January 09, 2020

Revit: New Ceiling Grid Pattern, Part 3 - Ceiling Type

First article in the series.
Previous article in the series.

In Parts 1 and 2, we created a Fill Pattern to define a grid pattern for an acoustic tile Ceiling, and then set up a Material that uses that Fill Pattern as a Surface Pattern. We will now assign that Material to the finish layer of a Compound Ceiling type.
  1. In the Project Browser, expand the Families node.
  2. Under the Families node, expand the Ceilings node. Then expand the Compound Ceiling node under that.
  3. Right click on the 2’ x 2’ ACT Compound Ceiling family type. Choose Duplicate from the context menu. If your project file does not have that type, choose another type used to show a grid-based acoustic tile ceiling.
  4. Give the duplicated type a meaningful name. I chose to call the example type 4-24x24_1-48x6 ACT System.
  5. Open a Ceiling Plan view that has an area to receive the new Ceiling Type. If the area does not already have a Ceiling, place one.
  6. Select the Ceiling, and, in the Properties palette, use the Type Selector at the top to change the selected Ceiling’s type to the newly created type.
  7. With the Ceiling still selected, in the Properties palette, select the Edit Type button.
  8. In the Type Properties dialog, verify that the newly created Ceiling Type name shows in the Type drop-down list. Then select the Edit button to the right of the Structure parameter, under the Construction category.
  9. In the Edit Assembly dialog, find the Finish 2 [5] layer under Core Boundary (line "4"). If you started with a different Ceiling Type that does not have a Finish 2 [5] layer, use the layer on the bottom, that will be exposed to the room below the Ceiling.
  10. Left click once in the Material column on the Finish 2 [5] line. This will highlight the name and cause a small button with an ellipsis icon (...) to appear at the right end of the column on that line. Select that button.
  11. In the Material Browser, find and select the Material you created in Part 2.
  12. Select the OK button to ratify the choice and dismiss the Material Browser dialog.
  13. In the Edit Assembly dialog, verify that the new material appears and that the value in the Thickness column for Finish 2 [5] is correct.
  14. Select the OK button in the Edit Assembly dialog to ratify the change to the material. Then select the OK button again to accept all of the changes to this ceiling type, dismiss the Type Properties dialog and see the effect on the selected ceiling.
  15. Synchronize the model to save the changes to the central file.

If you are using Basic Ceilings, rather than Compound Ceilings, you can still assign the Material created in Part 2. Instead of editing the Structure in the Type Properties dialog, you will assign the Material to the Material parameter under the Materials and Finishes category.

January 05, 2020

Revit: New Ceiling Grid Pattern, Part 2 - Material

First article in the series.

In Part 1, we created a custom Fill Pattern from a PAT file to define the grid pattern for an acoustic tile Ceiling. We will add that pattern to a Material in this article, so that it can then be assigned to the finish layer of a Ceiling in Part 3.
  1. On the Manage ribbon tab, on the Settings panel, select the Materials tool.
  2. For the purposes of this tutorial, all we care about is the Surface Pattern that will be seen in the contract documents, and the rendered appearance will not be adjusted. If that is also true for you, you can proceed by either creating a new Material from scratch or by duplicating one of the ceiling tile Materials and then editing the duplicate. I will take the latter approach here, as that way the new Material will inherit the graphic settings from the source material, maintaining consistency.
  3. In the Material Browser, find and select the Acoustic Ceiling Tile 24 x 24 material, which is part of the content supplied with the United States Imperial content in Revit. If you are working in a Metric file, choose an existing Material for a gridded ceiling.
  4. Right click on the material, and choose Duplicate from the context menu.
  5. Give the new material a meaningful name. For this example, I chose Acoustic Ceiling Tile 4-24x24_1-48x6.
  6. Select the Appearance tab. While we will not be setting a grid-specific render image for this Material, we do want to set the Material up with a unique Appearance Asset so that any future change made here will not affect other Materials, and any future change made to the Appearance Asset assigned to the Acoustic Ceiling Tile 24 x 24 Material (or any other Material using the same Appearance Asset) will not affect this Material. In the upper right corner, select the Duplicates this asset. tool. If successful, the name of the Appearance Asset will be changed (by adding a number in parentheses at the end) and the number next to the hand icon will be 0, indicating that this Appearance Asset is shared with no other Material. If you have a render image for this Ceiling, you would assign it here; that is beyond the scope of this tutorial.
  7. Select the Graphics tab.
  8. In the Surface Pattern area of the Graphics tab, select the image tile to the right of where it says Pattern.
  9. In the Fill Patterns dialog, verify that the Pattern Type is set to Model. Then find and select the Fill Pattern created in Part 1.
  10. Select the OK button to ratify the selection and dismiss the Fill Patterns dialog.
  11. In the Material Browser dialog, verify that the other settings on the Graphics tab are as desired. Assuming you want this ceiling pattern to appear the same one of the source Material (Acoustic Tile 24 x 24, or whatever Material you duplicated) (except for the Fill Pattern used), the settings should be correct.
  12. Select the OK button to add the new material to your project.

Part 3 will add the new Material to a Ceiling Type.