See a demonstration of how the Connector for ArcGIS can save time migrating geographic information system (GIS) data from an Esri ArcGIS Portal into InfraWorks software and Civil 3D software for use in infrastructure workflows. See how the GIS data can be modified and published back to an ArcGIS Portal, and learn how to export this data to an external GIS database. Join Autodesk Expert Elite member John Mayo and Autodesk Product Manager Ramesh Sridharan as they show how this new technology can save time working with GIS data in Autodesk products.

The rapid pace of technological developments and the emergence of disruptive technologies such as cloud and mobile computing mean that the opportunities in capitalizing on such advancements have never been greater. However, successfully implementing technology in your business is not just about purchasing software and getting some training. The biggest benefits come to those who step back and reevaluate how they do business, as well as take a strategic approach to changing management. This class will look at the art of business process re-engineering and change management.

This roundtable discussion focuses on topics around freelancing and running your own small business. Discover from the experience of others that there's more than just being good at what you do. This discussion covers the business of being an independent business owner. We address topics relating to what type of business you should form, marketing and advertising, financing, and paying yourself. Many freelance designers are very skilled engineers and artists. This session takes an approach that keeps that in mind. Learn about community resources and online tools that make managing your business easier so you can focus on your clients.

This course will cover multiple project case studies from Perkins+Will concerning how virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) were integrated into the design and presentation processes. Each project case study will break down a unique application and strategy using 2D panoramas, VR, and AR within the project. The class will walk through the modeling, software, and hardware workflows involved in creating design content. The demonstration will also cover accessibility techniques in order to be able to deliver these types of presentations to large crowds, regardless of technical skill level. We will examine difficulties, pitfalls, and successes, as well as insight into how well the client reacted and was engaged in the resulting presentation. In addition, all attendees will have the opportunity to experience the case studies in VR.

Commercial buildings are on the verge of the biggest transformation in history. Internet of Things (IoT) is making connected buildings a reality, and adoption is on the rise across architecture, engineering, building technology, real estate, and construction industries. The use of IoT data for building modeling offers tremendous opportunity to optimize the design, construction, retrofit, and operations of buildings. But just having access to data doesn’t unlock actionable insights. Vladi Shunturov, founder and president of Lucid, will explain how we can harness the power of Building IoT for teams across any number of disciplines, from energy management to finance, operations, tenant communications, and more. He'll explain how to turn what were once reactive processes into proactive opportunities, and share proven best practices and use cases to arm attendees with information they need to turn disparate data from connected buildings into strategic assets. This session features Building Ops. AIA Approved

Firms spend thousands on design technology, yet few come close to hitting the target once that technology is put into production. End users often struggle with utilizing the tools provided to them as much as those tasked with supporting the tools do with staying ahead of a constant funnel of questions—or worse, no questions at all. In the end, Band-Aids are placed on a long list of symptoms with little resolution to the underlying problems that are holding your team back. This class will focus on strategies for establishing dialog between those tasked with making your selected design-technology work, and those affected by its use within your organization. By understanding the issues limiting the success of the tools you use for design, contextualized targets may be established and a plan for how to progress toward the bull’s eye of those targets may be set.

This session will examine the Levels of Development (LOD) section of the standards for Building Information Modeling (BIM) delivery in Doha, Qatar, used by both the Qatar Railways Company (Qatar Rail) and the Public Works Authority of Quatar (Ashghal). The standards utilize a different arrangement in the often-confusing interpretation of BIM and LOD. The LOD standard is broken down into multiple catalogue types, which, when used in combination, create a fully flexible system that you can adapt to any project type and requirement. This LOD standard supports the infrastructure projects and building projects currently being developed by Qatar Rail and Ashghal, which include a wide range of different program types, project types, and scales of work.

Are you a glutton for the perfect CAD/BIM standard? Do you lust after other CAD/BIM managers who have the authority to get things done? Do project teams become greedy about their own standards, wrathfully rejecting the standardized and more efficient ways you proudly implement? You need not despair. This class will focus on ways to put yourself into the enviable position of having users who listen to you. Combining more than two decades of CAD, BIM, and IT support and management experience, plus years of working with numerous companies to help support their technical managers and staff, we will discuss the things nobody likes to talk about—the sins CAD and BIM managers commit while doing their jobs. What sins might you be guilty of, and what’s the path to righteousness? Join this session to learn some of the common pitfalls, missteps, and misconceptions that come with the job, and uncover why they happen, and learn how to avoid them.

According to research firm Statista, as the global population grows and urbanizes, the construction industry will need to build an average of 13,000 buildings in major cities every day through the year 2050. Yet the industry is contending with skilled-labor shortages and lagging productivity; 98 percent of megaprojects face cost overruns or delays. The building industry isn’t big enough to supply the demand. Prefab and modular construction show promise of a resolution, as well as significant savings in time and money compared to traditional building methods. Moving on-site construction to off-site facilities can enhance quality and efficiency to help the industry build more with less. Yet prefab and modular processes are still slow to catch on at scale. Join Autodesk's Redshift Editor in Chief and experts from GE Johnson Construction Company, HOK, Merge Architects, and Factory_OS in a panel debate about the opportunities and challenges of bringing prefabrication to scale when it’s needed most. Could prefab be the antidote to increasing housing demands, skilled-labor shortages, and a high-risk/low-margin industry? The end goal of the panel will be to understand why off-site construction can have a significant impact on urbanization, what the barriers are to rapid market adoption; and what the next steps should be to bring prefab and modular construction to the masses. https://www.autodesk.com/redshift Naomi Porat; Principal, Alpha and Board Member, Factory_OS Rotimi Seriki, Design/Visualization Specialist, HOK John Schwarz, Integrated Services Manager, GE Johnson Kyle Barker, Associate, Merge Architects Kylee Swenson, Editor in Chief, Redshift

Build it and they will come. Or will they? Are you a user group leader interested in building a more effective user group? Drawing from more than a decade of user group experience; this round table discussion will study what makes groups successful, what limits their success, and what resources are now available to user group leaders as part of the new Autodesk Group Network. During this conversation we’ll study where leaders of top performing groups find success planning, hosting meetings, and managing their groups. Come join the discussion to learn best practices for leading an effective user group.

Although most CAD/ Building Information Modeling (BIM) managers are responsible for creating and maintaining CAD/BIM standards, few have the authority to actually enforce those standards. Despite project teams insisting they could be more productive if the company had a standard, the imbalance between a CAD/BIM manager’s responsibilities and his/her authority almost always incubates a culture of noncompliance. This session will focus on ways to achieve the seemingly impossible dream of developing a CAD/BIM standard that’s willingly used throughout an organization without enforcement. By understanding the reasons standards are typically ignored, you will learn ways to overcome the most common behaviors that lead to noncompliance, and how to develop standards that are designed for compliance.

Hardware is hard' is a common phrase, but what does it actually mean? How does a team with a great idea for a new hardware product navigate the challenges of prototyping, sourcing, testing, validation, contract manufacturing, production scaling, distribution, logistics and retail. This presentation aims to capture some objective numbers on what it takes to start a scalable hardware business.

This class is about understanding human and animal anatomy and how that internal structure relates to external movement. Increasing demands for realism place a greater emphasis on accurately recreating the subtle details of motion and skin deformation. To recreate anything accurately, we first need to understand it. In this class, we explore foundation concepts of movement from an anatomical perspective. What are the different tissue types that are involved in movement and what are their properties? What forces are involved in moving and how do anatomical structures relate to these forces? What are the limitations of different parts of the body and how does all of this relate to what the viewer accepts as feeling real? Though mainly conceptual, this class also goes into specifics about creature design, topology layout, joint placement, and more. This class is not specific to any software package but is designed to be directly relevant to those who have an interest in animation, modeling, and rigging.

In this class, you learn to use MassFX in 3ds Max® for rigid body simulations in a destructive environment. Discover techniques for breaking things dynamically while maintaining artistic control. Learn about joint setups and art direction techniques to get MassFX to do what you want it to do rather than just what physics wants to do. There is nothing more satisfying than blowing stuff up in CG. Now, learn to do it better.

Brown University School of Engineering is a true IPD (integrated project delivery) project in the United States. BuroHappold Engineering and KieranTimberlake, along with Shawmut Design and Construction and their trade partners, created a plan that would involve complete live collaboration between all parties utilizing Collaboration for Revit cloud service. This involved all parties working in a live model environment while developing their design. Trade partners would be simultaneously coordinating all building systems in preparation for construction. Developing a seamless transition from design to construction model was an opportunity. The team was able to design in Revit software while creating content that was ready for fabrication. The process continued through construction using BIM 360 Glue software for final conflict resolution and then onto BIM Field 360 software, ensuring coordinated installation of all services. You will learn best practices and optimum setup enabling smooth movement of data from team to team and platform to platform for all project scales.

The emerging IoT space holds enormous potential for positive social, environmental, and financial impact if it is built with the most important node at its center: people. In order for the next wave of innovation around connected devices to happen, people must be able to understand the technology, relate it to their lives, and envision and prototype solutions to real-world problems, even when these problems are relevant only for the few. This, in turn, will only happen when the Internet becomes a material that is accessible to non-engineers and non-experts who can grasp and deploy interactions with the Internet in the physical world as easily as they can with physical materials.

Coordination techniques using Autodesk® Revit® 2013 software as the Building Information Modeling (BIM) authoring platform truly enable a changing of the game. Modeling and project execution capabilities are becoming so comprehensive that we need equally comprehensive processes for collaboration and coordination. This class will deliver all of that: software, processes, paperwork, and more. Every BIM project and frankly, every architectural project, is multidiscipline and has multiple teams. The best teams and projects have the most coordinated teams, best information flow, and most efficient communication. Learn how to coordinate BIM projects with proven techniques and technologies from an architectural, structural, mechanical/electrical/plumbing, and contractor point of view presented by Revit and BIM leaders working in each discipline. Participate in a live coordination session that will blow you away. We will teach you hard and fast concepts that will help you develop your own coordination techniques and expertise to even greater levels.

The difference between a successful project and an unsuccessful project can be directly associated to the good or bad working relationships of the main key stakeholders throughout the whole lifecycle of the project. This can be even more directly related to the personal relationships between the key individuals involved. Learn how BuroHappold are strategically changing their relationships with clients, architects, contractors and operators to achieve better success in project delivery. This shift in digital engineering strategy has contributed to BuroHappold being described by the engineering world as industry thought leaders and innovators, prepared to challenge the norm, embrace the difficult and deliver successful outcomes for their clients. A strategy that has seen Craig Garrett, Project Technology Leader, as part of a global team of regional BIM leads and computational specialists, redefine digital engineering and collaboration on numerous high profile, challenging and iconic projects across all markets and geographies. Advanced BIM adoption is now an intrinsic part of complex project delivery. Therefore to achieve success every aspect of a construction project must be touched by BIM processes and workflows and therefore everyone involved must be BIM savvy and technology literate. Successful data management and information processing is rapidly transforming the existing BIM landscape. The re-use of project design and construction data for an ever increasing number of new and diverse BIM uses creates efficiencies previously not thought possible. The panel will introduce BuroHappold Engineering’s digital strategy and call out some examples of how they as thought leaders, have responded to that strategy. Learn how BuroHappold Engineering are influencing how they do business and how they are standing up to increasing market pressure from larger firms. Learn how BuroHappold Engineering intends not to be the cheapest proposition to their customers, but to provide the highest overall value and return on investment. Also by adopting a forward integration policy and better understanding the future needs of clients they can help deliver this in their projects today.

Kickstarter offers designers, makers, and engineers a unique opportunity to connect with an audience and raise funds to bring their products to life. We’ll hear from Julio Terra, director of Design and Technology Outreach, about best practices for crafting great campaigns and building community on Kickstarter. We'll explore the core steps involved in planning, building, and managing a Kickstarter campaign. We'll also discuss strategies for building community and press outreach in preparation for launch.

Sol Rogers will use REWIND:VR case studies to show the sort of work that is currently being commissioned and utilized—from architectural design and development to Rolls-Royce’s new Vision vehicles, BBC’s International Space Station Space Walk, and the launch of Nike’s new Soccer Team kit. You may remember the early, overhyped virtual-reality (VR) attempts of the mid 1990s that were expensive and unable to deliver a truly immersive experience—and in many cases, just left people feeling nauseous. This is the year where VR truly becomes a viable consumer product. So, what's changed in the past 20 years? Sol Rogers, CEO and founder of REWIND:VR, will look at the developments—from technology and platforms to smartphones and appetite for the medium. VR is no longer just a marketing gimmick. It's a serious industry predicted to have 170 million active users by 2018.