Your Renderings Don't Have to Suck. How to Improve Rendering Quality in Revit

Have you ever spent several weeks on a project, created renderings and your images turned out terrible when used in a presentation?  Every image looks pixellated, blurry, fuzzy or worse. Perhaps you used Photoshop and increased the resolution thinking that somehow this would make the renderings better (NEWSFLASH, it actually makes renderings WORSE).  It all boils down to PPI, DPI, Resolution, Rendering Quality, etc.  They all mean the same thing.  These terms determine the overall quality of the images you generated in your rendering software. 

So everyone wonders, 'How do I get the best quality renderings in Revit'? 

I'll share some best practices for renderings in Revit.  in order to create 3D renders of your Revit designs, it is important to determine what quality you are after. 

First, let's break down some rendering terminology :

Rendering - is a computer-generated image of a 2D or 3D model using computer software
Pixels - open an image in Photoshop and zoom in closely.  Those tiny dots are called Pixels.  The more, the merrier.
Resolution - how much detail (measured in pixels using DPI or PPI) an image contains.  
DPI - dots per inch (old-school way of describing resolution).  How many pixels appear in every INCH of your image.
PPI - pixels per inch (new-school way of describing resolution)  Same as DPI.
Rendering Quality is measured in DPI or PPI and is calculated by the size of the image X the resolution required.

​So, what is an acceptable quality resolution or DPI for a rendering?  Well, that all depends on the purpose of your image.  If an image is intended to be shared on the internet, then 72 DPI would be acceptable.  However, if you intend to create a higher quality image for a presentation (either printed or PDF), then 200 DPI would be the lower limit while 300 DPI would give you the best results.  

​The steps are as follows:  

1. What is your desired Width and Height in inches?
2. What is the quality required? Consider 72 DPI (low quality, small file size, quick renderings) and 300 DPI (higher quality, larger file size and best quality)
3. Multiply the size of the final rendering (INCHES) by the quality you desire (DPI). 
   1. For example, an 8 in. x 11 in. drawing = 8 in. x (300 DPI) and 11 in. x (300 DPI), therefore Width=2400 px and Height=2200 px for best quality

This is the size, in pixels, that you should enter into your rendering software.  Follow these steps and you will get the best quality renderings in Revit.  When ready, you can either create a rendered image in Revit or create a rendering on the cloud using Autodesk A360 Rendering.  Check out the video for more information!