New York CitY College of teChNologYthe CitY UNiversitY of New York

From rhino to EcotEct

ArchitEcturAl tEchnology dEpArtmEntwritten by nicole Seekely

revised march 24, 2010 1:25 pm

notes:

page 2 of 10

From rhino to EcotEct

StEp onE:make sure your model has clean geometry. For lighting, Ecotect can handle detailed geometry - the more detailed it is, the better results you will get. however, it is important for your model to be clean for the best results.

StEp two:make sure all your elements are placed in layers that spec-ify the object’s material. this will make assigning material in Ecotect much easier. Again, the more specific, the better.

notes:

page 3 of 10

From rhino to EcotEct

StEp thrEE:File - Save As

StEp Four:Save your file as an AutocAd (*.dxf). Be sure to remember the location you saved your file.

notes: you’ll want to create a new scheme so that the surfaces are read correctly when brought into Ecotect.

page 4 of 10

From rhino to EcotEct

StEp FivE:click on “Edit Schemes”

StEp Six:click on “new”

notes:

page 5 of 10

From rhino to EcotEct

StEp SEvEn:rename your new scheme and click oK.

StEp Eight:Set your settings to look like the menu here. you want to make sure Surfaces and meshes are written as mesh-es, not curves.

StEp ninE:click close and oK when the Export File dialog Box pops up.

notes: it’s important to remember that the more polygons in your geometry, the heavi-er the file will be.

page 6 of 10

From rhino to EcotEct

StEp tEn:unless very detailed and ac-curate geometry is needed, move the slider all the way to the left.

if your model has complex ge-ometry that will be necessary for precise lighting analysis, then move the slider to the right accordingly.

you can hit preview to see how your geometry will be export-ed.

StEp ElEvEn:click oK.

notes: to check what units your model was in in rhino, type in options into the rhino command and click on the units option. your model units will be displayed there. once your model is imported, you can change the units in Ecotect to Feet & inches by going to File - user preferences - localisation page 7 of 10

From rhino to EcotEct

StEp twElvE:File - import - 3d cAd/geom-etry

StEp thirtEEn:make sure File type is .dXF. choose your file. the only thing checked should be re-move duplicate Faces.

StEp FourtEEn:Since Ecotect is in mm, you’ll need to scale your model.

rhino units Scale Factor Byft 304.8in 25.4

notes:

page 8 of 10

From rhino to EcotEct

StEp FiFtEEn:click on Zone - “Select All.” then with all the zones select-ed, click on Zone again, and select “By item name.” this will create a separate zone in Ecotect for each layer in rhi-no.

StEp SixtEEn:you can then assign the mate-rial of each zone here, or you can do this later.

notes:

page 9 of 10

From rhino to EcotEct

StEp SEvEntEEn:to assign a material, click on the layer and then click mate-rial - Select material

StEp EightEEn:From the pop-up menu, select the category of the object, and then select the material from the list.

StEp ninEtEEn:once all your zones have ma-terials applied, or if you want to do this later, click “open As new”

notes: you may need to click on 3d Editor tab on the left hand side to view your model. to view the model in shaded mode, click on the Visualize tab.

page 10 of 10

From rhino to EcotEct

StEp twEnty:to clean up the geometry, se-lect all your objects and click on modify - merge coincident triangles. this should reduce the number of surface subdi-visions.

Et voila! you should have a model ready to be used in Ecotect.