ChiefArchitect

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  1. From the album: Featured Customer - Michael Leach

    Sunflower Ranch, Sheldon MO being build summer of 2016 House is being build on an existing foundation. Previous house was destroyed by tornado a few years back. Basement/foundation was still in great condition. The only adder to the foundation will be the garage, front and back porch and rear garden room.
  2. Congratulations to Michael Leach for winning the Outdoor Living Design Contest! He has won a Chief Architect water bottle, 8 GB USB drive, t-shirt, one hour of personal training, and will be entered into our year end Design Contest of the Year for a chance to win an iPad Pro. Thank you to all who entered and shared your great designs!
  3. From the album: 2016 Design Contest Winners

    Michael Leach of MTLdesigns, LLC won June's Outdoor Living Design Contest! See more here. This design was created using Chief Architect X8 and is for an existing back yard here in the Springfield Missouri area (Nixa). My clients go to the Caribbean every year for two weeks so I thought I should bring some of that back to MO. I continued the already existing retaining wall with two curved rock walls and added a custom “lagoon” style pool. Decking color was picked to replicate beach sand, with an inset of green tile in the shape of a palm tree. On the back (NW) corner, a pergola holds a hammock which floats over beach sand (not tile) for softness of foot, and heat relief. All the plants are for zones 5-7, so they will grow fine in Missouri hot summers and cold winters. All other tropical plants are in pots for moving to the indoors when the temperature drops. Added was a spiral staircase off of the second-floor deck, an outdoor kitchen, living space furniture with glass jar pendant lighting and a palm bladed ceiling fan. Existing concrete will be painted with epoxy floor covering for durability and appearances. So bring your swim suit and relax. Michael Leach www.MTLdesigns.net 417-719-5195
  4. Congratulations to Bryan Ramírez Arroyo for winning the Residential Design Contest! He has won a Chief Architect water bottle, 8 GB USB drive, t-shirt, one hour of personal training, and will be entered into our year end Design Contest of the Year. Thank you to all who entered and shared your great designs!
  5. Design Contest – Vintage Industrial! The Chief Architect Design Contest is a fun way to share your work and win great prizes. Share your Industrial Inspired Space for a chance to win Chief Gear! Use any Chief Architect software product to create your original design and check out our Vintage Industrial Catalogs. Enter: Submit a single image file of your design to submissions@chiefarchitect.com. Include your name, company information, the software you used and a description about the design. Winner: Entries will be posted in a photo album on Chief Architect’s Facebook page. Fans of Chief Architect will be asked to “Like” their favorite entry. The entry with the most “Likes” will be declared the winner. Share with your friends to earn their votes! facebook.com/ChiefArchitect Prizes: 1-hour personal online training 8 GB USB drive Chief Water bottle Chief T-shirt Design Contest – Featured Customer Automatically be entered into our Design of the Year Contest! Rules: Vintage Industrial Definition: Vintage Industrial Style turns focus onto mechanical and utilitarian elements, especially those salvaged and reclaimed from warehouses, hospitals, commercial buildings, farms, or other bygone institutions. Heavy with reclaimed wood, metal, and masonry materials, Vintage Industrial designs highlight hardworking and humble spaces. Use any Chief Architect software product to create your original design. One submission/image file per person (can be single view or collage) Chief Architect reserves the right to refuse any contest entry. Your free hour of training must be redeemed within 60 days. Entry Deadline is July 18, 2016 Questions? Send inquiries to submissions@chiefarchitect.com
  6. Now Available - Chief Architect has a new 3D Viewer product that is a virtual reality viewer on mobile devices for 3D models exported from Chief Architect software. The product is a Free app and runs under Apple iOS and Android. Here's a brief sample plan exported to the 3D Viewer More information is on the website To export a 3D Viewer model from Chief Architect you will need Chief Architect X8 Premier or Interiors, version 18.3. Once you have prepared your model for export in Chief Architect it will package up your model (textures and all) and put it under your Chief Architect cloud account. From your Chief Architect account, you can manage the sharing, deactivation, and deletion of plans you have exported from Chief Architect. The current number of plans you can Share on the cloud has a limit of (3) files. If you need more storage, you can contact Chief Architect sales and upgrade from the free to a paid cloud plan. To share your plans with another 3D Viewer user, click the ‘Share’ button associated with the plan you would like to share. You will need to provide the Sharing code that appears in the console. Or, you can click the ‘Send’ button to generate an email that includes the Sharing code as well as instructions for obtaining 3D Viewer and creating a Chief Architect account. Share your models with your clients using the 3D Viewer!
  7. From the album: 2016 Design Contest Winners

    Bryan won our Design Contest – Residential Design in May and is primarily using Chief Architect for his hobby. See all the designs here. My name is Bryan and I'm from Costa Rica. I used to make 2D plans in a Graphics Vector Software, but I was unable to preview my plans in 3D so I started searching for 3D Software. I read many good comments online about Chief Architect so I decided to go for it. I started using Chief Architect Home Designer 2014 as soon as it came out back in 2013. It was my very first time using 3D software of this kind, so I went to the online reference manual provided with the software and it was really easy to learn. After months of gaining experience with Designer 2014, I realized I needed more features so I went to Chief Architect X7. Now I'm trying to learn more and more and look forward to updating it to X8. I'm not a professional architect, most of the time I use the software as a hobby and I will recommend it to anyone. It’s a great software and you will learn to use it very quickly.
  8. Featured Customer - Bryan Ramírez Meet Bryan! He won our Design Contest – Residential Design in May and is primarily using Chief Architect for his hobby. Keep reading to learn more about Bryan! My name is Bryan and I'm from Costa Rica. I used to make 2D plans in a Graphics Vector Software, but I was unable to preview my plans in 3D so I started searching for 3D Software. I read many good comments online about Chief Architect so I decided to go for it. I started using Chief Architect Home Designer 2014 as soon as it came out back in 2013. It was my very first time using 3D software of this kind, so I went to the online reference manual provided with the software and it was really easy to learn. After months of gaining experience with Designer 2014, I realized I needed more features so I went to Chief Architect X7. Now I'm trying to learn more and more and look forward to updating it to X8. I'm not a professional architect, most of the time I use the software as a hobby and I will recommended it to anyone. It’s a great software and you will learn to use it very quickly.
  9. Hello Jason, I am sure there will be some Chief Users that chime in here, but I wanted to reach out to see if there are any questions we can answer for you. You can contact our sales department by emailing sales@chiefarchitect.com or call 208-292-3400. Also, feel free to reach out to me personally. You can simply ask for Derek if you call. We look forward to serving you as a Chief Architect customer! Kind regards, Derek Chief Architect Software
  10. Hello Craig, Thank you for the question and for your interest in upgrading your software. Assuming that you currently own Home Designer Pro 2012, you can upgrade to Pro 2017 for $295. When you upgrade from HD Pro to Chief Architect Premier you get a $500 discount. The discount is the same when upgrading from HD Pro to Chief Architect Premier regardless of the version number. We currently have a special deal for upgrading Home Designer Pro to Chief Architect that is good through July 11, 2016. Please contact us for more information. You can email sales@chiefarchitect.com or call 208-292-3400 Kind regards, Derek Chief Architect Sales
  11. Design Contest – Outdoor Living Spaces! The Chief Architect Design Contest is a fun way to share your work and win great prizes. Share your Outdoor Living Design for a chance to win Chief Gear! Use any Chief Architect software product to create your original design. Enter: Submit a single image file of your design to submissions@chiefarchitect.com. Include your name, company information, the software you used and a description about the design. Winner: Entries will be posted in a photo album on Chief Architect’s Facebook page. Fans of Chief Architect will be asked to “Like” their favorite entry. The entry with the most “Likes” will be declared the winner. Share with your friends to earn their votes! facebook.com/ChiefArchitect Prizes: 1-hour personal online training 8 GB USB drive Chief Water bottle Chief T-shirt Design Contest – Featured Customer Automatically be entered into our Design of the Year Contest! Rules: Use any Chief Architect software product to create your original design. One submission/image file per person (can be single view or collage) Chief Architect reserves the right to refuse any contest entry. Your free hour of training must be redeemed within 60 days. Entry Deadline is June 20, 2016 Questions? Send inquiries to submissions@chiefarchitect.com
  12. Watch our quick video on Annotation Sets to increase your productivity with Chief Architect Premier. Here are a few resources to get you started. -Annotations (anno-Breckenridge.cadefs) -Layers (layersets-Breckenridge.layers) -Wall Definition (wall-definitions-Breckenridge.dat) If you're not familiar with importing these file types, you can simply go up to File>Import>Import Annotation Sets / Layer Sets / Wall Definitions Also, check out this Knowledge Base article. anno-Breckenridge.cadefs layersets-Breckenridge.layers wall-definitions-Breckenridge.dat
  13. This year, Chief Architect was happy to participate in Fine Homebuilding’s Annual HOUSES Awards by contributing Floor Overview renderings for each of the winning homes. The renderings feature the Water Color with Line Drawing rendering technique that can be applied to any 3D or Elevation view created in Chief Architect. View the renderings through our album: Then check out all the featured homes and view the galleries here.
  14. From the album: Fine Homebuilding’s Annual HOUSES Awards Renderings

    Editor’s Choice The master bedroom, the kitchen, and the dining and living areas are along the southern wall of the house, which has lots of glass for natural daylighting, solar heat gain, and views of the property. The guest bedrooms and bathrooms are placed along the north wall. Editor’s Choice: Image 8
  15. This year Chief Architect was happy to participate in Fine Homebuilding’s Annual HOUSES Awards by contributing Floor Overview renderings for each of the winning homes. The renderings feature the Water Color with Line Drawing rendering technique that can be applied to any 3D or Elevation view created in Chief Architect. Learn more about the featured homes and view the galleries to see more here: www.finehomebuilding.com/houseawards
  16. From the album: Fine Homebuilding’s Annual HOUSES Awards Renderings

    Best Traditional – 2nd Floor This updated bungalow plan offers a functional entry, private office, and semi-open living spaces downstairs and three bedrooms upstairs. Two covered screened-porches offer outdoor living in this hot-climate, neighborhood home. Best Traditional: Image 13
  17. From the album: Fine Homebuilding’s Annual HOUSES Awards Renderings

    Best Traditional – 1st Floor This updated bungalow plan offers a functional entry, private office, and semi-open living spaces downstairs and three bedrooms upstairs. Two covered screened-porches offer outdoor living in this hot-climate, neighborhood home. Best Traditional: Image 12
  18. From the album: Fine Homebuilding’s Annual HOUSES Awards Renderings

    Best Small Home – 2nd Floor This plan is designed with one goal in mind: to draw your attention towards the view. All of the living spaces downstairs and the bedroom and balcony above are arranged to provide a clear sightline towards the north-facing wall of glass doors and clear story windows which reveal a view of the Hudson River beyond. Best Small Home: Image 6
  19. From the album: Fine Homebuilding’s Annual HOUSES Awards Renderings

    Best Small Home – 1st Floor This plan is designed with one goal in mind: to draw your attention towards the view. All of the living spaces downstairs and the bedroom and balcony above are arranged to provide a clear sightline towards the north-facing wall of glass doors and clear story windows which reveal a view of the Hudson River beyond. Best Small Home: Image 5