Focused Scenes and Large Sets

The 3D Viewer is happiest with a focused scene — a group, a filter, a level, a hand-picked selection. It can show up to 1,000 clashes at once, but well before that limit a smaller scene is faster, clearer and easier to share. This article explains what happens when you open a large cohort and how to get to a focused scene quickly.

The two thresholds

Above 150 clashes — the viewer pauses before opening and suggests a focused scene instead. You can still open everything.
Above 1,000 clashes — the hard cap. The viewer never loads more than 1,000 clashes; larger cohorts are truncated to the first 1,000.

The "Open a focused scene instead?" prompt

When you open more than 150 clashes, a dialog titled "Open a focused scene instead?" appears before the scene loads. If the cohort is over 1,000, it also explains that the viewer shows up to 1,000 at a time and that a grouped, filtered or smaller scene works better.

The dialog lists the three benefits of a focused scene:

"Sharper focus."
"Faster, smoother 3D."
"Easier to review & share."

It also includes a tip for the long term: use the plugin's Group tool to group your clashes in Navisworks and publish the groups, so future reviews can open one group at a time.

Your choices

Group or filter first — go back to the grid and narrow down what you open (recommended).
Open a clash-number range — a built-in picker with From # and To # fields. Leave To blank to open up to 1,000 clashes starting from the From number. Confirm with Open range. Because clash numbers (#N) are permanent within a set, ranges are a reliable way to split a big set into review batches.
Open all {N} (or Open first 1,000 when the cohort exceeds the cap) — open the whole cohort anyway.

What truncation looks like

If a cohort still exceeds the cap, the scene opens with the first 1,000 clashes and shows:

"Showing the first 1,000 of {N} clashes — refine the selection to see specific clashes."

The header also displays a chip such as "{n} of {total} shown" so it's always clear the scene is partial.

Ways to open a focused scene

Open a group — use the cube button (View this group in 3D) on any group header in the clash grid.
Open a filtered view — apply a filter in the grid, then View filtered in 3D.
Open a selection — tick specific clashes and use View {N} in 3D.
Open a number range — use the range picker in the focus prompt.
Group at the source — group clashes in Navisworks with the plugin's Group tool before publishing; published groups become one-click 3D scenes.

Tips

Keep review scenes under 150 clashes where you can — that's also the ceiling for public share links, so a focused scene is immediately shareable.
Grouping by Level or Grid in the grid first gives you natural, building-shaped batches to open.
For very large sets, work in clash-number ranges (for example #1–#500, then #501–#1000) so nothing is missed between meetings.

FAQs

Why is there a 1,000-clash cap? Composing thousands of captured geometries into one interactive scene gets heavy for the browser. The cap keeps the viewer fast and responsive on ordinary hardware.

Does the cap change my data? No. It only limits what one scene displays. All clashes remain in the set on the web.

I opened "all" but some clashes are missing. Check the header chip. If it says "{n} of {total} shown", the cohort exceeded 1,000 and was truncated — refine the selection. Separately, clashes published without 3D capture are skipped with a notification.