Can learning about BIM be fun? It is when you’re with Brian Mackey. Irreverent, even a tad sarcastic, he’s an audience favorite at AU. The self-declared “Revit Geek” co-hosts a podcast entitled Revit Radio, and his classes are chock full of practical tips delivered with humor and frankness based on decades of practical experience. Geared towards structural engineers and architects, his AU 2017 class Creating Intelligent Details in Revit offers strategies for creating more responsive detail components. Mackey explains how to use consistent naming conventions for greater searchability, how to cr... READ MORE >

AU Las Vegas isn’t until November, but now is the time to think about the knowledge you might want to share there and the session you want to lead. That’s because the AU 2018 Call for Proposals opens in mid-May, just a few weeks away. It’s a bit later than in previous years, but you can use the extra time to create a better, richer proposal. Here are just a few of the topics we’re particularly interested in this year: Connecting design and preconstruction to reduce costs, improve decision making, and accelerate building. Making construction more like manufacturing by using modular and co... READ MORE >

AU is a learning community that flourishes year-round, with content available at AU online whenever you’re ready to learn. But the conferences are important, since they give our community a chance to come together, build professional networks, and share ideas face-to-face. Next up is AU Middle East, which kicks off next week in Dubai. If you're in the area, there's still time to register. Following that is AU London, June 19-20, 2018, at Tobacco Dock, which promises to be another incredible event. At AU London there will be more than 90 classes to choose from for professionals in AEC, desig... READ MORE >

Traditional surveying? Drone photos? Sonar? LIDAR?  How you get your point cloud data doesn’t particularly matter. The question is: what comes next? How do you go from point cloud to 3D model? Brian Flaherty and Michael Harvey tackle this challenge head-on in their AU 2017 class and show that complex conditions are nothing to fear. Combining AutoCAD Civil 3D with Leica CloudWorx, they show you how to navigate through various point-cloud data sets and verify accuracy, then begin the process of creating 3D models. Whether you’re a surveyor, a planner, or a civil engineer, if you want to ma... READ MORE >

From Ford’s first assembly lines to robots on factory floors, the past century saw the development and refinement of manufacturing systems for mass production. The 21st century is ushering in a wave of equally important innovations that are making manufacturing more flexible and agile, enabling us to prototype more easily and customize products on a mass scale. Today, we’re able to make things in ways and at scales and efficiencies previous generations could never have imagined—from foodstuffs and toys to cars and industrial equipment. Check out these 3 short presentations from AU 2017 to see ... READ MORE >