JonathanK

Are you using any terrain breaks? In the past, I've "ignored" the retaining wall tool, and just used terrain breaks and elevation lines/regions to get my terrain correct. Then used solids to get my retaining walls. Finally, make sure that your sidewalks are thick enough that your grass region isn't going to "bleed through" onto it.

Thanks, all. I’ll probably submit a suggestion to make these editable independently of each other. We don’t do a ton of them, but I would rather edit everything through the door DBX, rather than placing this piece or that piece. That’s not scalable for multiple users working with the software. I can make the custom track with the 1x mounting board, but I would like to be able to make that any length I want separately from the door slab.

Thanks, Joe. The problem with the lintel is that you cannot specify it being offset to one side or the other. So I made a custom track that has the lintel built in...but now there is this issue...

Is there a way to control a barn door slab width separately from the track above? Typically when we do barn doors, we have a 1x8 mounted to the wall, that the track mounts to. I want that to be a specific width (74-1/2" wide). But I want the slab of my door to be a specific width as well (36" wide). If I set my door so that that width is correct, it makes my track too short. If I set it so that my track is the right width...my door is too wide. See attached...

I agree with you, but it would be amazing to see something big like that get an update. Lets move into 2026...

Why is this so hard for you to understand? Have you not read through the blog that CA Staff posted, specifically the benchmarks: https://www.chiefarchitect.com/blog/computer-for-design-and-gaming/#real-time-ray-tracing I agree with you regarding AI...but only regarding FINAL IMAGES. It takes me longer to generate a 3D view through AI than it does to bang out a quick PBR view for a customer to review through email. Plain and simple... But I also agree with you regarding them focusing on other items (except material lists). I have always been frustrated with the amount of cabinet tools and libraries that CA has, but a lack of window tools that they have. Why don't windows have more control over sashes, frames, jambs etc.. like how a window is actually built? Doesn't make sense to me. Same with OH doors, or walk doors, or a pile of other things like you mentioned. How about elevation views...why can't I have only the outline of the building be bold?...why is terrain so fickle?...etc...

You're right, for an interior it's more like 5 seconds for it to completely clear, but exteriors are pretty quick. Like 3.5 seconds. But I can roll around in PBR and it's always clear enough that I can see what I'm doing or where I'm going.

I have the 5070Ti. Love it.

While I agree on the stance of AI, I personally do not want CA to remove or not focus on the PBR engine. I still send many, many views out to clients utilizing this over AI. Will that change in the future, Not sure. But the prompting needed for AI takes far longer than it does to shoot some 3D views in PBR and move along. But I'm also using a PC with a 5070Ti, not a Mac. So I can crank a PBR picture out in about 3 seconds. Maybe if I was on Mac I'd feel differently...

Maybe I'm not understanding issue #1 fully, but can't you just open the wall in question, click on the "Roof" tab, and check "Lower Wall Type if Split by Butting Roof"? Set that as your Interior wall type, and move on down the line...

You can change the different camera elevation defaults to be more "standard" to what you do 80% of the time. But you're right...you cannot have different "types" of wall elevations. The only thing you can do is set your wall elevation default, and create a bunch of different default sets that are what you're looking for. When you pull your wall elevation or exterior elevation, or cross section, then you change your default set in that particular camera view. In reality...probably same amount of clicks.

Here's a snip of the Default Set dialog box that allows you to change the aspects of each Default Set. So essentially you would create new (or use existing) settings for each of these items. They would be custom to whatever Default Set you're wanting.

Would default sets be what you're looking for? You can setup all your presets in there, and when you pull your elevation view, you can select which default set you want that has all of that information setup on the back end.

@VisualDandD, that looks AMAZING! Great job.

Have you tried using a window and switching the type to Louvered. I'm curious if it's the wall, or something else...

Are you talking about a window and making it louvered, or are you talking about a symbol out of the library?

The front to back is definitely a lower pitch than the side to side. If I were to guess I'd say 5:12 and 7:12; possibly 6:12 & 8:12. But you can use what the others mentioned above. We use Hover in our office: https://hover.to/

Made some revisions to my prompt, and been running tests...

Other options I've dabbled in...but haven't spent a ton of time perfecting these.

Yes...you're right, and your picture you posted looks great! Definitely more than one way to skin a cat.

10 years ago, I would dream of creating architectural visualizations that were extremely realistic. I always used Thea and Kerkythea with multiple softwares and importing models and creating textures, etc.. It would take a full night to let it run and in the morning, I'd get in and find that this wasn't quite right, or that wasn't quite right. It was a multi-day task to get one decent image. AI has brought that so much closer...and the more advanced it gets, the better the output. AND the quicker the turnaround. It's quite amazing.

Basically...if you upload a Chief render, and say "Make this more realistic", the AI will take all the stuff and enhance it slightly. But it will mostly just use all your textures, etc... But...if you upload a technical illustration and tell it what you want for materials, backgrounds, etc.. then it finds them and applies that to your illustration. The biggest challenge I ran into was that no matter what I did, it was always too clean and cartoony. The technical illustration shows the differences in the sidings, roofing, stone, etc.. so AI has context. You just need to tell it what you want...and it will fill in the gaps. Think rendering engine, not photo enhancer. It will do the photo enhancement, but if you feel like you're hitting a ceiling, that's the next step.

It's a prompt that I've fine tuned over the last few months. Nothing that anyone wouldn't be able to replicate on their own. It just has a lot of personal preferences and fine tuning/tweaking. But I use Gemini's AI. For the creative space, it's one of the better ones. Claude, ChatGPT, Copilot, etc.. are all not great in the creative sense. They are excellent "companions" or "code writers". But I'm looking for a "rendering engine" more or less...and Gemini excels in that.

@Joe_Carrick, see attached. I just did a screen grab of yours, and ran it through my prompts. Not perfect...but better. Tried to get it to ignore textures, but alas...it just wants to use them no matter what.

This was done with the help of AI. Not perfect, but gets you close.