BenLondon

Following on, I moved my boundry out to see what happened (see attached) to the list and changed the ceiling paint to white figuring the WB paint numbers are basically the same as my drywall numbers. I only have 4.00sqft of walls???? This tool is whack....unless I have some incorrect settings somewhere which would mean at best it is not intuitive or user friendly. Again, this is just a test to see if I can rely on much larger areas within a plan for generating material lists.

My apologies, I should have made it clearer from the beginning, I am using this tiny room as an example. I of course know how to measure for drywall in the real world, I was really using this exercise to test the accuracy/usability of material lists within chief to build confidence that Chief will pump out accurate indoor within a material list polyline. After looking through several other posts it looks like this is a common ask that Chief has not addressed for over a decade; there should be a way for chief to deliver accurate square footage of ALL surfaces, walls and ceilings, within a material list poly line. Afterall, CA calculates base boards and trim just fine so why can it not calculate the perimeter of a room and multiply it by the ceiling height to give the wall areas for the selected sides of walls only? This is a basic tool that needs some work still.

Hi All I'm trying to get a handle on using the material list polyline and am having trouble getting the list to correctly count drywall boards. See the attached small laundry room that we are goint to be remodeling back from the studs. The remodel will call for new drywall on the laundry room sides only of the walls. Is the Material List Polyline smart enough to tell me what I need for drywall on the ceiling and interior wall surfaces only. As you can see, I positioned the line in the center of the walls and "Include Contained Objects" with the hope it would give me the one side of the wall only, but the result is not correct. Ideas? Thanks!

I think I worked it out, I added a 3D solid to fill the void (ceiling framing area). Is that the right approach?

I am trying to get this gable wall right above the deck ceiling. The deck is built with "flat ceiling over this room" I added a wall on the Attic floor but it does not meet the ceiling below. Ideas? Thanks

Thanks Michael. Yes, that looks like it's working. I don't see any reason not to do it this way other than the extra steps needed to add the the 3rd floor level. I'm just making the Level 1 (walkout basement) walls Pony walls with concrete lower and siding upper and then adding the footing on level 0 as you say. I think this gives more simple design capability (internal walls etc) with the garage being on level 1 rather than level 0.

I am creating the model for a 2 story home, main floor with daylight basement. See attached photo. The proposed design I am working on is going to replace the deck on the left hand side with a garage and new deck (balcony room) over it. After watching a couple of videos on how to model a daylight basement, I started with drawing the main (upper) floor level on floor 1. My intention then was to "build foundation" on floor "0" to create the pony walls and footings for the daylight basement. However, I am now seeing that then trying to build a garage on floor 0 doesn't work in the program. Should I instead place the main floor on "2", build a new floor "1" and then just add footings under floor "1"? This would allow me to build the garage and balcony over it on floors 1 and 2. Which leads to my next question: When should you build a model with walk out basement on Floors "1" and "2" vs "0" and "1"? Is it possible to create a model on Floors "0" , "1" & "2" and have the same outcome as using only "0" & "1" with regards to the foundation and footings?

I had the number of lights at 100. It resets every time you change the render type back to 8. I don't think the number of lights is the issue. HOWEVER, you are right, it was the DEFAULT Light Set Check box that I needed rather than automatic. Thanks! Solver: Thank you for your kind advice with regards to how to interact on the forum - I'm sure you get a lot of newbies and it can be frustrating. I will be sure to create a signature with full details. Have a great weekend!

I am in X14. Attaching plan file. Thanks I used a 2nd floor because I wanted to add the wall at the edge of upper Mezzanine. If you have suggestions of how better to approch the plan file - much appreciated. Always learning. However, I imagine there will be times in the fututure that I will want light rays to pass from upper floors to lower areas through "open below" areas. Cheers Ben Movie Room.plan

I have built a 2 story movie room with most of it being an "open below" second floor, leaving a mezzanine. I have recessed lighting under the ceiling of the 1st (mezzanine) and 2nd floor. I am trying to get the full camera views to render with all lights "in use". The problem I have is I can only get the lower or upper lights to activate according to the height of my camera - not at the same time. It's probably something simple. Thanks for the help! Ben

I am trying to create a 3D tile texture similar to these lava tiles: http://www.islandstone.com/product-detail.php?id=63&keywords=V_Squares I have created 4 identical wedges as 3D solids by drawing the profile of the wedges and converting them to a polyline solid and giving them a height of 4". I now want to rotate them to orient as they are in the link photo. But it seams i can only rotate in the X-Y plane. I need to spin them in the vertical Z plane. How do i do this? I have attached the plan view of the solids. Thanks