Dan and I have a shared vision about the benefits of color documentation, and he convinced me to leave 72-degree Phoenix for 4-degree Neenah. I shared my research with the group, and my key premise is this:

Color construction documents help reduce errors and omissions as well as RFIs and change orders, thereby having a positive impact on the project budget and schedule.

To illustrate how color helps speed up interpretation of complex data, we gave the group an exercise. We handed out two matching D-sized floor plans, one monochrome and one color. We asked them to count the number of sinks that appeared in the B&W drawing. After spending some time looking and counting, the group replied with 7, 8 or 9 sinks. We then had them look at the color drawing and they immediately found 10 sinks.

This is a very simplistic example, but if we extrapolate it to a large-scale project, you can imagine the implications. In attendance was Darin Marsden, BIM/CAD Manager of Faith Technologies, a regional electrical contractor. Already a color convert, Darin believes that every hour spent in the office improving documentation saves his team up to five hours in the field. In addition, color plan sets help apprentices do field installation work that higher-cost journeymen often have to help with when using B&W documents.

Darin used Autodesk Design Review to show some electrical schematics before and after they had been “cleaned”. Before distributing plans to the field, his staff removes all unnecessary elements, adds color, and turns the documents into easy-to-follow tools for the installers. His examples showed each conduit size in a different color in a highly effective illustration of the power of color to simplify.