Taking Your Designs to New Heights with the Vectorworks Partner Network

Professionals in the AEC industry are called upon every day to bring innovative ideas, designs and solutions forth for their customers. This means that the very tools architects, landscape architects and design professionals use to bring their groundbreaking creations to life must also constantly evolve to best serve their needs. Vectorworks, Inc. recently launched their Partner Network that strives to do just that—connect innovators across the architecture, landscape architecture and entertainment industries to combine resources and form a diverse ecosystem that improves product offerings and shares them with wider audiences. What exactly does this mean? It means that Vectorworks has developed a system built off decades of successful partnerships with other key companies from around the world to incorporate stunning software and hardware integrations into the Vectorworks product line, providing adaptable solutions for every type of designer and their workflow.

The Partner Network provides solutions in several different categories. Technology partners help optimize Vectorworks software, content partners offer manufacturer-specific libraries of CAD/BIM symbols, material textures, images and data that represent manufacturers’ products and hardware partners are quality-tested and validated manufacturers who meet performance requirements and standards for designers worldwide. With over 120 different partners, the Partner Network opens a multitude of doors for design professionals to help them improve their overall process, but here are four key areas that showcase the Network’s immense benefits.

Rendering Application

Over the past 10 years, the AEC industry has seen a major shift toward real-time rendering as a faster, more efficient option for design professionals. Vectorworks provides rendering capabilities in its products, however new applications provide users on both Mac and PC with a more streamlined experience. For example, Enscape™ is a real-time rendering and virtual reality plug-in that brings direct benefit to Vectorworks users. This specific plug-in delivers a suite of rendering tools inside Vectorworks, allowing geometry, lighting, texture or view changes to be made simultaneously in both programs, making the rendering process much faster for designers. Enscape also provides the capability for designer collaboration with the ability to comment and make notes on necessary changes directly on the rendering draft.

Vectorworks and Enscape. Courtesy of Vectorworks, Inc.

Service Pack 3 for Vectorworks 2021 introduced a new export file format option for Datasmith, the native file format by Epic Games. This opens many doors for working within the family of tools by Epic Games including Twinmotion which is a very popular tool used by architects. Vectorworks continues to collaborate with this partner on new features that will further benefit designers and enhance rendering capabilities. Currently, the team is developing a highly anticipated direct link with Twinmotion for real-time rendering for Mac users.

Unreal Engine Datasmith Export. Courtesy of Vectorworks, Inc.

Vectorworks partnership with Lumion provides another avenue for designers looking to breathe life into rendering, allowing immediate, real-time visualization between the two platforms. Designers can make changes to their models in Vectorworks and see the changes take place simultaneously in Lumion’s lifelike environment—an immersive, fully featured landscape with everything from mountains to water and grass.

Additional new rendering features are also in the works. In coordination with partner and sister company Maxon, Vectorworks looks to implement new render modes for users with Maxon’s Redshift GPU-accelerated engine which provides speed and flexibility for designers.

BIM Collaboration

OPEN BIM workflows connect key stakeholders across the entirety of a project, from software vendors to architects, engineers, builders and clients, and Vectorworks is dedicated to supporting this process. Vectorworks partnership with Nemetschek sister company, Solibri®, provides a two-way connection and live sync of Vectorworks BIM model to corresponding IFC models in Solibri® Office for model verification, checking and coordination. Changes made in Vectorworks can be seen immediately on the IFC model within Solibri®, considerably cutting down on the time previously necessary to export models to IFC with each individual change. The Solibri® Direct  integration is another strong option to expand designer coordination capabilities, making them key players in the BIM collaboration process.

Solibri Direct Connection. Courtesy of Vectorworks, Inc.

Vectorworks partnership with sister company Bluebeam, Inc. also makes project review and approval fast and simple for designers, architects, contractors and other key project stakeholders. The direct integration between Vectorworks Cloud Services and Bluebeam Studio supports an innovative online review and approval process for digital construction drawings and 3D models, streamlining the cloud-based collaboration process. Vectorworks users can publish drawing sets as 2D PDFs or models as 3D PDFs to Vectorworks Cloud Services where they can launch a Bluebeam Studio Session and invite participants to compare and mark up documents in real time.

Product Specification

Product specification is essential within the AEC industry as part of the legal documentation that architects must produce for each project. The NBS Chorus integration, made possible through the Partner Network, enables users to access and dynamically link their models to the NBS online specification database, allowing all critical project information to live within one central Vectorworks model. Users can work concurrently with their model and NBS Chorus—data modifications made in NBS Chorus will update in the data record of the Vectorworks model, ensuring accurate and up-to-date specification information at all times.

Analysis Tools

A very specialized and unique form of analysis is available for designers across the architecture, landscape architecture and entertainment fields through Vectorworks partner, Transoft Solutions, Inc. The AutoTURN Online integration allows designers to perform vehicle swept path analysis to evaluate maneuvers of varying vehicle types within each proposed design solution. From loading bays for entertainment events, venues with driveways, garages at residential or commercial buildings and parking lots in public outdoor spaces, this integration allows designers to factor safe and efficient vehicle operation into their work.

Vectorworks integration with the only global local intelligence leader, Esri, brings another critical analysis solution to designers. Vectorworks GIS toolset and integration with Esri’s ArcGIS Online services allows users to integrate GIS information directly into their BIM models. With this solution, designers can utilize access to online mapping and aerial images. In addition, with proper geographic coordinates and projection in the Vectorworks file, designers can also accurately geolocate their project simply by entering an address.

The Partner Network provides transformative solutions created to embolden a designer’s vision and creativity. At Vectorworks, we’re continuously seeking to form new partnerships and inventive solutions to address customer pain points and streamline their workflows. If you are interested in applying to become a partner, please visit vectorworks.com/community/part-network/become-partner.

The Partner Network will continue to evolve to provide designers with a collaborative global community that opens up endless opportunities to elevate their work. To learn more about Vectorworks Partner Network and how each of our partners can help you achieve your design goals, visit vectorworks.net/community/partner-network/find-partner.

About the Author

Jeremy Powell was the original member of the Product Marketing Department at Vectorworks, Inc. With a unique dual experience in developing product roadmaps and strategic marketing campaigns, his vision and direction have helped strengthen the Vectorworks brand around the world. Since 2002, Jeremy has consistently worked with customers to better understand their workflows and provide customer resources while helping Vectorworks software keep pace with changes in the industry. He also develops key relationships with third-party partners to enhance the software’s capabilities. Most recently, he led the strategic development effort behind the General Device Type Format (GDTF), an open-source file format for data exchange between lighting control systems, CAD, and previsualization software, which has garnered world-wide attention across the entertainment design industry.

Category: Vectorworks

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 26th, 2021 at 2:18 pm. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.