time it's going to be a roving party, so that each month it's at someone else's shop.

We all get to see neat stuff and learn something new!

The first one is this Friday, August 8th, and starts at 6 PM at our shop: 1722 15th Street, Suite C, Oakland CA 94607. Walk through the gate with the big wooden robot-cutout, and we're down a bit and on the left. Huge roll-up door and '67 Dodge van. Can't miss us.

There's parking, a (new) grill (yay!), and old grill, a big fridge, a big robot, and plenty of room. We don't have a video projector or forklift (yet) so if you need one to show off what you brought then you'll need to bring your own.

We hope you can make it!

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There is this really cool exhibit going on at the MOMA in NYC where they had several designers produce small pavilion-like houses that were entirely built via CNC and laser cutting. Called "Home Delivery" it's going on right now and it looks amazing. When we were in NYC last it wasn't open yet, but we could see it in progress from a window in the American Folk Art Museum and we're itching to go back to NYC and see it finished.

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One thing we do here at Because We Can that we haven't talked a whole lot about is consulting.

We've been helping a few different companies on going from Revit to various CNC, Laser, and other automated tools; both on what they need to do within Revit in terms of modeling and strategy, and what they can expect once those models are exported out of Revit. We've also helped a lot on what sort of tools and processes are right for certain applications. We've even been leveraging BIM and CNC / Rapid Manufacturing into the high-end residential development market, something we're hoping to soon be talking a lot more about here.

Jeffrey has a long history of BIM and Revit consulting, a role that eventually got him to be the firmwide Revit dork for Gensler until he left to work full-time at Because We Can. Add to that our real-world experience with CNC automated fabrication over the last few years and we're well suited to help anyone's needs. Heck, we've even been invited to talk about this topic at Autodesk University, which we're honored and excited about.

While we've blogged here about some of our processes before, and we hope that helps people out there trying to do similar things, if you need more help then just contact us. Our rates are reasonable, being at the same market rate for a decent Revit consultant (which in our area is about $100 - 125 / hour). If the project is interesting, creative, or we get a share in the design or construction of the project, we're also very flexible in our rates.

So if your a designer, engineer, or Architect wondering how to go from Revit to CNC tools give us a ring.

So a little over a year ago, I posted about how we'd adopted Scrum-style practices in our business.

And, one year later, we're still at it, however we've really changed our interpretation and flavor of it.

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While embodied energy, material source, durability, and recyclability are all important factors in sustainable design, there is an often overlooked factor that we call 'Love-ability'.

That super-eco-friendly sustainable cradle-to-cradle product you're designing or producing is great. However if it winds up in the trash in the end because someone didn't love it enough to keep it around it sorts of defeats the whole idea. Even if it's recyclable, the energy that was used to produce it in the first place was now wasted. And most things don't recycle endlessly, and with each cycle break down into less useful materials. Even the so-called 'cradle-to-cradle' stuff.

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