Agentic and Agent-based AI

Over the last two years, AI technology at AIA24 and AIA25 has steadily matured, and we saw many AI solutions last year. However, this year, AI and automation were scaled up a notch. In particular, we are beginning to see Anthropic’s MCP (model context protocol) technology rolling out across product solutions and agentic AI technologies that orchestrate data and workflows. This is different than AI that simply finds information for you, whether about your application or data out on the internet.

Model Context Protocol

For clarity, Model Context Protocol (MCP) is closely tied to agentic AI, but the MCP standard is an infrastructure protocol, not an autonomous AI agent itself. Think of it as plumbing. In fact, the popular analogy for MCP is “USB-C for AI.” Tools that now support MCP are becoming numerous in AEC. Two key ones were awarded Architosh’s AIA26 BEST of SHOW honors yesterday. (see, Architosh: “AIA26: Architosh 12th ‘BEST of SHOW’ honors for digital technologies at AIA San Diego,” 22 June 2026)

MCP by itself doesn’t really do much. You need an AI architecture that can orchestrate the core software system and manage the AI’s state, controls, and logic flow. Such systems instruct the software on what step to take next. So we are seeing Anthropic’s Claude AI technology now connected to software systems like SketchUp and Bluebeam Max to do very useful kinds of things that normally take a considerable amount of time to do the old human-only way. Claude is used as a natural language user interface (NLUI) and can speak to the software and get work done.

SketchUp’s new Claude integration brings generative AI modeling to the popular 3D modeling platform.

In SketchUp’s case, it can create (model) 3D objects directly inside SketchUp. In Bluebeam Max’s case, Claude can produce Revu commands such as batch operations, batch search, highlight, and a whole lot more. Both of these tools were highlights of AIA26 San Diego this year.

Other solutions have chat-based palettes built directly into their interfaces. This is becoming table stakes for software in the age of AI. These solutions are often called “co-pilots” or “agent-driven UIs”. They don’t just answer questions about the software; the AI itself has an execution layer and can map natural-language intent directly into function-system operations. We discussed this intently in our recent feature on ARES 2026 software, where it was possible to talk your way into having the CAD and BIM software actually draw things for you, or create layers within your file, following your textual direction. (see, Architosh: “ARES 2027 Deep Dive: AI, Automation and BIM-to-DWG Workflows,” 5 May 2026). We also discussed this particular feature during an online event.

While CAD tools like ARES 2027 are nearly a full release cycle ahead of many CAD and BIM solutions in the industry in terms of this kind of AI capability, we are starting to see solutions like SketchUp, with its Claude integration, leverage AI automation to make work happen in a similar way. Basically, let AI drive the software and produce work for you.

So you may ask: what is the benefit of having AI drive the software in the same vein as having your Tesla drive itself?

The answer depends, but usually, if something is extremely repetitive, the AI can do it much faster. Or, if the task is quite complex and would require advanced skills in software you don’t have, the speed-up could be massive or even infinite, since you can’t actually do it at all. If you can’t model the Space Shuttle inside of AutoCAD or ARES, but you can use ARES’ AI tools to create it for you, the AI didn’t just save time; the AI made it possible for you.

Automation Matters Also

Not all the buzz in the AEC industry software involves artificial intelligence (AI). There are many ways general automation can occur without LLMs or agentic AI. With the new BIM 2.0 software tools, their data-centric workflows and API interconnections mean that data from tools like Arcol can stream directly into other solutions and data types via API linkages.

Arcol is showing its new integration of spreadsheets that can be bi-directionally synced with Excel files. This feature was highly requested by general construction and development companies so they could link building metrics with their own cost data.

As part of Arcol’s embrace of the construction industry (it is still focused on architects as well), the BIM 2.0 company added interconnections to spreadsheets (Excel) so that early-stage designs can be paired with cost data from large general contractors doing real estate development.

BIM 2.5?

We often write about BIM 2.0. But originally BIM 2.0 didn’t begin with AI in mind like we currently are thinking about AI. When firms like Spacemaker.AI (now Forma), Digital Bluefoam, TestFit, Arcol, and Snaptrude began their journey, it happened before the OpenAI explosion, and the public had no idea about such AI tools yet. But now that we are on the other side of this critical invention, what if someone built an AEC software ecosystem with agentic AI in its DNA from the ground up?

Newcomer (neoBIM), with its buildingOS system, is doing exactly that.

NeoBIM GmbH is a new German AEC software company aiming to reshape the industry with the industry’s first AI-native ground-up software ecosystem architecture. The company and its buildingOS system have several discrete tools so far, including a TestFit-like early-stage planning tool called Gen.

NeoBIM has a new AI-centric application system architecture for the complete building lifecycle, from early site test fits (shown above) to post-occupancy digital twins. The German software firm’s founder is Moritz Luck, who was co-founder and GEO of Enscape and is also the founding partner of SilverScale Capital. Their demonstrations at AIA26 were impressive, and so NeoBIM GmbH is definitely a company on our radar this year, and we look forward to learning more about what they are doing.

The post AIA26: AI and Automation Shine in San Diego—Some Highlights appeared first on Architosh.

Architosh BOS

This is our 12th year of judging what we saw at AIA as “BEST of SHOW.” These honors are aimed at directing our global readers’ attention to both interesting newcomer applications and critical trends that impact technology adoption. On this last note, the history of our selections for these honors is notable. Put another way, if our AIA BEST of SHOW were investment picks, Pete Evans and I would have done exceptionally well, financially.

MORE: AIA26: AI and Automation Shine in San Diego — Some Highlights

Just a few representative examples include Gehry Technologies’ GTeam (winner in 2013), which was later acquired by Trimble and is now Trimble Connect. Then there was IrisVR (winner in 2015), which merged with The Wild and was later acquired by Autodesk. We can say similar things about some smaller companies, which, perhaps not acquired (or recently acquired), have grown into powerhouse brands in AEC.

Honors and Prizes

For this year’s announcements, we are going to jump directly into the winners and write about our award categories, criteria, and thematic issues at the end of this article. We also always publish a “Perspectives” companion feature, but last year we switched that to a recorded discussion (video). Look for a forthcoming piece.

So let’s focus on the honorees. Without further ado.

Congratulations to the 2026 Architosh AIA ‘BEST of SHOW’ honorees!

BEST of SHOW — EMERGENT TECHNOLOGY Category

Winner: SketchUp (w/ Claude integration)

Trimble SketchUp has long been the standard for easy conceptual modeling in the early stages of design. Contractors also gravitated to this platform as it offered rapid visualization, which could be used for 4D visualizations and project realization. “This year, SketchUp transforms its accessible capabilities into a built-in, real-time collaboration space for teams and clients, a cloud-connected, multi-user workflow focused on the middle of the project delivery,” says Pete Evans, AIA, senior associate editor, Architosh. “It builds on its legacy of ease-of-use with an in-app chatbot for workflow assistance that can also generate 3D objects from text prompts and images, and likewise generate photorealistic images from models and text prompts.” 

More radically, it also introduced its first (Trimble-based) MCP connector, the “SketchUp Connector for Claude,” to open AI workflows more widely to vibe modeling. Pete Evans, AIA, Architosh, notes, “This multi-pronged AI approach includes a built-in intelligent core, but complements that with open, interoperable workflows and ease-of-use that SketchUp has forever been famous for by opening up and staying at the forefront of AI capabilities.” This is on top of other new features now built into the core of SketchUp, like the Analysis Hub and Lab tools, with specialized extensions such as Daylight analysis, which provides daylight metrics, illuminance data, heatmaps, and “right-of-light” submission capabilities. Live components also added more parametric-like capabilities for more powerful modeling alongside powerful cloud collaboration as part of its 2026 release. “At the heart of our decision to place this in the emergent technology winner category is the agentic AI interface with Anthropic’s Claude,” adds Anthony Frausto-Robledo, AIA, Founder and Editor-in-Chief, Architosh. “MCP and agentic AI workflows embedded into popular industry tools today are at the very heart of what is critically emergent in AEC tech in 2026.” 

Winner: Bluebeam Max

A mainstay in the AEC/O industry gained a new superpower thanks to agentic AI, coupled with both acquired and in-house-developed AI capabilities, in Bluebeam Max. “There are several different AI technologies in the Bluebeam Max product offering, but the Claude integration with the integral MCP server in Revu is the tech that has users exceptionally excited,” says Anthony Frausto-Robledo, AIA, Founder and Editor-in-Chief, Architosh. “Bluebeam Revu workflows in AEC are naturally highly repetitive, so Claude’s ability to automate these functions is a force multiplier in efficiencies. Moreover, the Smart Review AI features are already being used by GCs to find discrepancies in drawings within a day, which typically reveal themselves slowly over many weeks or months during the construction phase. As a result, it behooves AE professionals to deploy Bluebeam Max as part of their workflow prior to releasing drawings for bid or construction, so they find these errors first.”

Criteria Notes: The novelty of MCP with AI orchestrators like Anthropic’s Claude showcases a dramatic shift in how architects can work with existing desktop-era tools like SketchUp and Bluebeam, enabling users to experience a tremendous speed-up in software workflows. AI can request specific tools or data “on-the-fly” based on evolving tasks rather than operating on a pre-defined set of constraints. Claude powers both tools, revealing just the beginning of agentic AI’s capabilities. This speaks to our emergent technology award category at multiple levels, representing both convergence and a thematic change for practice. 

BEST of SHOW — INNOVATION Category

Winner: Kestrel Labs

“Kestrel Labs’ new compliance platform focused on building codes was one of AIA26 San Diego’s biggest highlights with respect to digital tools,” says Anthony Frausto-Robledo, AIA, Founder and Editor-in-Chief, Architosh. “While other AI code tools exist, Kestrel’s solution puts their compliance engine directly inside the design and documentation environment, whilst also having an intelligent web-based code analysis space for its users.”

An added unique feature of Kestrel’s strategy and implementation is the notion that your project’s “code work” moves with the project through different tools over different phases of the project’s lifecycle. While not all of this is available today, as Kestrel develops its solution for tools like SketchUp next and other BIMs, this unique feature will benefit its users. “Kestrel’s implementation is also particularly strong for a new application,” adds Frausto-Robledo, AIA, Architosh, “with a visually appealing GUI and brand identity that speaks to architects in a similar way that Monograph’s award-winning app does as well. “Every few years, maybe around every five, a brand new tool comes out that really has the ability to capture a critical beachhead—that Omaha Beach moment—where we just know a tool and its strategy is super strong and will have rapid success. We believe Kestrel is that,” adds Frausto-Robledo. 

Criteria Notes: Innovation winners often herald “new directions” in digital technologies often solving age-old pain points. Kestrel’s AI-powered compliance platform is a rather textbook example. The quality of attack on addressing code review in practice is particularly impressive, as is its implementation at version 1.0

BEST of SHOW — BIM Category

Winner: Arcol

Arcol short-circuited development by deeply connecting to Rhino3D instead of developing its own complex geometry engine. Today, this is a live feature in Arcol’s second year at the AIA conference. (Arcol won this award last year.) Arcol embeds live Rhino3D geometry in its modeling environment, where, if changed (remotely), it is continuously updated as native Arcol geometry within the data-rich collaborative web environment. Pete Evans, AIA, Architosh says, “Adding Rhino as a live, two-way directional bridge allows a new, very strong accelerator to data-rich modeling form that is unlimited.” Another distinct area of acceleration is in its tables and boards for team members beyond presentation. Specific data tables can be “soft time-stamped” to hold a state for a specific view, but they can be updated while still connected to the underlying project data.

This provides a contractor, for instance, with a more static view of a table that doesn’t dynamically change with model updates. This table can then be updated, but this clear communication shifts from static versioning and archiving, as in today’s practice, to an Arcol project that contains a live, data-rich core and narrative from start to end for continuous updates and shared decision-making. “We also like how Arcol, as both a company and a BIM 2.0 application, is gaining traction in the market with large general contractors and real estate developers,” adds Frausto-Robledo, AIA, “as this indexes Arcol’s stated goal of creating a BIM 2.0 application for the entirety of the industry and not just architects.” Finally, the company’s goal for agentic AI “agents” operating with IP knowledge from various industry leaders working alongside human designers is a compelling future vision. “This future aspect of the app isn’t factored into our award decision,” adds Pete Evans, AIA, “but it sharpens our watch on what we believe is the market forerunner on BIM 2.0 outside of Autodesk’s own similar tools.”

Criteria Notes:  While the BIM category winner can be new or old, Arcol (as a 2nd-year “Best of Show” winner) continues to rapidly expand its BIM capabilities and attack multiple pain points with its novel approach, and underpins that power with a full embrace of future agentic BIM (see notes below). Critically, this release includes Arcol’s ability to solve a critical pain point in advanced modeling integration with Rhino 3D, plus its worksheet functionality (bi-directional linking to Excel files like xRefs) to address the needs of large GCs (and we know of several as early customers), addressing longstanding cost-control issues in the AEC industry, by bringing these cost management functions up to the front of the process. 

The ability to corral multiple AI agents for its early-phase design includes costing, zoning, and structural agents, with a perspective that builds on the core real-time collaborative nature of Arcol. “Intelligent by default” positions Agentic BIM as a massive shift in the Macleamy curve itself, enabling a collaborative jumpstart with buildable information in a radically shorter timeframe.

BEST of SHOW —  CLOUD Category

Winner: Morpholio Trace

“Morpholio Trace has always been a special tool in the AEC universe,” says Frausto-Robledo, AIA, Founder and Editor-in-Chief, Architosh. “But a tight integration with this particular BIM authoring tool (Vectorworks) seems like the perfect match-up that will yield special advantages for both Vectorworks users and established Morpholio users.” While the sister brand Vectorworks acquired Morpholio, we don’t see Morpholio staying connected only to Vectorworks in the long term. “In addition to bringing the sketching-thinking process closer to an advanced BIM tool—where there are so many layers of interaction opportunities—Morpholio can serve as the ultimate first step to sketch-to AI-rendering and animation,” adds Frausto-Robledo, AIA.

Strategically, Morpholio Trace is a significant net benefit to the entire Nemetschek Group because sketch-to-AI visualization workflows are currently the highest accelerators in the industry. “Nothing in AEC is currently moving faster than AI-based rendering, and nothing is better to steer and control this kind of AI rendering than using a pen and digital paper,” says Frausto-Robledo, AIA. “Given that Nemetschek also owns Maxon with its rekindled interest in archviz, the next steps for where to take Morpholio Trace seem super obvious to me.”

Criteria Notes: Cloud-first and mobile-first solutions are those that drive at full utilization and maturing cloud-to-mobile or cloud-to-web tech stacks. Morpholio, with its new integrations with Vectorworks’s hybrid CAD/BIM environment, seems like it has found its ultimate dance partner. Morpholio Trace is strategically positioned to converge with AI visualization, and its underlying sketching environment is poised to drive such workflows. In the meantime, Morpholio Trace has so much to offer to the sketch-to-BIM concept at Vectorworks. 

BEST of SHOW —  VISUALIZATION Category

Winner: Chaos Veras

Chaos Veras 4.0 introduced a new AI rendering engine powered by Google’s Nano Banana Pro, which improved geometry fidelity, material realism, and lighting accuracy. Accuracy improvements were alongside reduced image artifacting and “AI hallucinations.” This creates better control and precision for both image generation from reference sketches or prompts, but also using a model as the underlying design to create more valid visual results. New capabilities also introduced 2D to 3D visualization with floor plans to generate spatial renderings and the ability to construct multiple perspectives from an initial view, without rebuilding geometry. Animation is also a new capability from a static image while controlling camera motion, animated entourage such as cars and people, time of day, and different weather conditions. Pete Evans, AIA, noted, “Veras is a whole new level of storytelling that invites more technically-based architects as well as non-technical designers, such as an office principal, to a new, rapid visual idea layer for interactive project visualization.

Veras radically reduces the need for a technically accurate, time-consuming 3D model during early-stage ideation. This frees up valuable resources for creative visual iteration and communication.” “The time-savings and yield advantages of AI rendering tools like Veras are major force multipliers in practice,” adds Frausto-Robledo, AIA. “While there are numerous options in the market, we see future advantages of Veras being a part of Chaos beyond just its integration with all of Chaos’ tools.”

Criteria Notes: Chaos continues to challenge and transform the way architects approach the visual landscape of architectural visualization. The release of Veras 4.0 this year presented significant and compelling materials for seeing architecture in unprecedented ways. This tool’s advancement easily meets the criteria for this category (see below), especially in implementation quality and the acceleration of solution quality. 

BEST of SHOW — The Economics Prize

Winner:  Chaos Veras

The Economics Prize is awarded to solutions that reflect substantial process improvements even through “creative destruction.” Chaos Veras is a leading mature AI visualization tool in the industry, Uber-izing a known process: photo-realistic 3D renderings and animations. “While Veras is a worthy winner of the Economics prize for the sheer speed-up of its abilities to produce useful visuals deployable to different purposes in the design communication process, it is also disruptive to established archviz professionals who have painstakingly developed advanced visualization and animation skillsets,” says Anthony Frausto-Robledo, AIA, Architosh. Architects today are finding Veras a force multiplier for securing client buy-in and for design exploration prior to it. “It’s not hard to see why Veras, and tools like it, are so incredibly popular,” adds Frausto-Robledo, AIA. “They accelerate both sides of the visualization coin: the part that helps us design as architects and the part that helps us sell our ideas to our clients.” 

Criteria Notes: Veras delivers sizable process improvements to a common industry deliverable: photorealistic renderings. The “Uber-ization” part of our comments relates to the accessibility of what Veras produces and the three-point superiority factors: cost, speed, and quality. The cost of final images is multiple times lower; the output speed (via the process) is multiple times faster than traditional rendering; and the quality is solid and fit for purpose.

Award Categories and Criteria

Our award categories are designed to be broad and flexible, enabling us to honorably note a product across multiple categories if warranted.

• Emergent Technology (emTech) Category Award — acknowledges industry potential for novel or bleeding-edge technology implementations that will offer “thematic” change for practice or create convergent technology paths and drive synergistic directions for the industry.
• Innovation Category Award — acknowledges the “most promising” companies and products that are heralding innovative “new directions” in AEC software or hardware technologies, as measured by: (a) implementation quality, (b) acceleration of quality of solution, (c) quality of attack on addressing “pain points” in practice, and (d) fitting convergent technology paths and driving at synergistic directions for the industry.
• BIM Category Award — acknowledges both new or mature companies and products serving the “BIM workflow” industry transformation, touching down at any segment of the MacLeamy Curve where value gets added, as measured by: (a) implementation quality, (b) acceleration of quality of solution, (c) quality of attack on addressing “pain points” in BIM workflows, (d) adoption, extension and commitment to Open BIM philosophies so that data and toolchains are social and democratized to their fullest extent, and (e) fitting convergent technology paths and driving at synergistic directions for the industry.
• Cloud Category Award  — acknowledges technology solutions (software or hardware) driving at full utilization of synergistic and maturing “cloud-to-mobile,” “mobile-to-cloud,” and “cloud-to-web” technology stacks, exhibited or seen at the AIA convention, as measured by: (a) implementation quality and novelty, (b) acceleration of quality of solution, (c) quality of attack on addressing pain-points in AEC, and (d) fitting convergent technology paths and driving at synergistic directions for the industry.
• Visualization Category Award  — acknowledges the “most compelling visualization solutions” and technologies that are “transforming the architect’s workflow,” heralding new ways of seeing architecture for all stakeholders and not just clients, accelerating design optioneering, material, and light discovery, design problem solving, and design collaboration, as measured by: (a) implementation quality, (b) acceleration of quality of solution, including rendering speeds and image qualities, (c) quality of attack at addressing “pain points” in practice, and (d) fitting convergent technology paths and addressing synergist directions in the industry.
• The Economics Prize — reflecting an important shift within the architectural industry to acknowledge the extent of poor economics for architects and a newfound demand for better working conditions and pay, the Economics Prize is awarded to digital technology that shines in the direction of better economics for architects, as measured by: (a) sizeable process improvements to common industry deliverables via creative disruption (ie, Uber-ize a known process), (b) notable value disruption by a vendor via license cost comparison without “bundling,” (c) notable outsized release update delivering exceptional value increase for users, and finally (d) performance capture due to innovative, leading-edge software or hardware solutions.  

Congratulations to the 2026 Architosh AIA ‘BEST of SHOW’ honorees listed below.

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Redshift for Revit

The distinguishing feature of Redshift is the quality of its raytracer technology, and bringing that to real-time BIM authoring solutions gives architects and designers another excellent choice for both real-time design visualization and final-render presentation visualization. Moreover, with a simple click, work in Redshift for Revit or Redshift for Archicad can send your scene forward to Maxon’s award-winning Cinema 4D DCC (digital content creation) software for more sophisticated animations and visuals.

Redshift for Archviz debuted in Vectorworks in March 2026, and Maxon intends to roll out its acclaimed Redshift technology across popular AEC modeling solutions as part of its growing AEC roadmap. Redshift for Graphisoft Archicad is now open for beta sign-ups; click here to learn more.

Maxon’s new AEC industry push continues with Redshift for Autodesk Revit and more. A beta version of Redshift for Graphisoft Archicad is also available.

“The world architects create is inherently three-dimensional, yet much of the industry still relies on workflows built around two-dimensional representations,” said David McGavran, CEO of Maxon. “With Redshift for Archviz, our goal is to make 3D design the new standard across architecture, engineering, and construction. Through enabling digital projects to be experienced as if they already exist in the real world, we’re giving architects and interior designers a more powerful way to communicate ideas, make decisions, and bring their visions to life.”

Redshift for Revit Details

Now available, Redshift for Autodesk Revit delivers physically accurate lighting, reflections, shadows, and materials while remaining highly interactive. Maxon is also introducing three new platform features for architectural visualization:

• Depth of Field enhances architectural renders by mimicking real-world camera effects in real time, helping designers guide visual focus and create more immersive client presentations.

• AI Context-Aware Library Search analyzes the current view and suggests suitable assets, helping users build richer, more detailed scenes with less manual searching.

• Maxon Plants Smart Transfer is designed to simplify the process of bringing high-quality vegetation assets into architectural scenes for more realistic environments and faster scene development.

Maxon says that for users on Apple Mac computers, Maxon Redshift leverages Apple’s new MetalFX technology for improved interactive frame rates and exceptional visual realism for macOS users.

”Architects and interior designers don’t think in floor plans. They think in light, materials, and how a space feels,” said Nicolas Burtnyk, EVP of Rendering at Maxon. “Redshift lets them shape all of that in real time, then see it at full photorealistic quality, iterating on and refining how a space looks and feels as they go.”

Maxon’s Ecosystem

Maxon’s Cinema 4D flagship application has long been a popular archviz application, particularly in DACH regions in Europe. Architosh has reviewed Cinema 4D in the past from the point of view of AEC visualization. And the solution is a stunning application for doing sophisticated animation work. As part of the Redshift Archviz solutions (Vectorworks, Revit, and Archicad), a single button pushes out the scene and its assets to Cinema 4D for more advanced still visuals and cinematic animation work.

To learn more and see the new Redshift for Autodesk Revit and Redshift for Graphisoft Archicad (beta), click on the appropriate links.

Architosh Analysis and Commentary

There are subtle differences in some of the implementations of Redshift for Archviz, but for the most part, the same features are common whether you are on Revit, Vectorworks, or Archicad. In terms of visualization competition, the new Maxon offerings do add competitive pressure for real-time interactive rendering solutions in the market. Both Chaos and Maxon are up against Epic Games and its Twinmotion tie-in with Autodesk Revit, which is partially integrated. On a cost basis, Maxon is undercutting Chaos’ pricing with Enscape, but the Chaos ecosystem is much larger and more mature. Ultimately, cost shouldn’t be the deciding factor between either of these solutions, but rather their other advantages. 

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Kestrel raised USD 2.15 million in pre-seed financing from New Stack Ventures, FirstMile Ventures, Denver Ventures, and Avesta Fund.

Kestrel Labs

Kestrel Labs is the first software company to deliver this capability, bringing code compliance natively inside BIM workflows.

Key Takeaways

• Industry-first compliance platform built natively inside BIM authoring tool.
• Introduced first for Autodesk Revit, with SketchUp support coming soon. There is also live Trimble Connect integration
• Compliance analysis is also supplemented with an AI building code assistant available directly inside the plugin palette in Revit or in the web browser

This will give architecture teams the ability to check design elements against jurisdiction-specific code requirements directly inside Revit before drawings reach plan review stages.

Kestrel Labs, shown inside Autodesk Revit, is the AEC industry’s first native BIM compliance platform. With Kestrel, architects can bring building code analysis directly into the BIM authoring environment, where Kestrel’s unique technology works with the data and geometry in the BIM file to discover and instruct on code compliance issues.

Based on data from the Construction Industry Institute, the cost to fix a compliance issue multiplies tenfold at each successive project phase. So what might cost an hour to fix during design can multiply to a week’s worth of time after construction begins. For decades, architects have been navigating a compounding problem, and as senior architects with decades of tacit knowledge about building codes begin to retire, the knowledge transfer that used to happen on the job is beginning to disappear at exactly the same time compliance paths are increasing in complexity.

The Kestrel Platform

The Kestrel Compliance Platform consists of multiple components at this initial launch, including:

• Kestrel Compliance Analysis — One click inside Revit runs a full compliance check in about 30 seconds, with every result tied to the specific model element in question and cited to the exact code section.
• Kestrel Compliance Chat — A built-in AI building code assistant and thought partner that answers project-specific compliance questions in plain language, cited to the exact code section. This AI building code chat assistant is available in both the Revit Kestrel panel and in the web browser.
• Kestrel Portal — A web-based compliance dashboard for project managers and firm leadership with no BIM file required.

Marian Pulford, co-founder and CEO, Kestrel Labs has told Architosh:

“New hires are billable from week one now,” adds Micah Gray, AIA, Director of Technology and Innovation. “There is little runway to sit with a senior architect and transfer twenty years of code knowledge. Kestrel changes that equation. The code is in the model, visible to everyone, and it does not depend on who is in the room. That is not a small thing for a firm that is trying to grow.”

Deep Investor Positivity

“Construction is one of those industries where everyone knows the problem, and nobody has built the infrastructure to fix it,” says Nick Moran, General Partner, New Stack Ventures. “Kestrel came to us with deep domain knowledge, a product already running inside the tools architects use every day, and a data foundation that would take most companies years to assemble. That combination – inside the workflow, grounded in authoritative data, solving a problem the profession has accepted as unsolvable – is exactly what we look for.”

Kestrel Labs in action with the code violation window shown. As you work through the code issues list, Kestrel brings into view the specific BIM element in question.

“We invested in Kestrel because they understand what most AEC companies miss: compliance is not a feature. It is the foundation,” adds Aaron Stachel, Founding Partner, FirstMile Ventures. “Every permit delay, every round of rework, traces to building code issues in the design process. Kestrel fixes that from inside the BIM model. This is not a workflow improvement but a structural shift for the industry, and this team is built to lead that shift.”

Availability and Pricing

Architects can find Kestrel Labs’ solution inside the Autodesk Design & Make Marketplace, the Trimble Connect Marketplace, and soon with added SketchUp integration (coming soon).

Pricing works through a firm-wide annual license. There is no per-seat fees.

• No limits on users, projects, or compliance checks.
• Pricing reflects firm size, project complexity, and jurisdictional scope.
• Charter customers receive preferred pricing and input on the jurisdictional roadmap.

On that last point, Kestrel’s compliance platform intends to expand beyond North America to address code compliance for architects worldwide. In an upcoming Architosh interview feature, both co-founders discuss in detail how Kestrel Labs began, how the origin of its co-founders impacted the solutions they are bringing to market, what core technologies are at play, and numerous other details about Kestrel’s direction moving forward. So look for that upcoming interview feature soon!

To visit Kestrel Labs, go here now.

About Kestrel Labs

Kestrel Labs, located in Denver, Colorado, is the first AI-powered building code compliance platform built natively inside BIM and the first structured compliance data layer for the built environment.

Architosh Analysis and Commentary

This is a technology that should have been embedded in BIM authoring tools years ago, so we are excited to see Kestrel Labs tackle this age-old problem of code compliance and code-checking. Most large architectural offices either have a dedicated code specialist or regularly consult with a code specialist consultant, and there are many around. However, working with code consultants is a different kind of workflow and has limitations. What Kestrel is doing is democratizing code compliance knowledge, which is especially meaningful as we enter the crest of the Baby Boomers wave as they retire over the next decade. When they leave, so does decades of hard-earned tacit knowledge (know-how) about how code compliance works in architecture. Kestrel Labs has arrived just in time for the world of architecture.

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Sketch-to-BIM

This integration comes with Vectorworks 2026 Update 5 and connects iPad sketching directly to Vectorworks.

Key Takeaways

• New Export to Morpholio Trace command — sends selected, scale-accurate sheets or viewports from Vectorworks via the cloud to a dedicated Vectorworks folder in Trace on their iPad.
• New Import from Morpholio Trace command — brings sketches from Trace back into Vectorworks files as images or vector-based linework, streamlining tracing to CAD/BIM workflows.

Architects today still begin design processes with hand sketching, and many use tablet-based software products like Morpholio Trace. The Apple Design Award-winning iPad app has been labeled “dream software for architects,” and combines the power of Apple Pencil technology with the incredible processing power of the Apple iPad.

Vectorworks 2026 now has full integration with Apple award-winning app Morpholio Trace.

From initial concepts and design details to construction administration stage markups, Morpholio Trace delivers intelligent workflows for architects using the power of immediate hand to sketch workflows.

MORE: Vectorworks acquires popular Morpholio—Leading Mobile Design App

The new Trace integration with Vectorworks reflects a market-proven fact that drawing, tracing, and sketching remain central to how designers think, explore, and communicate ideas. Through the connection with Vectorworks on desktop, designers can move between various workflow scenarios and personas, from the immediacy of hand sketching to the intelligence of their BIM and CAD models.

“With this integration, we’re bringing the power of sketching and the precision of BIM closer together than ever before,” said Vectorworks Product Planner Iskra Nikolova. “Drawings and sketches now move seamlessly in both directions through Vectorworks Cloud Services. Designers can start in Vectorworks and then sketch in Trace, or begin in Trace and bring those ideas back into Vectorworks, enabling a fluid, flexible creative process without extra steps or friction. The release of this integration in Vectorworks 2026 Update 5 marks another milestone in our commitment to connected, mobile-friendly workflows that honor the craft of design.”

Getting Features

This new integration comes with Vectorworks 2026 Update 5, available now. This update is now accessible for all currently released English-language versions of Vectorworks 2026 through subscription and Vectorworks Service Select customers. Vectorworks users can install by selecting “Check for Updates from the Vectorworks menu (Mac) or Help menu (Windows).

To explore the new Morpholio Trace integration and all the latest features, start a free 7-day trial of Vectorworks Design Suite and download Morpholio Trace for iPad and iPhone in the Apple App Store.

Architosh Analysis and Commentary

Morpholio Trace works with more applications than just Vectorworks, as it can ingest 3D models created in various applications, from BIM to professional 3D modelers. Usually, you export your model out to a (.USDZ) or (.OBJ) file format to bring into Trace. Of course, the Vectorworks integration is even smoother than this, and it’s automated in the cloud. 

Beyond Morpholio Trace, Morpholio Journal is another sister app for simply having a digital sketchbook. It features amazing pens and brushes, and you can also write in it. Then there is BoardPro, a mood board application. ELLE Décore magazine called it “addictive” and awarded it “Best Apps” for interior design, home decor, and interior architecture. This particular app is interesting because Vectorworks, as a company, has toyed with the idea of an industry vertical version of Vectorworks for interior professionals. Currently, interior professionals buy Vectorworks Architect or Vectorworks Design Suite to use as their CAD-BIM environment, but we could see an evolution in which both Vectorworks and this suite of apps (especially BoardPro) develop into a consolidated solution or package called Vectorworks Interiors. 

The advantage Vectorworks has created through its industry vertical solutions is the delivery of a tailor-made solution for a particular type of AEC/O professional. Architosh has written about this in the past in some detail: the one-size-fits-all approach will eventually lose out to highly focused, more pointed, and specialized solutions. We don’t know for certain if that is where the company will go next, but the acquisition of Morpholio Trace offers interesting suggestions. 

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Importantly, Newforma announced a simplified, modular user-based software licensing model, which will help firms better align purchases with role-specific needs.

Newforma and AI

Artificial intelligence (AI) was front and center at Newforma World 2026, the company’s annual user conference. So was updating and modernizing the company’s product offerings.

Newforma announces its broad strategic visions for the AEC/O global industry.

Key new announcements include:

• Newforma Vojo — the company’s new AI assistant, built on an agent-driven framework that lets users search project information, analyze content, and complete tasks more efficiently. Initial capabilities include natural-language search across project data, AI-driven analysis of BIM models and documents, and AI-assisted submittal review workflows.
• Hybrid Modernization — continued investment in hybrid modernization with Newforma Project Center, a reflection of its strategic vision, helping with a seamless transition to the cloud, cloud-connected environments, and more.
• Newforma FedRAMP Moderate — new initiative to address ongoing work toward advanced compliance requirements.

At Newforma World 2026, the message was about flexibility towards the cloud, combining Newforma’s AI-driven automation and support of open integrations, and reinforced a “cloud-first, not cloud-forced” approach that supports customers wherever they are in their modernization journey.

Customers choose when and how they modernize. We decided not to be cloud-only, and it’s by design,” said Carl Veillette, Chief Product Officer at Newforma. “Everything we build must either lower risk, save time, or unlock scale.”

MORE: Newforma accelerates AI innovation and AWS expansion

The AI agent Vojo is embedding intelligence directly into project workflows, such as Smart Email Filing, an AI-powered capability that automatically associates emails with projects and recommends filing locations for RFIs, submittals, and action items, which aids firms in maintaining a more defensible project record.

These capabilities are supported by the company’s collaboration with Amazon Web Services (AWS), providing secure and scalable infrastructure for advanced AI innovation.

“AI is only as powerful as the data it’s built on,” said Ben Schreiner, Head of AI and Modern Data Strategy Business Development at Amazon Web Services. “Newforma’s approach combines secure, scalable AWS infrastructure with an agent-driven AI framework to help AECO teams surface insights, reduce manual effort, and make more confident decisions, and we’re thrilled to be partnering with Newforma.”

To learn more about Newforma’s latest announcements, go here.

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DACH Region

The news reflects the company’s interest in establishing a stronger European hub that builds on ComputerWorks’ market expertise, technical support structure, and sales channel developed over decades of service to German-speaking architects and designers. The acquisition is expected to be completed by 4 May 2026.

As part of the deal, ComputerWorks in Germany will be renamed Vectorworks Germany GmbH. ComputerWorks AG will spin off its CAD division to establish Vectorworks Switzerland AG, while the remaining business will continue as ComputerWorks AG.

Vectorworks has new corporate offices in Germany and Switzerland, acquiring its DACH region distributor, ComputerWorks AG’s CAD division. 

“For many years, ComputerWorks has represented Vectorworks to thousands of designers and planners in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland,” said Vectorworks CEO Jason Pletcher. “By bringing ComputerWorks into the Vectorworks family, we are not only expanding our presence in these specific countries, but also combining the strength of a global product organization with the expertise of trusted local professionals. This will enable us to help our customers move faster, collaborate more effectively, and deliver superior designs.”

German Language Market Needs

ComputerWorks AG has long localized Vectorworks products for the German language markets, tailoring the product line and offering complementary solutions to meet regional needs for the architecture, interiors, landscape, and entertainment industries.

“Designers in the DACH region face complex projects, demanding clients, and evolving regulations. They need partners who understand both the local context and global tools,” said Alexander Meier, CEO of Vectorworks Germany. “Becoming part of Vectorworks enables our team to bring our deep understanding of customer needs across all disciplines directly to the people building the software. Together, we can shape features, content, and services that reflect how our customers work today and where they want to go tomorrow.”

“With more than 30 years of development experience, we know that true innovation begins with a deep understanding of local needs and workflows,” said Andreas Hängärtner, CEO of Vectorworks Switzerland. “When that local insight is amplified through international collaboration and presented on a global stage, it creates new opportunities for our users to design with greater confidence and impact.”

German and Swiss Offices

The Vectorworks Germany office is located in Lörrach, Germany, and the Vectorworks Switzerland office is located in Basel, Switzerland. Vectorworks’s parent company, the Nemetschek Group, is headquartered in Munich, Germany, in the Nemetschek Haus, a large office complex that also houses several of its key brands, including Allplan and Bluebeam’s European offices.

Global Presence

Vectorwork, Inc., is an award-winning design and BIM software provider serving the entire AEC industry and the related entertainment design industry in 85 countries around the world. It is headquartered in Maryland, United States, with key offices in Newbury, England; Sydney, Australia; Vancouver, Canada; and Japan.

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This year, Nirva Fereshetian (CIO of CBT Architects) and Niknaz Aftahi, CEO of aec+tech, will be hosting a similar event at the beautiful Carrier Johnson + Culture office in downtown San Diego during the AIA National Conference on Architecture & Design, the United States’ premier annual conference and exhibition for the architectural industry.

‘archi+tech’ Social Night

The evening event is a mixture of a social get-together with short presentations by technology providers and leaders in the global AEC industry. But largely, it’s a social event where attendees can have real conversations with members of the digital tech community in attendance.

A kind of class picture from last year’s first-ever ‘archi+tech’ Social Night at AIA National in Boston 2025. The event had sponsors from numerous AEC digital technology providers, including the industry’s largest companies.

Carrier Johnson + Culture is a larger architecture and planning firm in San Diego (with offices in Los Angeles and Seattle) with an award-winning portfolio spanning project types. They have graciously offered to host the event in their San Diego office.

Event Details

‘archi+tech’ Social Night will take place at 5:30 pm, Friday, 12 June 2026 (register here), during the week of the AIA Conference in San Diego. This year, the event is focusing on “innovation” and bringing together people who are actually shaping how technology is used in the architecture and AEC industry.

Nirva and Niknaz are curating a group of around 100 to 120 people at the intersection of design and technology, including:

• Architects and firm leaders
• CIOs, CTOs, and innovation directors
• BIM and design technology leaders
• AEC technology founders, investors, and accelerator teams

What is special about this event is the intimacy of the room and the opportunity to showcase the host firm’s location as a bit of an exhibition of their technological prowess. Last year, CBT Architects displayed a stunning set of digital solutions, specialty technology spaces, model shops, and interactive technology tools to give attendees a sense of what practice is like at a tech-forward large firm.

Registration

If you are attending AIA San Diego in early June and would like to attend this event, please register here: https://luma.com/dfmu0kut

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V-Ray 7 Update 3

“By bringing real-time ray tracing directly into the V-Ray viewport, artists can iterate faster while maintaining the quality that V-Ray is known for, all within a single, unified workflow,” said Vlado Koylazov, Head of Innovation at Chaos.

Key Takeways

• Final-frame-quality real-time rendering is now possible in V-Ray Viewport for those with a Vantage account
• V-Ray 7 update 3 is now out for Rhino and SketchUp, with 3ds Max coming soon
• AI Mood Match technology brings the atmosphere from a reference photo into your render

Real-time ray tracing technology in Chaos Vantage transforms how archviz teams work because it is able to handle complex lighting, large scenes, and large-scale geometry without slowdown. Now, V-Ray 7 users with a Vantage license can tap the power of real-time rendering without leaving the V-Ray workflow.

Parallax Interiors is the software that uses interior shaders from Cosmos. The effect holds from any camera angle and can be varied across a facade to avoid repetition, bringing convincing life to every window, especially during night scenes.

While real-time final-quality ray tracing rendering is a powerful update, Update 3 has eleven other great new features we discuss below, including impactful new AI capabilities.

New Features

There are multiple new features beyond the new capability to tap into Chaos Vantage technology directly in V-Ray 7. These include a new Gaussian splats relighting, Quick Caustics, Chaos Cloud Reviews, new Cosmos Sets, and New Assets.

AI Mood Match technology will be a hit with users who can use a reference photo and have AI match the lighting and atmospheric mood of the image and implement that in the rendered scene.

Moreover, there are multiple new AI tools that bring the power of AI deeper into the production process. An important one is the new AI Mood Match feature. Now, a user can use a reference photo to automatically align a scene’s lighting with the image’s look and atmosphere, reducing manual setup and achieving desired outcomes faster. Other AI features include the ability to AI-generate materials at 4K resolution for eye-popping renders.

Other features include in summary:

• Parallax Interiors — Architects can now add realistic interior depth and lighting to exterior renders without modeling or heavy geometry. Using parallax interior shaders from Cosmos, the effect holds from any camera angle and can be varied across a façade to avoid repetition, bringing convincing life to every window, especially in night scenes.
• Node Material Editor (V-Ray for SketchUp and Rhino) — Users can now build and adjust V-Ray materials visually using a node-based editor, making it easier to understand material logic and create complex shaders with greater control. The node editing workflow offers a more intuitive and visual alternative to traditional material creation and editing. The tool is now available as a preview, with more possibilities to come in future releases.
• AI Enhancer: Large Surfaces Coverage — Architects can add more realistic details to large surfaces, such as floors, walls, asphalt, and terrain, adding natural variation at the correct scale without manual re-texturing.
• AI Enhancer: Improved Accuracy and Single Object Creative Enhancement — Users can achieve more precise results across the board, with new support for applying creative enhancement to individual objects.
• Video Collaboration — Chaos Cloud becomes a professional-grade video review platform for animations and render sequences, with precise commenting tied to timestamps, ranges, and visual annotations.
• Cosmos Sets and New Assets — Cosmos sets provide a fast and simplified way to populate scenes with grouped assets that naturally work together. This update adds 700+ new Cosmos assets, including 400 high-poly Globe Plant models and new branded models.

To learn more and explore what’s new, visit the V-Ray Collection page on chaos.com. Or watch the video below:

Pricing and Availability

Launching first on V-Ray for SketchUp and Rhino, real-time rendering in the V-Ray viewport is available to users with an active Chaos Vantage or V-Ray Collection license. AI Mood Match and real-time rendering in the V-Ray viewport are expected to be introduced to V-Ray for 3ds Max.

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Update 4

This is the fourth major update to the Vectoworks 2026 product line, and it expands on capabilities that architects, interior designers, and other creative professionals are looking for, including enhanced data-driven design workflows.

Maxon Redshift for Vectorworks is a plugin for the BIM software adding real-time, photo-realistic, GPU-accelerated raytracing to Vectorworks workflows.

“Vectorworks 2026 Update 4 reflects our ongoing commitment to empowering designers with smarter, more efficient tools,” said Vectorworks Vice President of Product Development Hugues Tsafak. “From the first iteration of phasing, supporting various project types and sizes, to enhanced sustainability dashboards and Maxon Redshift for Archviz, this release leverages our strength in data management to help designers plan, document, and visualize projects more accurately and sustainably. We remain committed to evolving these tools to meet the growing demands of modern design.”

Details

Already covered in some detail in this report on Maxon, new in Update 4 is support for Maxon Redshift for Vectorworks, bringing next-generation visualization rendering features to the popular design and BIM software platform. Vectorworks is the first of the four major BIM platforms (Revit, Archicad, Vectorworks, and Bentley), used by architects worldwide, to leverage a direct integration with Maxon’s Hollywood-level Redshift rendering technology. As Redshift is available as a standalone product from Maxon, those with existing Redshift licenses can now access the integration directly from inside Vectorworks 2026, Update 4.

MORE: Maxon Enters AEC with Real-Time Rendering

Unlike export-based rendering workflows, the Maxon Redshift for Vectorworks plugin maintains a live synchronization between your Vectorworks main window and your Redshift rendering window. Geometry, lighting, cameras, and scene elements remain aligned between both environments.

Update 4 also introduces new renovation and multi-phase workflows technology. Now, a time-based dimension is embedded directly into your BIM model, assigning defined status conditions. With data visualization integration, Vectorworks 2026’s new phasing status capabilities can now control object visibility and graphic representations.

Other improvements included below in highlight format include:

• Updated Vectorworks Embodied Carbon Calculator (VECC)
• Improved Class and Layer search for AEC professionals
• Linear Material tool now includes world-based parameters for stucco and plaster
• Hedgerow tool is now fully integrated into the Styled Landscape Area object
• Refinement in Spotlight numbering device management tools for Entertainment Industry professionals using Vectorworks Spotlight 2026.
• New Cable tool insertion modes for enhanced efficiency

This update is now available for all currently released English-language versions of Vectorworks 2026 and is immediately accessible to subscription and Vectorworks Service Select customers. To install, select “Check for Updates” from the Vectorworks menu (Mac) or the Help menu (Windows).

Redshift Availability

Maxon Redshift for Vectorworks, which powers the new live rendering integration in Update 4, is available as a standalone product from Maxon and can be purchased either through Vectorworks or Maxon. To use Redshift for Vectorworks, customers must create a Maxon account and purchase a Redshift subscription.

The post Vectorworks 2026 Update 4—Next-Gen Rendering and More Added appeared first on Architosh.

Real-Time Redshift

Starting with sister company Vectorworks, Maxon has launched Redshift for Vectorworks, the German company’s first real-time archviz solution. Alongside this release, Redshift for Revit is also announced as an official beta launch. (There are open sign-ups here.)

Maxon Redshift is now available for Vectorworks, offering an industry competitive real-time to final render pipeline solution.

Graphisoft’s Archicad will get its real-time Redshift for Archicad later in 2026. In all cases, the new real-time Redshift solutions for architectural design tools mark a major milestone for Maxon, which has always served high-end architectural visualization users with its famed Cinema 4D solution. The new Redshift real-time technology embeds its features directly into the host design applications.

“Maxon’s tools have a rich history in media and entertainment, used by the creative teams behind so many popular Hollywood movies to create Oscar-winning visual effects,” said Nicolas Burtnyk, Maxon’s Executive VP Rendering. “Now, we’re bringing this same magic to architects and interior designers, helping them translate their vision into cinematic visual experiences worthy of big screens.”

Solution Details

Engineered for architects and interior designers, Maxon is bringing its award-winning Redshift rendering technologies straight into the AEC industry’s globally leading BIM and design solutions, beginning with global BIM/CAD solution Vectorworks.

An example of Maxon Redshift’s rendering quality.

Redshift for Vectorworks launches alongside the release of Vectorworks 2026 Update 4. The solution allows users to smoothly move from real-time design previews to high-end, photorealistic renders all within the same unified ecosystem. Redshift for Revit (now in beta) and Redshift for Archicad will be released later in 2026, with further launches planned for 2027.

Technicals include:

• Archviz in real-time — Architects can visualize designs instantly in real time, then elevate scenes using the same Redshift technology used in feature films – without leaving their CAD environment. Projects can be sent to Cinema 4D with a single click for advanced modeling, animation, simulation, fly-throughs, and rendering.

• Exceptional ease of adoption — Early user testing highlights a key priority: effortless setup, intuitive controls, and fast results, especially for iterative workflows where architects need to explore lighting, materials, and composition quickly.

• Intelligent, production-ready asset libraries — Maxon’s platform includes a vast library of assets known as “Capsules” – materials, plants, furniture, and environmental elements – updated monthly and supported by procedural tools and AI-assisted search for rapid scene building and creative iteration. As the Archviz solution evolves, so will its library.

• Full Mac and Windows parity — Whether teams work on Mac, Windows, or a mix of both, Maxon’s AEC solution delivers consistent performance and functionality across platforms. Architects can collaborate fluidly, share files with confidence, and maintain unified workflows throughout their design-to-visualization process.

• Better value for architects and studios — Compared with market alternatives, Maxon’s first-wave AEC offering launches at a significantly more affordable price, while offering compatibility with broader DCC pipelines, including Maya and Houdini.

Maxon will be showcasing this new Redshift product line at upcoming architecture and AEC events, including the DigitalBAU (24-26 Mar 2026) and AIA26 Conference on Architecture and Design (10-13 Jun 2026), in San Diego, California.

Availability and Cost

Redshift for Vectorworks is available now for purchase through either Maxon or Vectorworks (initially only in English language, with additional language support coming soon). When bundled with Vectorworks, users can benefit from significant discounts, making it the most affordable renderer in its category.

Redshift for Revit Beta Sign Up

For readers who are Revit users and want to sign up to test out the beta, visit here.

Architosh Analysis and Commentary

Maxon’s Redshift renderer is a GPU-accelerated raytracing system and provides real-time raytracing. The more powerful your GPU, the faster and smoother the UX. Like several of its chief real-time rendering competitors, Redshift for Archviz—which will ship as an annual subscription and include all integration plugins—works as a plugin in a host application and brings up a second dedicated Redshift rendered window from which a side-by-side view is shown. When you rotate your building model in, say, Vectorworks, the building rotates in synch in the Redshift window. 

The visual results shift as you move around in the environment. When you stop the rendering, it up-scales in quality. We are curious how fast Redshift may be on the latest M5 Pro and M5 Max chips since they have much more powerful GPU cores with a neural accelerator in each core. We hope to speak to Maxon executives soon to learn more details about this new offering. So far, the demo results look compelling, but the market is crowded with excellent solutions. One thing we did notice is that Redshift for Archviz is priced quite low at just USD 289.00 per year. That is a compelling offer. 

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Collaboration

The nature of the collaboration highlights Trimble’s trusted thought leadership in AEC, and this will manifest in opportunities to contribute to architecture and design continuing education programs, event panels, research, and knowledge community engagement. AIA members also benefit from this collaboration in that they gain technical expertise, professional development, and specifically learn how to bring vision to life using Trimble’s leading 3D design software under the SketchUp brand.

Trimble’s new SketchUp AI offers new tools.

“United by a shared vision for the future of the built environment, we’re excited about the opportunities this relationship will shepherd,” said Andrew Flank, Senior Vice President of Sales, Events & Exhibitions at AIA. “Strategic partners help fund key initiatives, empowering AIA to provide valuable resources to members while upholding independence and mission alignment.”

MORE: Trimble Launches SketchUp AI—New AI-Powered Modeling

“We are committed to helping architects move their digital designs from concept to reality,” said Chris Cronin, VP & GM of Architecture, Design, and Education at Trimble. “Teaming up with AIA creates meaningful intersections between technology and practice, empowering architects to design with greater confidence, iterate faster, and deliver more resilient, high-impact outcomes for their clients and communities.”

Trimble SketchUp

Trimble provides a large range of software and digital solutions for the AEC/O industry, but SketchUp is the primary software tool that millions of architects and designers know and utilize in their creative processes.

Trimble notes, “as the creative anchor for Trimble’s mission to bridge the digital screen with the physical world, SketchUp has evolved from a standalone 3D modeling tool into a comprehensive and collaborative ecosystem.”

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New Capabilities

The updates add more than 20 new capabilities across lighting, scene population, AI materials, and more. Teams can now deliver and work within an uninterrupted workflow from ideation through review and approvals, within the Enscape design workflow.

Chaos has delivered major updates across over six products.

“Architects need to deliver more, faster, with less— while adapting to AI transformation,” said Petr Mitev, VP Product, Solutions for Designers. “Our end-to-end design and visualization workflow gives them integrated solutions that eliminate workflow friction from their first moments with Enscape to their final presentations, so they can focus on design instead of managing disconnected tools.”

Design Faster from the Start

Used throughout the architectural world, Enscape is one of the easiest ways to visualize CAD/BIM data in real time and is often most people’s entry point into the Chaos design ecosystem. Today, architects can take advantage of:

• Asset Brush Placement — Used for rapid scene population, 3D assets can now be painted into designs for refined creative control and instant visual feedback. Since assets are fully connected to the original BIM model, choices will remain consistent as projects evolve.
• Centralized Light Management — Users can now manage all of their light sources via a centralized list, removing the need for manual searches. Multiple presets can also be added to a single scene, making it easy to test, compare and refine lighting scenarios without duplicating views or breaking the workflow.
• AI Material Generator — Architects can now create custom 3D materials with real-world photos. High-resolution outputs not only support close-ups and final presentation deliverables, but encourage high-quality experimentation with finishes, surfaces and more — all without leaving the design environment.
• Consistent Assets from Design to Presentation — Assets placed in Enscape transfer cleanly into Envision, maintaining placement and quality across real-time and high-end workflows.
• Grass Visualization Improvements — More realistic grass rendering delivers denser, more natural-looking landscapes with better shading and detail.
• New Chaos Cosmos Assets — Over 1000 high-quality vegetation and branded assets – optimized for both real-time and high-end use cases – have been added to Enscape. These new assets are also designed to work seamlessly across Envision, Enscape and more.

There are also new AI-assisted ideation and design exploration features. Chaos says that AI is a rising star in AI-powered visualization and helps architects explore, ideate, and deliver moods and emotional imagery that propels projects forward through buy-in and approvals. Veras’ AI technologies work without breaking geometry or design intent.

New Cosmos assets are part of this round of updates. Over 1,000 high-quality vegetation and branded 3D assets have been added to Enscape.

Major updates include:

• Render Engine 7 — The recently released Veras 4 now comes with a new AI rendering engine powered by Google’s Nano Banana Pro. The new engine delivers cleaner, higher-fidelity images with fewer artifacts, so architects can cycle through faster ideations while working with SketchUp, Rhino, and Revit.
• Image as Input — Designers can now generate concepts using reference images like photos, plans or sketches on a napkin, offering one of the fastest ways to visualize full scenes without a prompt.
• Gallery Mode — A grid-based, thumbnail view of past renders has been added, making it easier to compare variations over time.
• New Video Presets — Twelve video presets provide render-ready animation settings for smooth, photorealistic motion, balanced lighting, and various cinematic styles.

Of course, more than Enscape obtained new updates. Chaos Envision has also been updated with significant new capabilities. The higher-end standalone visualization software that only runs on Windows and uses its own rendering engine gains several features that will help architects visualize, animate, and produce fully interactive scenes with complex multi-element interactions, such as traffic and crowds. New features include:

• Live CAD Linking — Envision now includes live links to Revit, SketchUp, and Rhino, ensuring that all changes are reflected in the original CAD file.
• Cinematic Camera Movements —  Users can now create smooth, natural camera paths with refined motion control for more polished and intentional walkthroughs.
• Animation Smoothing — Improve the flow of animations with smoother transitions and better interpolation between keyframes.
• Advanced Light Controls — Refine and adjust lighting with greater precision to achieve more accurate mood and presentation quality.
• New HDRIs — 20+ New Chaos Cosmos HDRIs expand your environment options, making it faster to set up realistic lighting and contextual backdrops.

Chaos Cloud, the software firm’s cloud service, helps teams do more together through collaboration, design reviews, and cloud rendering. Added to this are now these new abilities:

• Centralized Reviews — Chaos Cloud now helps teams share, review, and improve designs directly in the cloud, removing the need for downloads or external tools.
• 3D Streaming — Architects can now stream scenes directly from Enscape, providing full fidelity reviews from any remote location.

These features will aid architects in getting faster approvals within their workflows.

Performance Insights

Chaos has been focused on helping architects meet sustainable design objectives for several years now through its Enscape Impact product line. Impact helps teams understand energy analysis early in the design process, when larger impact decisions come more easily and with less rollback on interrelated decisions. New additions include:

• Thermal Comfort Analysis — Architects can now determine if a building will hit the sweet spot between too hot or too cold for occupants, assessing everything from air temperature to humidity in moments.
• Performance Summaries — All performance reports can now be exported and shared amongst relevant stakeholders, ensuring sustainability goals are being hit before decisions become too costly.

All of these new tools and updates benefit Chaos workflows and will help architects communicate more effectively with end users and clients. Chaos says that while each tool is designed to carry out specific workflows, sometimes from end to end, the Bulgarian-originated software firm says users should consider mixing and matching products to fully leverage the technical leadership and features Chaos offers.

New ThermalComfort measures are added to the energy-facing analysis tools for Enscape Impact. Architects can now determine and visualize thermal comfort in their designs.

New architectural design offering updates will be released on a quarterly basis. Stay tuned to Chaos’ blog and social channels for sneak peeks.

Price and Availability

The ArchDesign Collection update is available now for users with an annual license. The collection includes Enscape, Veras, Envision, Chaos Cosmos, Chaos Cloud, and Enscape Impact, and all subsequent updates as long as the subscription lasts. For full pricing details, please visit the ArchDesign Collection pricing page.

About Chaos

Founded in 1997, Chaos provides world-class visualisation and design solutions that empower creative minds to bring ideas to life.

The company serves multiple industries, including architecture and design, media and entertainment, and product e-commerce, providing an ecosystem of accessible tools that support every stage of the design and creation process. Its innovative solutions help architects, designers, VFX artists/animators, and other creative professionals share ideas, optimize workflows, and create immersive experiences.

Headquartered in Karlsruhe, Germany, Chaos has offices in 11 cities worldwide. For more information, visit chaos.com.

Architosh Analysis and Commentary

Envision’s live links to SketchUp, Rhino, and Revit are a big deal and will be greatly appreciated by users of Envision and those dominant CAD/BIM platforms. The Thermal Comfort analysis with Enscape Impact is also a significant end-user benefit to architects to ensure that their designs offer thermally balanced and comfortable environments for owners and users. And finally, the Enscape streaming to Chaos Cloud is another boost for users to leverage the Chaos Cloud in their workflows. 

We have already written about Veras 4.0 with Nano Banana Pro and all that it can do. The big improvements there (and yet we have not tested this ourselves) are the engine’s better understanding of the architect’s intent, especially in holding to intentional geometry. All these updates continue to add value to architects’ workflows, and we suspect that most practices still lag in leveraging the full capabilities of Chaos’ software tools. The Architectural Design Collection (which includes Enscape, including both Veras, their AI tool, and Enscape and Enscape Impact, the latter two likely not being fully appreciated in the market) could help solve this problem by getting these tools into more users’ hands. 

The post Chaos delivers major product line updates appeared first on Architosh.

A Direct Presence

By acquiring these distributor companies, Graphisoft gains the assets it needs to operate directly in the region, serving its customers in two critical BIM markets, whilst also delivering direct customer support as the company rolls out an expanded product line.

“By welcoming our Australian and New Zealand distributors into the Graphisoft family, we accelerate growth, strengthen customer relationships, and deepen our long-term commitment to both markets,” said Daniel Csillag, CEO, Graphisoft. “The Central Innovation team brings over 30 years of market expertise, strong customer relationships, and deep insight into user expectations, further enriching our global experience and strengthening our presence in the Pacific region,” Csillag added.

Graphisoft acquires its Australian and New Zealand distributors. See our Analysis section below for more info.

“We’re proud of the progress we’ve made in expanding BIM adoption across Australia and New Zealand, and we’re confident our customers will benefit significantly from Graphisoft’s hands-on approach to support and services, as well as its long-term vision for the AEC industry,” said Shannon Reshno, COO, Central Innovation.

Continuity

Graphisoft’s customers in Australia and New Zealand will continue to work with the same teams they already know and trust, and these organizations become part of Graphisoft’s global organization.

For more information, visit graphisoft.com/en-au in Australia, and graphisoft.com/en-nz in New Zealand.

Architosh Analysis and Commentary

There has been a long-term trend in the AEC software world where makers of software are acquiring regional resellers and distributors, often after decades of running these businesses. For the reseller or distributor, this often times with retirement and provides liquidity and an exit strategy, but for the customer, it often means continuity with the teams they know and the regional teams that know their markets.

Moving to the DTC (direct-to-consumer) model can offer the regional user improved access to global resources, but in Graphisoft’s case, this aspect of providing support is likely already excellently handled by these Australian and New Zealand distributors. For Graphisoft, the channel discounts they provide to distributors and resellers are now internalized, offering improved margins. Often, the distributors of CAD and BIM software offer unique packages and incentives to move product, but the days of renewing perpetual licenses are very much in the rearview mirror. 

The acquisitions of the AEC businesses of Central Innovations include the entire AEC side of their business. We assume this includes Ci Tools, the company’s own software extension package for Archicad.

A key point to note is that parts of these businesses appear to have been acquired from Central Innovations of Australia, the parent company of Intercad & Graphisoft (Australia). Here is the announcement from Central Innovations, directly. Central Innovations focuses on both AEC and manufacturing CAD solutions. Only the AEC part of the business is acquired with capabilities beyond serving Archicad, including support and solutions for Twinmotion, Solibri, and Ci Tools. Ci Tools, is an extension toolset for Archicad sold by Central Innovationthat enhances Archicad’s core functions in areas like cabinetry, 3D roof claddings, a keynoting system, a Fitout tool, and more. 

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This is the largest startup investment in Autodesk’s history and echoes a conviction that AI should augment, not replace, human ingenuity while going beyond text and language and entering the physical world.

World Labs

World Labs is a frontier AI research company co-founded by Dr. Fei-Fei Li (CEO), Justin Johnson, Christopher Lassner, and Ben Mildenhall. The company is focused on spatial intelligence and is a world leader in this domain of artificial intelligence. World Labs is building AI models that can perceive, generate, reason, and interact with the 3D world.

A screen capture from Autodesk’s video on its investment in World Labs. We like this image because it conjures the feeling of the unknown and the weightlessness of the promises of AI. How much weight will AI tech take off the shoulders of design professionals? But at the same time, working in the future of AI is like working in outer space. It’s that radical. (IMAGE:  Autodesk)

World Labs’ first product is called Marble, and it generates spatially consistent, high-fidelity 3D environments that you can inhabit and move through. Once created, you can also edit them as you are inhabiting them. You can also model inside them with familiar modeling tools, but in general, the feeling is a combination of traditional 3D manipulation and text-prompt-based editing and generation.

Investment from Autodesk

World Labs’ Marble platform looks especially strong in many, if not most, of the fields that Autodesk software operates, from architecture and interiors to robotics and manufacturing to gaming and entertainment. The strategic investment at a glance looks like this:

• USD 200 million in World Labs (an AI startup working at the frontier of AI)
• Autodesk’s largest startup investment to date
• A research-level / technical collaboration focused on physical-world AI and multimodal world models.

Dr. Fei-Fei Li remarks about the backing and investment by Autodesk and their strategic collaboration, saying:

“Physical AI must understand worlds, not just words. With Autodesk’s deep expertise in geometry, simulation, and real-world design, we have a uniquely complementary opportunity to ground AI in how the world is actually designed and built, for designers, builders, and creators.”

Marble’s API technology enables third-party tool providers to leverage the World Labs AI technologies in their host applications. One such application is web-based Fenestra. (see image below).

World Labs spatial intelligence AI technologies have attracted the investment interest of Autodesk, AMD, Nvidia, Fidelity, and more.

Both Marble and Fenestra are fully web-based, and both support Gaussian Splats rendering through SparkJS. When a user submits an image or text prompt using Fenestra, the web-based software connects to the Marble API and constructs a navigable 3D environment, which can be further edited and explored. Both spatial and 2D elements can coexist in supplying the AI engine the inference data it needs.

Another tool using the Marble API is Interior AI. This new tool has garnered quite a bit of publicity from top-shelf press, including the New York Times and Fast Company. We don’t like its homepage tag line, “Fire your interior designer,” and the messaging it sends, and especially think that Autodesk’s position with AI technologies is that they will complement the design professional, not eliminate them.

What Autodesk is saying is that the company wants to forge a different path for AI, as opposed to the hyperscale AI investments and centralized platforms crunching on ever larger LLMs. They write, “Our investment in World Labs represents a different path, focused on solving the hardest problems in designing, building, and operating the physical world, guided by human needs and domain expertise rather than scale alone.”

To read the blog post about the investment, go here. 

Architosh Analysis and Commentary

With a USD 1 billion funding round from heavy hitters like Nvidia and Fidelity, Autodesk’s largest-ever investment in a startup appears to be a strong strategic play. We wonder how the Marble API may interact with the new AI technologies we saw at last Fall’s Autodesk University. Those neural CAD engines were aimed at a different kind of utilization of AI technologies, but we can certainly see how multimodal AI workflows and technologies can be combined. 

World Labs says they are focusing next on fully interconnected design canvases. Fenestra is working on what they are calling an Infinite Canvas. CAD and BIM systems today already have infinite internal 3D and paper-space 2D worlds (ie, “canvases”). What we are seeing in the AEC/O market is vast, rapid advancements in the “pixel”-based technology stream of our industry. This has been the case since Midjourney and GANs. AEC pros, however, must get this pixel image-oriented or vide-oriented pixel laden content into precise and accurate parametric 2/3D vectorial data. That challenge has begun, but it’s a vital bridge piece that will greatly help the acceleration of these kinds of AI visual tools in the AEC markets (not that these tools aren’t already on fire in the market, because they are!) 

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Morpholio Acquired

The award-winning Morpholio Trace came to the AEC market after the iPad became a hit new device for AEC professionals. Over the years, other tools emerged, including Morpholio Board and Morpholio Journal—all apps for Apple’s popular iPad and iPhone. The iPad is the dominant marketshare leader for tablet computers in the United States’ construction industry.

The news means architects, interior designers, and other creative professionals can extend the design-centric workflows of both companies’ solutions from the earliest ideation and sketching all the way through complex and sophisticated Open BIM workflows with documentation and delivery.

Morpholio is now part of Vectorworks Inc, after a strategic acquisition by the Nemetschek Group’s daughter company.

“We are thrilled to welcome Morpholio to the Vectorworks portfolio,” said Vectorworks CEO Jason Pletcher. “Morpholio shares our belief that software should enhance designers’ creativity, not hinder it. By combining Vectorworks’ CAD and BIM platform with Morpholio’s expertise in mobile sketching and presentation, we are strengthening our foundation and expanding what our tools can do together, so customers gain even more freedom, confidence, and creative control in their workflows.”

Joining Forces

The founders and team members of Morpholio, who are architects and designers with a strong passion for design and quality, will now join the Vectorworks team. With Vectorworks’ global resources, scale, and commitment to innovation, the Morpholio apps will now advance even more rapidly than before, serving both the needs of existing Morpholio customers and the strategic goals of the Vectorworks platform.

“This partnership allows us to put the best of mobile together with the best of desktop and create opportunities for designers to bring the unique magic of drawing to more parts of their process,” said Morpholio Co-Founder Mark Collins. “In the years ahead, we see an opportunity to support a richer design experience where sketches, markups, BIM, and AI work seamlessly together. That’s how we unlock new creative superpowers without losing the soul of design.”

The two companies see building on existing AI technologies in Vectorworks and leveraging that to bring additional AI-ready features to Morpholio Trace via sketching, moodboarding, and presentations.

The Power of Morpholio

Morpholio Trace is widely regarded as an all-in-one drawing and design app for architects and designers, offering “scale-aware” sketching, layers, markup, and presentation-ready imagery that pair naturally with Vectorworks models and drawings. The acquisition actually formalizes an existing relationship between the two companies, including work to advance connectivity between Morpholio apps and Vectorworks Cloud Services.

Morpholio Boards serves interior designers and stylists with powerful moodboarding, product curation, and presentation tools. Interior designers use it to deliver polished deliverables to their clients.

Morpholio Journal provides a flexible digital notebook and sketchbook, giving architects and designers a place to capture ideas, notes, and visuals.

“Over the past decade, the iPad and Apple Pencil have sparked a creative renaissance for architects and designers,” said Morpholio Co-Founder Anna Kenoff. “Morpholio was founded with the vision to help define that era. While that has been an incredible beginning, we’re now ready to lead the design industry into its next creative technology revolution.”

Going Forward

For existing Morpholio users, day-to-day use of the apps remains unchanged, and customers can continue to subscribe to Morpholio Trace, Board, and Journal through the Apple App Store. Vectorworks also plans to introduce new offerings designed for larger offices collaborating across devices in Morpholio Trace and Board in the future.

“As part of the Nemetschek Group, Vectorworks’ acquisition of Morpholio is an important step in our strategy to deliver intelligent, connected, open solutions for customers across AEC brands,” said Sunil Pandita, Chief Division Officer Planning & Design, and CEO of Allplan. “Over time, we see a strong potential to expand Morpholio’s mobile sketching and presentation capabilities available to designers working in a multitude of Nemetschek applications, so more of our customers can benefit from cognitive, richer, and cohesive workflows from concept through construction.”

“I believe strongly that joining forces is not an additive operation—it’s a multiplier,” said Morpholio Co-Founder Toru Hasegawa. “Vectorworks and Morpholio coming together is not simply a sum of capabilities, but the start of a multidimensional expansion of initiatives, reach, and long-term value.”

To learn more about Morpholio, go here or here for more on Vectorworks.

Architosh Analysis and Commentary

Morpholio was founded in 2011, a year after Steve Jobs first unveiled the iPad on 27 January 2010. At that time, Architosh did a series of features focused on the revolutionary iPad because we instantly saw its potential for field work in AEC, including bringing construction drawings onto the job site as well as sketching and more. Morpholio’s founders, Mark Collins, Anna Kenoff, and Toru Hasegawa, were architects and clearly saw the same potential and more. Based in New York City (by the way, one of the strongest architectural markets for Vectorworks), Morpholio Trace was quickly recognized within the industry. We first wrote about it in 2013, including it on a list of drawing apps for the iPad. 

Winning multiple awards and honors, and being featured in the New York Times, Fast Company, TechCrunch, and Architectural Digest, among other publications, Morpholio Trace has evolved tremendously over the past decade and a half. Looking forward to the era of artificial intelligence, what is exciting about this pairing is that AI visualization tools are getting much better at staying closer to what architects are actually trying to envision, and are able to be fed hand sketches and stay quite close to the design intent in those hand sketches. 

But where were those sketches taking place? 

By and large, tools like Chaos’s Veras 4.0, which we just wrote about, and numerous other AI-powered visualization tools, including Vectorworks’s own AI Visualizer, can leverage hand sketches, but much sketching, if not the vast majority, takes place on actual trace paper. Morpholio Trace was always meant to be the digital equivalent of a roll of tracing paper. You can already sketch over 3D models (that can come into Morpholio Trace) for your 3d sketching, but now we can imagine the Nemetschek Group’s AI Visualizer rendering technology going to Morpholio Trace so that architects can deliver client-facing workflows that go from sketching to photo-realistic AI-powered visuals and animations. Moreover, its moodboards content can feed the AI engine. 

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Veras 4.0

The new Veras 4.0 focuses on delivering higher fidelity output with fewer unwanted errors. The latest engine reportedly makes a huge improvement in how it understands geometry, a key aspect that architects are focused on intently as part of any design workflow. Not just geometry, but lighting and materials fidelity are also much improved, says Chaos.

Unlocked Workflows

With this new engine, new workflows are unlocked for the first time. Images can be created from turning 2D floor plans, drawings, or even hand-sketched images into 3D scenes. The engine can also create multi-angled perspectives from mood boards and retain the correct geometry.

The hero image for the new Chaos Veras 4.0

When working with Veras 4.0, designers can add furniture and other entourage with a single text prompt or make changes like “change the color of the couch to blue” without selecting the item itself. Such capabilities speed up the workflow and eliminate tedious steps.

Clarity in Prompts

The new engine treats prompts as clear instructions and not as loose suggestions, producing outputs that more closely follow the stylistic intentions of the designer, or material changes or environmental adjustments.

version 1 image and text prompt version 2, next image

A version 2 text prompt image is different than version 1 image at left.

“When AI renders drift from the design, they create rework, lost time and awkward moments in client reviews,” said Bill Allen, Director Product Management, Chaos. “Veras 4.0 directly addresses this by keeping the AI aligned with the designer’s vision, rather than inventing its own version of the project. With greater control, designers can trust Veras to reflect their intent while exploring concepts quickly and confidently.”

Quick Iterative Visioneering

Chaos Veras 4.0 is built for architects and interior designers who need fast, design-faithful visuals directly from SketchUp, Revit, or Rhino without needing to have even intermediate rendering skills.

Image Reference as Input has also been updated, allowing designers to guide new outputs using an existing image instead of relying on text.

There is also Gallery Mode, a grid-based, thumbnail view of all past renders, which makes it easier to compare variations over time. Twelve new video presets have been added for ready-to-use animation options. Designers can produce smooth, photorealistic motion graphics with balanced lighting and a consistent cinematic style.

More Info

With this update, Veras becomes more predictable and versatile, providing a more stable foundation for daily design work.

For more information, please visit Chaos. 

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An essential theory change is to challenge the notion (current working method) that workflows function in separate stages, with visualization being its own stage across disconnected workflows. For decades, design, modeling, visualization, asset-sourcing, and presentation happened in isolated steps, often requiring repeated export, re-imports, etc. The underlying workflow remained fragmented.

D5 Workflow

D5 is aiming to reduce this friction inherent in this fragmented workflow by enabling visualization to be part of the design process itself. At the core of the new D5 Workflow is that visualization shouldn’t be treated as a downstream task but an upstream one. Architects should be able to immediately visualize and test their design ideas.

The new D5 3.0 delivers a smoother, unbroken workflow with AI at the center.

This shift is enabled through three components.

• D5 Lite, which brings AI-native real-time visualization directly into early design tools like SketchUp, bridging the gap between conceptualization and design development. It allows architects to visualize instantly, lowering the barrier to professional-grade rendering and keeping ideas moving from the earliest stages.
• D5 Works, a curated asset platform designed specifically for architecture, landscape, and interior design, is integrated into the workflow to remove the need for external libraries, manual file management, or format conversion.
• D5 Render 3.0, the latest evolution of D5’s real-time rendering engine, serves as the intelligent core of the workflow with advanced AI capabilities and physically accurate realism.

These three components of the workflow form a continuous loop in the workflow process, reflecting the ideal way in which architects want to work.

AI as Enabler

Artificial intelligence (AI) is a core component of the new D5 Workflow. D5 leverages AI to become a key assistant and to tackle repetitive tasks and set up work, all shortening feedback cycles. This happens through:

• AI Scene Match — use AI to simply describe your desired atmosphere in words such as ‘Autumn dusk’ or ‘Snowy winter’ and D5’s AI Agent generates reference visuals, matching lighting and post-processing parameters to your scene in a simple click.
• AI Asset Recommendations — either using an uploaded reference image or prompting D5’s AI Agent, will suggest the perfect models from the library for your scene. This can save hours in a standard week.
• AI Image-to-3D generation — upload an image to generate a 3D model to use in your scene. The AI Agent will analyze the image and smartly build a high-accuracy 3D model in seconds.

All of this helps architects and 3D artists iterate without restarting their work, and the emphasis is not so much on automation but on continuity in the design process.

AI technologies in the new D5 enable rapid asset recommendations based on uploaded reference images or text prompts, using AI Scene Match.

D5 notes that other similar industries have made a similar transition to integrated workflows by replacing collections of specialized but disconnected tools. As such, D5 sees the latest enhancements as signaling a long-term commitment to reduce friction in the entire architectural design lifecycle.

D5 Render 3.0

Other new features in the new rendering engine update include a new Ocean System. The new ocean system delivers dynamic waves, caustics, and shoreline interactions. The system will smartly analyze your terrain to generate organic coastline transitions, rolling waves, and wet-sand effects.

Also new is Displacement Material (beta) to complement the existing Parallax solution. Now users can physically displace geometry based on height maps. The weather system is also completely updated in version 3, with a new Volumetric Cloud. A new set of accurate preset skies gives your scene a start, and then you can fine-tune with sliders.

D5 introduces a new Ocean System that dynamically interacts with your terrain modeling, creating truly organic coastline transitions.

A new City Generator takes large urban models and transforms them to life with realistic building facades, urban streetscapes, and treelined parks and boulevards.

D5 Works

Directly in the launcher, D5 Works is a materials and creative hub putting comprehensive resources at your fingertips. This includes being able to acquire affordable assets to use in your scenes that complement the D5 Asset Library’s assets and workflow.

For presenting your visualizations, D5 v3 offers simplified ways for users to create Panorama Tours, Spatial Tours, and XR Tours, with the latter supporting 3D Gaussian Splatting. And there is also Cesium integration now in D5 for instant massive urban real-life context.

Supported Platforms and Integrations

For workflow integration, D5 version 3.0 works with SketchUp, 3ds Max, Rhino, Revit, Archicad, Vectorworks, Blender, and Cinema 4D.

D5 requires Windows 10 v1809 or later and has GPU threshold requirements of NVIDIA GTX 1060 6GB or higher, AMD Radeon RX 6000 XT or higher, or Intel Arc A3 or higher.

To learn more, visit them here.

Architosh Analysis and Commentary:

D5 Render does not support Mac natively because its core rendering engine is built on Microsoft’s DirectX 12 (DX12) with DirectX Raytracing (DXR) technologies, which are incompatible with Apple’s Metal Architecture. While the development team has noted that they plan to support the Mac, there is still no official release date. To support the Mac, they likely would need to develop a cross-platform compiler to translate their code into Apple’s Metal API. 

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Phase 3 Conditions

As announced multiple times since April 2024, existing customers holding Archicad perpetual licenses with active SSA/FWD maintenance contracts can convert their licenses to Archicad subscriptions under preferential terms. In other words, lower costs than for new customers.

Graphisoft announces Phase 3 Conditions for Subscription Conversion for existing users.

The third phase of Graphisoft’s multi-year SSA-to-Subscription Conversion Program will start on April 1, 2026, and will run for a full 12-month cycle till March 31, 2027. The main change to the current Phase 2 conditions is that during Phase 3, customers’ SSA/FWD contracts will lapse at the end of their next term, independent of their decision about converting their licenses to subscriptions; thus, converting them to a subscription will be the only way to keep their licenses current with future Archicad updates. Please note that local conditions and timelines may vary.

Benefits

The company also says that these preferential terms extend out a bit, assuming there are no significant shifts in economic conditions. Graphisoft CEO Daniel Csillag notes:

“Technology in the AEC industry is evolving at lightning speed,” said Daniel Csillag, Graphisoft CEO. “Shifting our product delivery model to subscription allows users to take advantage of agile, responsive, and up-to-date software solutions — as soon as they hit the market.”

To learn more, go here.

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Trimble Collaboration

Trimble and Programa are strengthening the path from 3D design to project management for the interior design industry. A new shared sign-on process provides users with a more secure, seamless integration across the industry’s leading platforms. The new shared sign-on process has been live since mid-December.

Programa’s project management tools feature a working Kanban-style board for task assignment and management. However, the real strengths of Programa are its Web Clipper technologies that streamline obtaining product specification data into well-managed schedules and project specifications.

Designers can now use their Trimble ID credentials to log in to Programa, which simplifies their daily workflows and improves security and the user experience. After all, multiple logins are a hassle, and this consolidates two. Chris Cronin, VP & GM, Architecture, Design and Education, Trimble, says:

“Our goal has always been to give designers their time back,” said Traviss Orr, co-founder and CEO of Programa. “Minimizing the friction between design and operational tools they use every day lays the groundwork for cutting through the admin and inefficiencies that slow studios down.”

About Programa

Programa is the studio operations platform for architects, interior designers, and suppliers. By uniting specifications, schedules, approvals, budgets, invoicing, time tracking, client communication, and supplier coordination in one connected workspace, Programa eliminates fragmented tools and reduces admin. The result is stronger collaboration, clearer visibility, and more time for designers to focus on creating spaces that matter. https://programa.design/

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