Designer1

Thanks for the reply Eric. Good to hear your not experiencing the same thing. This plan originated in an earlier version of chief but carried over to x11 a while back. So perhaps I just need to explore some settings to fix this. Glad to know this isn't a regular occurrence. Thanks again!

So I have an open concept floor plan to the kitchen, great room and dining area. I used the room divider tool to delegate the sections and room labels to allow for size calculations and accurate room names. The issue is the room dividers are messing up the crown and base moldings. Is there any way to have both the room dividers and not have them mess up the moldings? I don't want to erase all the dividers to take pictures only to have to replace them later on. Seems counterintuitive to not be able to have both work fine. Work done in X11. Any ideas? Thanks in advance!

Rob you were right....if you go to.... Default settings > Camera tools > Floor Camera > Backdrop > make sure no backdrop is selected and then in the background color you can select whatever you want. The problem is unless you select this for the default for each plan it defaults back to the white background in each plan. So I will have to change this for my template plan so I wont have to go do this everytime! At least we know where to go to change it now...that was a bit frustrating. It wasn't essential but for me it got to be about the principle of me having to find out how to change the color! haha

Is it possible to change the background color in the library browser? Im finding it hard to fully view selected library items, especially light fixtures with the white background. I clicked around but couldn't find a place where I could adjust this. Thanks!

Great thanks Eric! No, each time I get a new version of chief I always start with the default plan that comes with that version and only making modifications with hardware, moldings, paint etc. So I never mess with layers like what Im experiencing with a few of these plans. Never in 16 years of using chief have I had this problem before, that's why it was so puzzling, I couldn't understand why this was for some but not all plans. Looks like I will try some of these recommendations you gave and try them out. Thanks for the suggestions, I appreciate it!

Eric I can do without sarcasm, I asked a question for help. Clearly by default some of my settings on certain plans have the standard area and text on the same layer. My question is why is this like that on some and not all because Im not having this on all the plans. At this point with all of the work done and clicking off the layers, I need to figure out how to separate the two so I don't have to manually select all of my custom text and switch layers.

Glenn, I have noticed when I do turn off Room standard area in layer settings it also turns off all my text when I use the text tool. How do I separate the two, so I don't have the standard area displayed yet still have the text tool labels I put on various items?

Thanks Glenn, to be honest with you that is something I haven't even explored yet in Chief dealing with Macros. Another tool Ive never used in chief is the ruby console...whatever that does...haha... I just say it adds bling to my dashboard! Ive used nearly all the tools just a few that I haven't but the ones I haven't used, I have no clue what they even do. Looks like it might be optimal for me to be adventurous on a slow day and go check out the nifty buttons and trinkets on the dashboard I never used before... feels like the first time driving a car again!

Thanks Glenn, that was it! I remember back in the day in earlier versions you could click on many selections of what you wanted to add to room labels. I couldn't remember what version it changed. Thanks again for the reply Glenn, I appreciate it very much!

Does anyone know how to customize the room labels? For instance, usually it will just saying Living Room or Kitchen with the size 12'X 14' ex. Now one of my plans has that plus the square footage and its just too much information. I went to the room labels default but don't see the selections of chosing sq feet and other selections. I use to remember where to go for this and now I forget! Thanks in advance!

Im putting optimism out there for some legendary new stair tool new from the top down with great tools and customization for X12!

Interesting, looks like the stair tool is more particular then I thought. Yeah Im not sure if it would change things if I changed it to landings, I will try that. I wish chief could update its stair tool, its virtually unchanged but minor tweaks since version 9. Thanks so much for everyones replies and help!

Ok, I tried the recommendations but Im not having the same results. Does anyone know why I cant seem to get the stairs and railings to have smooth transitions? Is there something to select on the railings like I did the staircases? Thanks in advance! Turret Stairs.plan

Yeah your computer sounds more like a space ship then a computer! So with all the high numbers does chief ever lag if you load a huge project or does it just hum along with zero lag? im going to upgrade my computer soon. I always buy a really big expensive one then wait a long while before replacing, so its getting close to the time im going to look for another new one.

Haha! Your probably right Rene! All us bay area chiefers should get together once in awhile and see what everyones specialty is in the industry so we have help and can refer people to each other. Your not far from San Jose at all! By the way... your rendering looks great! Did you do that in pbr or raytrace?

Thanks Cheryl and Graham. Wow what beautiful renderings! Its nice to get some advice from the pros that have been using pbr for awhile just so us newbies on pbr can avoid some of the mishaps. It will be interesting to see quick results vs waiting for the raytrace. Im just happy the new raytrace engine back a few versions is so much better then in years past with the checkerboard background where you couldn't even see your image till it already ran for awhile. At least now you can stop and make adjustments before investing too much time. So this pbr thing will be even better. Thanks again for all the recommendations!

Rob, Would you be willing to post some of your settings for those of us who haven't embarked on PBR yet? If not I understand as sometimes the secret recipes of chiefs tools are for each user to figure out.

Cheryl, what do you usually reduce the sun settings to before you begin the pbr?

Wow interesting thanks for the heads up! Yeah when I did the quick pbr in the scene the sun appeared so much stronger then even the lights in the house. The main thing I noticed was the stainless steel polished looked almost like chrome, that's why I was wondering if brushed stainless steel was better. In reality when I think of brushed stainless steel I think of a much more wire brush finish but in chief it appears more like regular appliance stainless steel. I can see this might not be as easy to transition from raytrace to pbr as I thought. I appreciate all the replies and additional info though, every little bit helps!

Great, thanks!

Any advice before I begin my first pbr vs raytrace? Ive done many raytraces on previous versions of chief but just got to the point where Im starting my pbrs. Do most of you use brushed or polished stainless steel for appliances? I did a quick view in pbr and noticed the polished SS seems mirror like and maybe not as realistic as the brushed? I also noticed the sun appears to be twice as strong as in raytrace. Just wanted to ask before heading into the water about some of these things to see what you all might recommend. Thanks!

Great! Thanks you all for your support and replies. I will give those a try and see what results I can get. Im hoping that in future releases of chief they will greatly address an updated stairs and railing builder. At this point were dealing with nearly the same stair/railing tool weve had since 2007 and earlier... time for a huge upgrade! Thanks again!

How can I get this railing to have a center newel without it reaching to the beam BUT I want the outer newels to be post to beam like shown in the picture? I understand we can space newels out on the DBX but I need one in the center for support I just don't want that one reaching all the way to the beam like the rest. I hope theres some option I can accomplish this. Thanks!

Thanks for all the replies and help! There were a few moving parts with all this so a variety of things ranging from a bad link to one of the libraries, to old libraries replacing new ones. Bottom line from my several day adventure with this is, you have to download a fresh library download from chiefs website, don't use one that's already downloaded into a folder (even if its not uploaded into Chief), even if its the same one that your about to download from the website. For some reason once the folder is on your desktop you cant make any changes to it, even if you change the name before uploading into chief and then it replaces your newest libraries. This can be a headache because then your running around trying to figure out which library is old and new, as neither one of them have different names and don't create two libraries its just one replaced manufacturer library. So then its like is this the new or old library? So by me downloading several old manufacture libraries and also the old core materials library fresh off chiefs website and before allowing it to save, change the name. Once it goes onto your desktop folder, even before uploading to chief, any name changes made no difference for me. So that appears to be the magic of the whole thing. I kept getting frustrated over the fact that, for the old manufacture libraries, it didn't matter if I already had the library item downloaded to my computer it still would erase the new one. Ahh, glad that whole ordeals over with...now to remember this topic so I can refer to it in the future should I want to do something similar in future chief releases.

I tried this for a smaller sample using manufacture libraries and it erases the ones I have and installs an older one... so Im hesitant to mess with my X11 libraries as it seems to delete X11s when you click on even older x7 manufacture libraries. I tried renaming the folder like Simpsondoor2017 yet it ignores it and still overwrites the new. I might just need to call chief to get the old stuff.