The reason for bringing in a 3D drafting firm is rarely the technology. It is a peak that lasts too long, a deadline that cannot move, or a drafter vacancy that stays unfilled for months. Meanwhile the work carries on and the pile of modelling work nobody gets round to keeps growing.
We take that part off your hands. We draft and model; we do not do engineering, we do not carry out calculations and we do not give structural advice. The work is done fully remotely from our own office, in our own environment and with our own licences.
We have a large, flexible team that scales with each project: one drafter for a small assignment, and on a large project we deploy as many drafters as it takes. Everyone who works for us has more than ten years of CAD experience, so no time is needed to learn the trade itself. When something is urgent, we add people to the ongoing work straight away, without having to recruit first.
Cable tray routing in the model, built with parametric families that carry the material schedule with them.
The repetitive work where a 3D drafting firm saves you time
Most of the work that comes into a 3D drafting firm is not complicated, but it is extensive. It consists of the same operation repeated hundreds of times, each time with slightly different dimensions. That is exactly where the time savings lie. One example from our own practice comes from greenhouse construction. Companies in that sector often work in AutoCAD, and AutoCAD is not smart at building components such as valves in piping systems. If you need one valve at 90 and another at 110 in a diagram, you draw each one by hand every time.
With a handful of them, that is manageable. With a complete piping diagram, it adds up to days of work that add nothing to the design. With a smart component, that same part is placed in a single action, in any size. In that type of work it saves at least seventy per cent of the time. We see the same pattern in a series of similar details, in a product line with variants and in a revision round where hundreds of sheets need the same correction. For your own drafting team, that is exactly the work that gets shelved the longest, because it does not feel urgent until suddenly it is.
We take on that volume, split it across several drafters where the set can be divided, and keep the structure consistent. Work that is closely interlinked we deliberately keep with a smaller group, because otherwise coordination becomes more expensive than drafting. What remains for the client is the part that genuinely requires in-house knowledge and that nobody else can fill in.
What we deliver as a 3D drafting firm
As a 3D drafting firm, we deliver the model and all the output derived from it. In Revit we build models from the documents supplied, along with the floor plans, sections, elevations and details that follow from them. In Rhino we work on geometry that cannot be captured in a standard model, supported by Grasshopper where needed. We use Inventor for parts and assemblies, for example when a manufacturer wants its product line modelled. Alongside the three-dimensional work, we also deliver regular 2D drafting, because in practice a project almost always calls for both.
As-built drawings and revisions are part of the standard package. Delivery is in DXF, DWG, the Revit formats and STEP, and otherwise in any common CAD format, so the file fits in with whatever is used further down the chain. Exactly what the deliverables include is agreed at the start: which sheets, which scale, which level of detail and in which format. That avoids discussion afterwards about what was or was not included. We also agree on the interim steps, because we deliver in stages rather than all at once at the end.
Before a batch goes out, it passes through at least three review layers. A drafter produces it, a second team member checks it, Sam, our team leader, reviews the technical side and Barry, our project manager, goes over it one final time. As a result, the number of errors stays minimal in practice, even across a large series. The client receives the source files, not just a printable version, so your own team can carry on without us.
No ongoing payroll costs and no idle staff once the peak is over. If one of our people is off sick or on holiday, we replace them and the work simply carries on.
Working parametrically with smart Revit families
Working parametrically is the difference between a model that survives every change and a model in which every change means manual work. We build parametric Revit families, in other words smart components. Such a component adapts to a new situation or a different size, so it is made once and can then be placed anywhere without redrawing. The material schedule is linked to it. If the component changes, the schedule changes automatically, which makes a separate count, and the errors that come with it, unnecessary. For a manufacturer, that means a product line available as a set of components rather than as a folder of separate drawings. For an engineering firm, it means a change to a detail does not have to be checked a hundred times over.
We clean up existing families and templates or rebuild them. The state of the existing set determines which choice makes more sense. If a family set is very messy, with variants mixed together and components set up differently each time, rebuilding is sometimes faster than repairing. We put that trade-off to you before we start, with an explanation of how much time each route takes. Alongside Revit, we use Grasshopper for parametric geometry in Rhino, and Dynamo to a limited extent. What we will not do is set up a system your own team cannot maintain. The structure has to match how you work internally; otherwise it grinds to a halt after six months and the investment stops paying off.
Software, versions and formats at our 3D drafting firm
We work mainly in Revit, AutoCAD and Rhino. On top of that come Inventor and Grasshopper, and to a limited extent Dynamo and Vault. We always work with the latest versions, so we never get stuck on files created in a newer environment. We exchange files in DXF, DWG, the Revit formats and STEP, and in practice in any common CAD format. The client decides which environment we use, not us.
If you supply AutoCAD and want AutoCAD back, the work stays in AutoCAD, even if a model would be more elegant on paper. For a 3D drafting firm that is an important point, because a model nobody further down the line can open is not a deliverable.
We draw to the standard and drawing conventions we receive from the client, including layer structure, title blocks and naming. If there is no documented standard, we derive one from the existing set and present our assumptions to you. That way the delivered work remains part of one set rather than an isolated island next to it. The drafting is done in our own environment on our own licences, so nothing needs to be set up or opened up on the client's side.
Files are exchanged by email, and on larger projects through software the client can log into to follow the project. For standalone AutoCAD drafting, email remains the quickest route, because setting up an environment for a short assignment costs more than it delivers. As a result, what you get back slots straight into your existing folder structure.
Frequently asked questions about our 3D drafting firm
Hand your 3D modelling work over to us
Send us your documents and drawing conventions and we will let you know within one to two working days what we can take on and when.