Round Tripping Design Review mark-ups in Revit

A typical workflow for a set of construction drawings include printing out a set of drawings, having the Lead architect or Project Manager review the project by marking up the sheets with a red pen and then give back to make the noted changes.

This can include lots of printed sheets and lots of space to lay out the printed drawings….

If we use Design Review for our review drawings we can exchange comments, notes and questions all digitally. Whoever is reviewing the DWFx sheets can also see the properties of elements as well as use a set of tools in Design Review to pull information as well as place comments.

When you mark up the DWF file, you are marking on top of the plotted views from Revit, as if you used a red marker on a printout. After you have marked up the DWF, you can link it back into Revit.

Bringing the DWFx back into Revit we can mark the changes as either Question, Done or For Review as well as write comments and then be saved back to the DWFx.

The reviewer can also have the entire model to review and explore in Design Review giving them a far better understanding of the entire project.

Here’s how we can “Round trip” a DWFx file to and from Revit:

Firstly we need to export Revitsheet and views to a DWFx file.

Note: The difference between DWF and DWFx, we can export sheets and views to DWF as well as DWFx but only DWFx will allow us to export the 3D model.

 

·         From the application button (the big R in the top left) select Export > DWF/DWFx

·         Select from the drop down what you want to export. Note that if you select “All views and sheets in the Model”  you will be able to select the 3D view as well as the sheets.

After making your selection you can save it for future use.
 Save to a folder and you’re ready to open in Design Review to mark up…

Open the DWFx in Design Review and using the tools available make any comments, notes queries that you need.

 

After you have marked up your DWFx bring it back into Revit by using the DWF Markup took in Revit.

A dialog box will pop up allowing you to map the DWFx sheets to your Revit sheets, but only if you need too and if you have renamed your sheets after exporting the DWFx.

You can manage your DWFx links through the Manage Links dialog box.

Any comments and mark-up on the DWF will then be superimposed on top of your Revit sheets.

By selecting the comment the properties of the DWF appear which you can now manipulate.

Such as:

Change the status of the comment.

Options include: None, For Review, Question and Done.

Make notes on the comment; maybe write a question here or a comment for the reviewer.

Review the History of the comments and the number of times it’s been “Round Tripped”.

When you’re done reviewing and making the appropriate comments to the DWF file while in Revit save the Revit project, this will automatically save back your changes that you have made to the DWF.

You can resend the DWFx back to the Reviewer for verification. Any changes to the status of the comments or adding your own comments will be updated in the DWF file.