podcast 195 3D Viewing Changes in Vectorworks 2015

Vectorworks 2015 has combined some of the 3-D viewing settings to make them easier to locate, it is also introduced an ability to choose your default 3D rendering and projection. When I'm using Vectorworks 2015 I like to set my 3-D rendering to OpenGL and my projection to perspective. I find this makes it really easy to see your model. In this movie show you how to change your settings as well as showing you where to locate the new location for the Cropped Perspective preference.

BIM_SIG_051 Architect Special Interest Group August 2014 (am)

Using worksheets to help improve our workflow. Worksheets are very powerful, not only can use them to count objects and areas, but you can also use worksheets to find and edit information attached to objects. I often use worksheets to help control the data attached to objects like title blocks, drawing labels, et cetera. We also looked at creating a solar study.

Vectorworks Tip #150 - Preferences - Autosave

Auto Save it is really important to save your work on a regular basis, and it is really important to back up your files. Auto save allows you to automatically save your work, or to automatically backup your work. I choose the option to automatically back up my work and to keep the last five copies. This is saved me a lot of trouble from time to time when Vectorworks crashes or when I have a problem with a corrupted file.


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Vectorworks Tip #149 - 3D Modelling - Taper Face

Taper Face tool. This tool makes it really fast to edit your models when you want to taper the face of an object. In the past you had to change views and use the Split tool to do the same job as this tool. Now, you do not have to change the view, which makes it faster and easier to see what you are doing.


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Vectorworks Tip #148 - Visualisation - Create Animation (Vectorworks 2015)

Create Animation - Move Along a Path in Vectorworks 2015. Vectorworks have substanitally re-written the Move Along Path dialog so that it is much easier to use.

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Vectorworks Tip #147 - Basic Tools - Class Options

One of the class options I'm not very keen on is Active Only. The reason I don't like this very much is that always causes trouble with objects that are inside groups or symbols. It goes back to the basic concepts of Vectorworks that groups and symbols are container objects that have classes separate from the objects inside the container.
I was reading about somebody's problem on the Vectorworks community board where they had objects on two different classes inside a symbol. The symbol used the class of one of those objects, let's call them Class A and Class B. The symbol itself use the class Class A.



If you set your class options to Active Only, and you make Class A the active class, you won't see the object on class B.
However, if you make Class B the active class, you will not see anything inside the symbol because the the symbol (the container part) has been assigned to Class A, meaning that it disappears. And when the container disappears, everything inside the symbol disappears as well.

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podcast 194 - Surface Hatches in Textures Vectorworks 2015

Vectorworks 2015 has made huge improvement to textures. Textures can now have a surface hatch. The surface hatch will only appear when you view your model in hidden line rendering. If you set up your surface hatches correctly on your textures, you will see the normal part of the texture when you view your model in the rendered view, and you'll see the surface hatch (the lines) when you view your model and hidden line rendering. The feedback from my clients so far is that this is a huge improvement. If you watch this movie you will see one scene where you can see some viewports and hidden line rendering and one viewport in OpenGL rendering, all using the same textures from the same model, but giving completely different views of the model.

Vectorworks Tip #146 - Document Preferences - Mesh Smoothing

Some of you 3D models will look like a series of triangles making a mesh. This occurs with imported objects like cars and it will also occur on site models. the answer is to use Mesh Smoothing, one of the Document Preferences. It will dramatically smooth out the 3D model.
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Vectorworks Tip #145 - 3D Modelling – Fillet Edge

The Fillet Edge tool from the 3D Modeling toolset is used around the corners of 3-D objects. It also allows you to change the radius of the edge as it goes along, creating a variable raduis edge.

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Vectorworks Tip #144 - Visualisation - Lit Fog

Vectorworks Has the ability to show the strings of light coming into the building. This ability is a preference called Lit Fog You'll find Lit Fog in the preferences for the environmental lighting and it adds a beautiful quality of light. Use this to improve the quality of your renderings.

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Vectorworks Tip #143 - Basic Tools - Enter Key to Mimic Mouse Click

Enter Key to mimic mouse Click and double enter to mimic double mouse click. I often use this technique with the enter key to mimic the mouse click. For example, if I'm drawing a wall of a specific length, I will use the numeric keypad to type on the length of the wall and then use the enter key to mimic the mouse click so that I can then draw the next wall. This is a really quick way to draw. If you double hit the enter key it mimics the double mouse click finishing your wall, polygon, et cetera
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Vectorworks Tip #142 – Interactive settings – Background Color

Interactive Settings – Background Colour. The standard settings for the background colour are to have a white background colour for Top/Plan view, and a slight minty colour for 3-D views. The reasoning for this is that it helps you to see when you change from a Top/plan view to another view. But you may not like this idea, so you can change it using Interactive Settings.

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Vectorworks Tip #141 - 3D Modelling – Project Tool 3

The third mode of the Project tool is quite different to the first two. In this mode the project tool will project a shape onto another NURBS surface. You could think of this as being like an extrude to the NURBS surface

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Vectorworks Tip #140 - Visualisation - Visualization palette

The Visualization palette show the lights that are in the current scene, and if a viewport is selected, the Visualization palette shows the lights that are in the viewport. This allows you to edit light, shadows, the intensity of the light, etc. in this viewport, without affecting the lighting in other viewports.

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Vectorworks Tip #139 - Snaps - Tangent Snap

The Tangent Snap is really useful when you need an object that starts or stops at a tangent to circle or arc. This snap is the only way to ensure that your object is tangential.

You can find more information about this and other snaps on the Guide to Productivity.

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podcast 193 Changing the Interactive Appearance Settings

The interactive settings are designed to give you control over the way Vectorworks looks, not the way that it behaves. There are numerous settings here allowing you to change such things as the screen colour, the background colour for perspective views, and preselection colour, to name just a few. Changing these interactive settings can speed up the way you work by making it easier to see the things you want

Vectorworks Tip # 138 - Interactive settings - Ground and Sky Colour

You can change the sky and ground colours using the interactive settings.

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Vectorworks Tip #137 - 3D Modelling - Project Tool 2

The second mode of the Project tool is similar to the first mode except that it cleans up the area where you have split the original NURBS surface. In other words the NURBS surface is trimmed to the shape of the planar object. This makes a very quick to create a NURBS surface and then trim it to the shape that you want.

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Vectorworks Tip #136 - Visualisation - Animationworks - Creating Rotating Objects

Animationworks - Create Rotating object. Animationworks has a tool that will create a rotating object, so that as the movie plays, the object rotates.

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Vectorworks Tip #135 - Snaps - Snap to Distance

Snaps - Snap to Distance. Use this snap when you want to snap to a percentage along an object.

You can find more information about this and other snaps on the Guide to Productivity.

 

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podcast 192 - Using the Project Tool for 3-D Modelling

I'm a big fan of using the Project tool, because it so powerful for 3-D modelling. You can use it to trim a NURBS surface to suit a planar shape, you can also use it to project planar objects onto a 3-D object. In my recent 3-D Modelling Special Interest Group, the topic of the project or came up. Many of the users were surprised at how powerful this tool can be.