Alaskan_Son

I assume you know I was kidding. I am absolutely and sincerely thankful for all your help. And for the record, I added Remove 3D to my toolbar...one of my new favorites : )

You're welcome. Looking good...and much brighter : )

Instead of using the image as a backdrop, perhaps try Build>Image to create an image or billboard you can place outside your windows. Just a thought.

I'm sorry, I didn't mean to suggest that you turn all the lights off. I was merely trying to show what could be accomplished without them. Try adding some light sources back in, maybe mess with the intensity settings in the Ray Trace DBX... And try turning up your ambient lighting settings under 3D View Defaults... Here's a quick example done without any lights (not even a sun). Ambient lighting settings down near 20% (don't remember exactly what I set them to)... Here's another one. Again, without any lights. Ambient lighting settings at 100%... I'm not exactly a ray tracing expert, but hopefully messing with those settings in combination with the north pointer and sun angle (as previously mentioned) will get you closer to what you're looking for.

Just re-read the original post with regard to joists directions and it appears as if though you might be referring to actual ceiling joists (as opposed to rafters or trusses). If this is the case, the problem you're likely experiencing is because your rooms are defined as having no ceilings...so there is no ceiling to frame. Check "Ceiling Over This Room" and it frames just fine...

That's kinda what I said to do earlier (manual framing) but I thought you had provided a better way...I guess not. No need to even place rafter spacing at all though if you're framing manually right? Just don't build any auto roof framing.

I couldn't find any other interior-4 walls in the plan. Am I missing something? If you're worried about it affecting other plans, don't be. Those settings are entirely plan specific. The only settings that affect all plans (global settings) are found under Preferences.

I could get it to work for ceiling and floor joists but not for rafters or trusses.

I can't tell you why, but for some reason, when you try changing your wall definition for your wall type "STUPID" to give it a zero thickness, it reverts to the "Interior-4" wall type (as you said). If you change the "Interior-4" to a zero thickness, the zero thickness works. Once you do that, you can change back to your zero thickness "STUPID" or "Room Divider" and it seems to work except if you open up the wall it is still "Interior-4". Feels buggy to me. Unless I'm missing something, this seems like one to submit to tech support as a bug.

Thanks Scott. I thought there had to be a way. I very rarely draw up framing and so I haven't really explored the framing tools all that much.

Not sure exactly what you are trying to accomplish, however if you're talking about getting rafters or trusses to run parallel with the length of the building...I've never needed to do that and just messing around with it for a couple minutes I wasn't able to make it happen automatically. You can however manually create a rafter or truss though using Build>Framing>Rafter (or Roof Truss). Once created you can use the Multiple Copy tool or Transform Replicate to distribute it as necessary. Edit: Better yet, do as Scott suggests below.

Try again. Make sure to close the plan before trying to attach, and make sure to click "Attach This File".

Totally agree. Not even sure how those words made it through. Seems to me like they usually automatically get edited out by the system.

Glad I could help.

Just to give you an idea of what the sun alone will do, here's a very quick example. Turned off all light sources except for the sun and didn't mess with any materials or settings other than the sun position and lighting intensity. 7 passes...3 minutes. Edit: Accidentally left the ray trace running. Here's 36 passes and 15 minutes.

Opened up your plan and messed with it a bit. Looks like you need to actually add a North Pointer and Sun Angle to your plan. Brightens up nicely... Note: I deleted my previous post because after opening your plan I realized it didn't really apply.

The ones with dollar amounts also have the little SSA ribbon up in the right hand corner.

There are quite a few options including but not limited to: 1. The soffit tool (one of the more popular options). 2. Creating room dividers and adjusting the ceiling height and structure settings for the individual areas. 3. Using ceiling planes (probably one of the better methods in my opinion). 4. Using polyline solids (many will disagree, but this is usually my personal favorite). 5. Much more complicated, but you can build soffits using an additional "Floor" with very short ceiling heights. I'm sure the list could go on. These are just the methods that come to mind.

Why not use the Layer Hider tool instead? Just checked and you CANNOT "uncheck" a layer using the Layer Painter tool in X7 either.

You might have to zip it first.

Very nice Christopher!

You're welcome. Glad I could help.

Ya, that's what I was envisioning. With the railing width you're using though you would need a bigger newel or block anyway. Use a smaller rail or larger corner post and it should look just fine.

You know Glenn...not sure whether I want to give you a hug or punch you in the face sometimes. That's an awesome tip. Not sure I've ever used that tool before. Thank you : )

We can't make it look good without adding an extra newel post. Adding an extra newel could fix it though. Here's something to think about... That connection isn't possible to perfect in real life either. It would need a newel post or plinth block of some sort for the transition.