What softwares do i learn before second year BA Architecture?

im a first year BA Architecture student at the Manchester School of Architecture. what softwares should i learn before starting second year??

Reply 1

Pedr0

AutoCAD, Revit, Rhino are all good to know, particularly knowing Revit can be really useful for landing internships/experience - plus the ease with which you can make sure your plans, sections, elevations, etc are all consistent with BIM software is great. Also, learning a rendering software (there are good free ones these days such as D5 Render and Twinmotion) along with Photoshop for post-processing your rendered images.

Edit just to expand a bit more on what you might use these softwares for
AutoCAD - general 2D drafting
Revit - once you have a design you can model it in Revit and it'll automatically cut plans, sections, elevations etc, so when you modify the building model the drawings will automatically update. you can also export to .dwg which is the file format used by AutoCAD, so you can get accurate drawings out of Revit and then modify lineweights etc in CAD
Rhino - I didn't use this much admittedly while I was at uni, it's a very good modelling software and comes with a visual programming interface called Grasshopper which is very powerful for making parametric models and organic shapes among other things. You can also use it to do useful analysis like daylight autonomy, sunpaths, weather data etc.
Twinmotion - free rendering software which you can 'link' to 3D modelling software like Revit, Rhino or SketchUp to apply realistic materials and lighting. You may also have access to more powerful alternatives like V-Ray or Lumion through your university.

feel free to PM or ask any questions btw and I can try and help out, I finished my MArch last summer so I can try and point you in the right direction in terms of learning software and stuff to be more efficient