form•Z 5.0

The next release of the popular 3D modeling, rendering, and animation application, form•Z 5.0, was formally announced at the recent Macworld 2005 show (see AECbytes Newsletter #17). Coming almost two years after its last major release which made its debut in Macworld 2003, the new version continues to build upon the open architecture that was introduced in version 4.0. form•Z now includes a full-fledged Software Development Kit (SDK) that allows users to customize the application and extend its functionality by writing plugins and scripts. It also includes a host of other enhancements and improvements for modeling and rendering, and in its interface. This review provides a comprehensive overview of the application for those who are not familiar with it, and looks at the key new features in the latest release.

Overview of form•Z

form•Z is a general-purpose 3D application that can be used across a variety of design fields, including architecture, interior design, product design, automotive design, mechanical design, movies and gaming, and so on. It runs on both the Macintosh and Windows platforms, and is available as three separate programs: form•Z, form•Z RenderZone, and form•Z RadioZity. The first includes modeling, basic rendering, and animation functions; the second includes lighting, texture mapping, and photorealistic rendering capabilities; while the third adds radiosity-based rendering, which simulates the lighting conditions in a scene more accurately. In addition to the 3D capabilities, form•Z also includes a separate drafting module, which allows you to annotate, dimension, and format 2D drawings. While the modeling and drafting environments are not synchronized, i.e., the drafting module does not automatically generate plans and sections of modeling objects, the 2D projections of 3D objects can be copied and pasted into the drafting module, or exported into another CAD application, and used as the basis for creating construction drawings

Unlike most 3D modeling programs that rely heavily on geometric primitives such as boxes, spheres, cylinders, etc. for object creation, modeling in form•Z is focused more on five different types of object creation modes: 2D Surface, 2D Enclosure, 3D Extrusion, 3D Converged, and 3D Enclosure. These are used in conjunction with standard drawing tools such as Rectangle, Circle, Segment, Line, Curve, Arc, and so on to create different kinds of objects. Thus, the same Rectangle tool can be used to draw a 2D rectangle, a 2D double-line rectangular enclosure, a 3D solid rectangular extrusion, a pyramid, or a 3D enclosure with a thickness, depending upon the selected object creation mode. This makes form•Z very flexible and particularly intuitive for building modeling. For example, the 3D Enclosure mode can be used in conjunction with the Line, Curve, or Arc tools to easily create a connected sequence of linear and curved walls (see Figure 1-a). To create openings in the walls for doors and windows, another innovative set of tools is provided: the Insertion modes. If you choose, for instance, the Insert Opening mode, you can use the same set of standard drawing tools to punch holes of different shapes in the 3D enclosures that represent the walls of a building (Figure 1-b shows circular openings created with the Circle tool). In this manner, a single tool performs a variety of different tasks depending upon the mode chosen, which helps to minimize the overall toolset, making the program easier to learn and use.

In addition to creating "regular-shaped" objects using the creation modes described above, form•Z has the full complement of tools for creating organic, free-form surfaces and forms with NURBS, Bezier/Coon patches, and metaballs. A variety of derivatives, both parametric and non-parametric, let you derive 3D objects from 2D shapes, as well as 2D shapes from 3D objects. Examples include revolving 2D shapes about an axis to create an object of revolution, sweeping a 2D shape along any designated path to create a 3D object, creating a spiral staircase simply by specifying a single line axis about which it will be centered, creating a straight staircase by specifying its path in 2D, creating a terrain model by drawing 2D contour lines and the site outline, and so on. Then there are a number of tools for creating meshed objects as well as displacing, disturbing, and deforming them. Boolean tools are provided for working with planar objects, along with special tools for performing the same operations on objects with non-planar surfaces such as meshed objects. Tools for working with 2D line objects, creating and manipulating 3D text, creating, placing and editing symbols, applying colors, texture maps, and decals, and various other specialized tools round up the modeling toolset of form•Z. Window settings can be manipulated with various zooming, panning, and viewing tools, grid, direction, and object snapping, and tools for creating and manipulating reference planes in any desired orientation in 3D space.

For lighting, form•Z provides the ability to create seven different kinds of light sources: distant, point, cone, projector, area, line, and custom. The intensity of the lights can be specified either by a simple percentage value, or accurately, in terms of real world lighting units. Lights can be moved, copied, and deleted just like regular modeling objects, and can also be organized into groups. Both lights and light groups can be included in symbol definitions, which makes it easy to create reusable light fixtures. For highly realistic and accurate renderings of the lighting conditions in a scene such as the example shown in Figure 2, the radiosity option is available in the RadioZity version of form•Z. It is very memory-intensive and time-consuming; however, form•Z provides a network rendering option, which allows a single image or an animation sequence to be rendered much faster on multiple machines simultaneously. Multi-processing is also supported, which increases the rendering speed in computers with this capability.

Texture mapping in form•Z involves the creation of the desired surface style using the Surface Style Parameters dialog. Here, you can create almost an infinite array of surface styles by choosing from a variety of options for each of the four main attributes of a style—color, reflection, transparency, and bumps. Alternately, a large selection of predefined surface styles is also available to choose from. A Texture Map tool is provided to precisely scale and position a style on the surface of an object, and a Decals tool lets you apply multiple styles on the same surface. Photorealistic rendering showing the lighting and textures can be performed using several different rendering types, along with a variety of configurable options for the background, environment, and illumination. Animation capabilities in form•Z allow you to set up the key frames, preview the animation in wireframe to make the desired modifications, and finally render and play the animation file.

New Features in form•Z 5.0

form•Z 5.0 has several new modeling tools and enhancements. Freeform modeling has been made easier by the addition of four new tools to the Primitives toolset that generate ruled parametric surfaces: paraboloid, single hyperboloid, double hyperboloid, and hyperbolic paraboloid. Just like the other primitives, these surfaces are created through interactive graphic methods and can be easily edited after generation to change their shape. A new Formula Curve tool allows curves to be generated from preset or user-provided mathematical formulas, and the same concept has been extended to the 3D realm with a new Formula Surface tool that allows surface objects to be generated based on predefined or user-defined formulas. Some predefined formulas include well known mathematical types such as Mobius Strip, Catalan, Catenoid Helicoid, Enneper, Henneberg, Monkey Saddle, Whitney Umbrella, Steinbach Screw, and Shoe Surface. A few such formula surfaces generated with form•Z 5.0 are shown in Figure 3.

Modeling of building structures such as trusses and geodesic domes should now be easier in form•Z with the introduction of the Frame tool, which constructs cylindrical pipes of a specified radius around all the edges of an object. At each point of the object, a sphere with the same radius is placed. All pipes and spheres are unioned together to form a solid object. An example is shown in Figure 4. This frame is a parametric object, whose radius can be edited after it has been constructed.

Another new feature that will be greatly appreciated in building modeling, which typically includes a lot of repetitive components such as columns, beams, doors, windows, and so on, is the ability to create clones of an object. Subsequently, any changes made to the original object will be automatically applied to all the clones. The cloning is enabled simply by having an additional option in the Copy Options dialog. The cloning can be undone with the application of an associated new tool, Unclone. The usefulness of the cloning feature had been further enhanced by a new Replace tool, which allows all the clones to be replaced by a different object altogether in one single operation. This is particularly useful when a model includes multiple copies of a complex object; temporary low resolution objects can be positioned as place holders during the early stages of model development, and can then be substituted with the real detailed objects at the end of the process.

Other modeling enhancements include the ability to model 3D solid stars, detailed screws and bolts, and accurate gears; a new Draft Sweep tool that generates sweep objects using draft angles and mathematical formulas, making it possible to create a much wider variety of swept shapes than before; the ability to generate smooth parametric text in addition to the previously available polygonal text; and two new tools, Object Doctor and Project Doctor, for detecting any irregularities found in an object or project respectively and fixing them if possible.

On the rendering front, an exciting new feature is a new line renderer called Doodle, which produces line drawings with a hand-drawn sketch appearance. Available as a plugin, Doodle comes in several different styles, and can be based on a wireframe or hidden line base rendering. An example of the Freehand style of Doodle rendering is shown in Figure 5. Also new is the ability to display shadows for the OpenGL renderings produced by the Interactive Shaded display mode, which allows the shading in a model to be studied interactively. Additional types of maps can now be used with environments to produce reflections in a scene, including a single, composite image map for cubic environments and a spherical image map for spherical environments. You can now get more accurate lighting effects with a new light type, the environment light, with which images mapped on an environment themselves act like lights. Going hand in hand with this capability is the support for two new image formats oriented towards lighting: HDRI (High Dynamic Range Image), which allows a much greater range of intensity values in each pixel, allowing images to capture real-world light intensities; and OpenEXR, a similar high dynamic-range (HDR) image file format developed by Industrial Light & Magic for use in computer imaging applications. Images in these formats can be downloaded from the Internet and used with environment lights. Rounding up the rendering enhancements are a variety of plugin shaders for surface styles that further increase the range of textures that can be created with the application.

Interface enhancements include the ability to define multiple selection sets and save the selection criteria with a project; improved font support that is also now more compatible with the font control supported by third party software and the operating systems; enhancements to how text, textures, and surface styles are exported and imported; and support for the 3Dconnexion Spaceball through an optional plugin. A new feature that improves form•Z's potential for working on 2D documentation is the ability to directly transfer data from a modeling window to a drafting window without copying it to the clipboard, as was required before. This feature also works when 2D data needs to be transferred from a drafting window to a modeling window.

The final set of enhancements in form•Z 5.0 are two new options that work in conjunction with each other to make form•Z move beyond its traditional and somewhat circumscribed role of only modeling the building geometry. It is now possible to define new custom attributes and assign them to objects, in addition to the standard form•Z attributes of surface style, layer, object name, and so on. A custom attribute can comprise of multiple fields, each of which can be formatted to represent a number, fraction, distance, area, volume, angle, percentage, currency value, date, time, an item from a value list, and so on. Thus, users can create attribute definitions that describe a set of relevant data, for example, the style, color, grid, glazing, and so on, for a window (see Figure 6-a). Subsequently, when a window object is created in a model, the Window attribute can be assigned to it and the different fields can be set to the desired values, as per the specifications of that window (see Figure 6-b). All these different object attributes can then be mined using the new Information Management option, allowing you to produce lists (see Figure 6-c) for schedules, bills of materials, and so on. These lists can include values calculated by formulas, using script functions based on form•Z's new API (Application Programming Interface), allowing those adept at programming to use this option in advanced ways to produce detailed and sophisticated lists.

As mentioned in the beginning of the review, a significant aspect of form•Z 5.0 is the availability of a full-fledged Software Development Kit (SDK) that allows programming-savvy users to customize the application and extend its functionality by writing plugins and scripts. A plugin is written in the C or C++ computer language outside of form•Z and is compiled into a binary library. A script, on the other hand, is intended for the less advanced programmers; it is developed using form•Z's own editing environment and written in the form•Z script language (FSL), which is a simplified version of the C language. Both plug-ins and scripts work with the form•Z API, which includes over 3000 functions and provides access to much of the form•Z functionality, including modeling operations, interface elements, data access, memory management and math functions. Examples of how the functionality of the application can be extended include file translators that import and export data to different object and image formats, RenderZone shaders that define shaders for the different attributes of a surface style, custom attributes, new tools and commands, drivers for interfacing with hardware digitizers, and so on. Complex extensions to the application can only be handled by plugins rather than scripts.

Strengths and Limitations

form•Z is a hands-down winner when it comes to precise, dimensionally accurate, geometric modeling across different design domains. It has a relatively uncluttered and well organized user interface, making it much easier to learn and use in comparison with other high-end 3D modeling and visualization applications. The new features introduced in the latest version continue to extend its capabilities along all fronts, and will be welcomed by users across all the various design disciplines it caters to. Its new ability to define and assign custom attributes to objects and subsequently mine them to produce lists of object data is particularly relevant to the AEC industry as it moves towards more information-rich ways of representing buildings during design. Despite being a full-fledged modeling, rendering, and animation tool, the system requirements of form•Z are still relatively modest—minimum memory is 128 MB, recommended is 512 MB; minimum disk space is 50 MB, recommended is 200 MB—allowing it to easily run on most home computers.

From a building design perspective, however, form•Z does have its share of limitations. It comes with a very limited set of libraries of building components. Notable in their absence are door and window libraries, making it necessary for the user to model these commonly used objects from scratch. Ideally, it should have full-fledged door and window objects that automatically cut walls when placed. Another critical limitation is the lack of integration between the 3D and 2D modules that would allow users to automatically create clean plan and sections cuts of their 3D models, and then simply add annotation and dimensioning in form•Z or another CAD program. Currently, there is no efficient way to do this.

One area relevant to all disciplines that could do with significant improvement is the documentation. Currently, form•Z only has a manual in PDF format that is available as a stand-alone document. At the very least, it should have built-in online Help (of the type common in most applications) or a HTML-based Help document that can be launched from within it. Context-sensitive help would be even better and so would video tutorials, which can greatly help in reducing the learning curve of the application.

Conclusions

In my June 2003 Cadence cover story, "Should We BIM? Pushing the State of the Art in AEC", I predicted that as Building Information Modeling (BIM) gains momentum and BIM solutions acquire improved lighting, texturing, rendering, and animation capabilities, it is likely that general-purpose 3D modeling and visualization programs such as form•Z and Autodesk VIZ will lose ground in the AEC industry. This point of view was forcefully repudiated by Chris Yessios, President and CEO of autoodesosys Inc., the developers of form•Z, in his Viewpoint article for AECbytes. Yessios developed the core concepts behind form•Z in research projects at he Architecture Department at Ohio State University, making form•Z one of the relatively few software products in the AEC area whose technological underpinnings came directly out of a university, and an architecture school at that! While form•Z has been developed and marketed as a general-purpose 3D application, its origins in architectural CAD research give it a fluency of use for building modeling that makes it particularly popular among architects. With all the BIM applications still not sufficiently abstract and fluid for conceptual design (see my reviews of Revit 7 and ArchiCAD 9), form•Z's focus on the ease of modeling along with its ability to create highly detailed and accurate models continues to guarantee it a unique position in the industry.

At the same time, given that building-specific object-based BIM is the logical evolution for the building industry from general-purpose geometry-based CAD, form•Z needs to find innovative ways to maintain its edge in a post-CAD world. The ability to capture object properties is a great start. What is badly needed is the ability to automatically derive 2D drawings from a 3D model, which can be done even if the model is geometric and not object-based. Then those who would like to continue to use form•Z for its fluid modeling capabilities will not have to pay the penalty of redrawing plans, sections, and elevations, and can find it easier to justify their use of the application. While the new open architecture is welcome, I see the ability to customize the application by writing plug-ins and scripts as less important than innovations that will improve upon basic productivity. All designers are not programmers, but most of them are required to produce adequate documentation for a design. As things stand today, form•Z is an excellent tool for conceptualizing and visualizing design, and I hope it can adapt well to the changing AEC technology landscape as it develops further.

About the Author

Lachmi Khemlani is founder and editor of AECbytes. She has a Ph.D. in Architecture from UC Berkeley, specializing in intelligent building modeling, and consults and writes on AEC technology. She can be reached at lachmi@aecbytes.com.