Craigevans

matty12, Thanks…. I'll give that a try…. Thanks for the idea.

Perry, This is in South Florida where everything is either CMU walls with tie beam. We are actually designing this house to be built with ICF with a 4" pour and then we are talking with the manufacturer and engineer to see if we can continue with a floating ICF beam or if not we will form a 16" high by 9 1/2" wide tie beam to allow for the door. We have done a lot of them with tie beams but this is the first we are trying to design with all ICF structure. Its turning into an interesting project. I am just new to Chief and am trying to figure out how to show it in the prints on a 3D.

I am trying to include a 90 degree slider into my drawing. I cannot seem to find a way to do this with the current door tools in x6. It is forcing me to still have a portion of the wall remaining in the corner as a column. Has any one had any experience in drawing these with chief? If so please help…… I'm Lost!!!!

Jon, Thank you so much for your help. How long did that trace cook? I'm gonna go over what you did and see where I was going wrong! Thanks Again. Craig

Jon, I am enclosing the plan. Any help you could offer would be great. I am not quite site where I am going wrong in my set up. I know its how I am setting up the software to cook the ray trace and I am seeing too many people put out great looking prints without going to any other software such as sketch up or the like. I started to put it into Photo Shop but I decided to wait and learn where my problem is stemming from so I can fully utilize the software. Thanks in advance for any help you can offer. I have tried new grass patterns, tried making them larger as suggested and still I don't get any better than this and the quality still looks almost as if it were 2d. Thanks again. The Riviera.plan

I am still fairly new with CA but I am having troubles finding a good mix to create a photorealistic look with Ray tracing on exterior shots. I am getting much more comfortable with my inside shots but can't seem to figure out the outside. The grass just looks like a flat piece of paper that my eight year old colored. I have tried working with the textures and bump maps. I have tried several different lighting aspects even playing with direction of sun and time of day. Also, the driveways always seem to be bland. Can someone help?

Thanks so much for the help! By taking the wall and making it invisible that took care of the problem. I couldn't use the rail wall because I want the area open from all sides and the finished floor height is at ground height. Thanks again. This forum is great for help and the responses came a lot faster than I thought they would. This is a great resource especially for the newbie!

I am new with chief and I am having a problem. When I build a covered lanai or porch, I am building my tie beam by building a wall and using the pony wall as a room divider to allow for the height i need of the beam and also to provide an enclosed "room" space so I can set my ceiling heights. The only problem is that when I do this, the room divider is removing the siding at the point of contact with the exterior wall and I see the exposed structure of the wall. Can someone help with why this happening and how to fix it. Or if there is a better way to create a tie beam and still creat the "room for ceiling heights ect. Thanks!