Building Information Modeling (BIM) is a technology that uses three-dimensional drawings to increase the accuracy and efficiency of architectural design, overcoming the limitations of traditional CAD drawings and minimizing errors in the building process. However, it is not yet widely used due to the limitations of computer power, and it is being watched closely to see if it can become a standard in the building industry.
While it may look like a simple drawing of lines and shapes, there’s a lot of detail and information behind it. But do you know how it’s drawn? Architects go through countless calculations and analyses to create these drawings, and they’re much more than just pictures. Believe it or not, many of them were drawn by human hands. And now, with the advent of a tool called BIM, the way we design is about to change dramatically.
Currently, most design drawings are created using a program called CAD. CAD stands for “Computer-Aided Design,” and it’s software optimized for drawing. In short, you can think of CAD as an advanced Paint for drawing. Of course, for your convenience, you can use tools called drawing layers to categorize walls into walls and numbers into numbers. But in CAD, those lines are just individual lines that the designer created by double-clicking the mouse. There’s a big difference between the computer recognizing four lines and lumping them together as a wall.
Here’s the problem. For example, if you want to fix a single incorrect column, you have to fix the floor plan, elevations, sections, etc. that it’s in, all individually. This is a very complex and time-consuming process. For a single apartment building, the plans would be about 10 centimeters thick. Drawing them all individually means that mistakes are inevitable, no matter how hard and careful you try. Because drawings are still drawn this way today, it’s not uncommon to find things that don’t fit together. These problems are only discovered when construction is in progress, which can cause major problems during the construction process. Especially on large projects, the cost of these small mistakes can be enormous. Currently, computers are only able to create drawings to replace pen and ruler, but not much more.
A new tool to solve these problems is a technology called Building Information Modeling (BIM). BIM isn’t just a drawing tool, it’s a system that integrates all of a building’s information into a three-dimensional model. With BIM, drawings can be drawn in three dimensions, which offers a different approach than the current two-dimensional drawings. While it is not possible to accurately extract a three-dimensional model from a current two-dimensional drawing, with BIM it is much simpler to draw the three-dimensional drawing first and extract the two-dimensional drawing from it. The number of drawing errors that can occur in this process is greatly reduced, and because the two-dimensional drawings extracted from the three-dimensional drawings are not different from the drawings currently in use, there are no communication issues with the workers doing the actual construction.
When drawings are created using BIM, the computer recognizes concrete walls as concrete walls and not just lines, and steel columns as steel columns. This allows the computer to perform a structural analysis of the building, which gives you a more thorough understanding of the building’s structural stability. While building safety is the most basic of basics, these analyses will allow for more efficient and safer designs.
What’s more, the computer’s understanding of materials and structure makes the results even more compelling: When you enter basic information into the program, such as how long a construction project will take, the computer can estimate how long it will take to complete. Not only that, but it will also be able to tell you which construction methods will get the job done in less time. Since time management is directly related to the cost of construction, it is possible to accurately calculate the movement of materials in and out of the building, which can save unnecessary costs. In other words, with BIM, you can accurately calculate the necessary costs for the entire construction process, or even the middle of it, in advance, and choose the more economically favorable construction method.
Building drawings are often too complex and unintuitive for the average person, but with BIM, even non-expert architects can intuitively see how a building will look before construction begins. In fact, the main stadium for the Beijing Olympics was built using BIM. Not only that, but in recent years, architects are increasingly demanding BIM models when designing large, complex buildings in Korea and abroad. This gives them a clearer understanding of what they’re building and helps them avoid errors during the design process.
The benefits of BIM are endless. It’s not just about converting design drawings into three dimensions, it’s also about simulating the flow of heat, calculating winter heating bills in advance, and estimating maintenance costs by taking into account the lifespan of materials. The reason these groundbreaking programs are not yet widely available, however, is due to the limitations of computer power. The fact that BIM programs are available at all is a testament to the advancement of the technology, but it hasn’t yet reached a stage where it can be used to its full potential. Even with today’s high-end computers, BIM is time-consuming to use, which can lead to the decision that using BIM is more time-consuming than it is practical.
BIM is still a technology that needs to be refined, but the impact it will have on the architecture industry is huge. Only time will tell how big of a difference BIM will make in the future and whether it will ever reach its full potential. It will be interesting to see how BIM evolves in the future, whether it will become the standard for architectural design or remain just another tool.
