Optimizing imported geometry

A 3D model can contain too much data to process for your source software exporter or import destination. On this page, we'll provide tips for optimizing and troubleshooting your exported models for Arkio on any device.

3D views

When using Arkio's plugin for Revit, Rhino, Sketchup, and Unity. Your active 3D view will be exported to Arkio as a glTF/GLB file. All geometry that is visible in your 3D view will be exported, so you can prepare a part of the models that you would like to work with in Arkio.  You can also use this to troubleshoot any issues with models that fail to export from our plugins or to import into Arkio.

Section box

The easiest way to control your export is to use the built-in section box tool in Revit, which limits the export to objects within the section box bounds. Using the section box, you can easily prepare several saved views with smaller sections of your model. If you want to load extremely large files in Arkio, it can help to reduce the model per building, wing, atrium, or courtyard, so you can see more detailed geometry on devices with limited rendering budgets. 

It can also help troubleshoot geometry that might cause import/export issues: pick a part of the building you suspect has geometry that might cause issues, and first create a smaller section box around the model to see what parts of the model still load.

Often, geometry far from the origin of your modeling software can cause export issues, so creating a section box around the main building can address that. Far-away geometry can also cause other issues in your original modeling tool, so it's best to fix this before it affects your model performance.

If you have issues loading a model, it helps to break the building into smaller fragments to see which parts still load well. When a part of the building does not load, you can further narrow the section box to identify the exact geometry causing the issue.

Worksets, layers, (sub)categories

When working with CAD/BIM tools, you often organize your geometry by Workset/Categories (Revit), Layers (Rhino), Tags (Sketchup), and Hierarchy (Unity). You can disable many of the objects you don't need before exporting to Arkio to simplify the export for mobile devices and troubleshoot which geometry might be causing issues.

Model export preparation - best practices

When exporting large scenes, follow these steps to make your models look and perform better in Arkio across all your devices. These are best practices for most 3D modeling applications and are sorted by priority of effect on performance

• Use a 3D section Box to crop only the part of your scene that you need.

• Turn off Worksets, layers, (sub)categories and geometry you don't need 

• Make use of Revit's built-in detail visibility settings (Course, Medium, Detailed)  to reduce the details of elements inside Revit families

• Use families/components/blocks without imported geometry to prevent invalid geometry and unnecessary details like 3D text and screws/bolts. These objects will slow down your original modeling tool and will also affect your device performance with other tools

• Avoid overlapping or thin surfaces and objects that could cause Z-fighting. If you plan to work at large scales in Arkio, try to use a minimum thickness of 30mm for solid objects to prevent the geometry behind bleeding through.

• Keep large architectural elements visible, like floors, walls, and ceilings, and add more details from there, as these elements don't add much geometry and help divide the building for Arkio's dynamic occlusion.

• Apply fewer materials. This will keep your modeling software faster and improve performance when bringing your models into other rendering tools. A useful workflow for this in Revit is making a multi-category material schedule organized by name and volume, so you can spot rarely used materials in your project

Manual Mesh optimization

If your model has too many triangles and you are not using Arkio's plugins to optimize and export your 3D view, you can optimize your mesh models manually using 3D mesh editing software like Blender, 3D Studio Max or mesh optimization tools like Simplygon.

Using Blender, you can import the mesh and apply a "Decimate" modifier to easily reduce your geometry up to 5% of its original size. After applying this modifier and exporting your geometry to GLB, these optimized models can be loaded to Arkio to better fit your device's render budgets (see Importing large 3D models)

Files exported from other modeling tools can be several million triangles, so the import process can take a while in these tools, but the triangle stats and wireframes can directly point you to unneeded dense geometry in the model and allow you to optimize the model before loading it to Arkio.

You can find tutorials online on how to optimize your 3D mesh files, which require some knowledge of the tools mentioned above.

Models not loading in Arkio

When a model cannot be loaded in Arkio, there may be an issue with the model's data or Arkio’s importer. If you have 3D models that still load correctly in online viewers or tools like Blender.

You can contact us at support@arkio.is if you have a model that does not load well, as we love to learn about this to improve Arkio’s importers.