SHCanada2

hmm, I'm not sure I would call that "built in". It looks like it snapshots the current screen to an image file, uploads it to the cloud, AI runs on it, then it shows it back to you, where you can then download it. And it doesn't look like you can alter the AI image. Is this any different than capturing an image in CA, uploading it to an AI engine, getting it back and then putting it on your layout. seems like the same thing, no? At least with an independent AI engine I can tell it to make it brighter, or change colours or pick the one I want. If it was truly "built in", I could run it on my camera, see different options, pick one, then tell it to make it brighter, change colours, and that is all saved in my model. This perhaps is softplan's step one before doing a truly built in and fully functional AI assistant for images.

the current plan view looks like: If you make them longer in plan view, they show as longer: If you make them longer in truss detail, it does not look to make them longer in plan view. what are you looking to see in plan view?

how would the truss look any different in plan view from before and after you modified it? I'm not understanding something...

plan view or elevation view?

..and probably need to look at the terrain videos

here it is even simpler for the past 25 years. main floor, second floor, foundation optional if there is a reno in the basement, then "finished area" which is usually total less utility room. So i have for my template 2 different ones to pick from plus parcel coverage if needed

but that is not the only way. you could change the room type for any room you do not want to include, and not use that as the actual room name, and then exclude it from the schedule, or in the room specification ->include in schedule you could set the rooms you dont want to include to a different category, and then not include in the schedule. for instance go into the room and change the include in schedule from rooms to 3D solid. The schedule I just created will then exclude that room, or just exclude from the schedule altogether. or create a new category called "unconditioned" and create a new schedule with only rooms that have that category. Lots of different options The only other thing you need to do if you want multiple totals is create individual schedules and then stack them on top of each other 18.02.2026_17.46.30_REC.mp4

here is a simple example: ...but the trick is what to do when you want to exclude certain rooms. If you have two rooms of the same type of room, but you only want to exclude one, that is where it gets tricky. CA has a field on each room as to whether or not it is include or excluded in the living area. You can use this flag in a macro and set this property in a custom field in the object information panel, and then use this in the schedule, but there is some work to it. my macro has: stdArea=standard_area include=include_in_living_area if (include == true) stdArea.to_f else 0 end this effectively creates a new field to be used in the schedule instead of the std area i show in the video 18.02.2026_17.28.54_REC.mp4

@Doug_N Did you try polycam?

did you book a free demo? I looked on their website and there are images of the 2d point cloud, but they all look wavy. I would expect if there was 2mm accuracy, the walls would be straighter.. It will be interesting to see how you make out. $99US per month is a bit pricey. I prefer per scan pricing. It would be also interesting to see how good their room "Stitching is". This is where I can always tell the accuracy of these things. If all the walls are a bunch of different thicknesses, then it is probably not correct. bit of a weird website. if you click user guides, there looks to be a bunch of bitmaps under "Academy" I could not find an actual user guide

you could check the CA log file. I think you can see where it is located under preferences. It almost sounds like you are being starved for resources if it works for awhile. Other far out possibilities:virus scanning constantly running against the CA data directory where CA is constantly writing files, but that is a way out there guess. You could also disable the Nvidea card to see if that is related but better question is when did it start to do this and what happened just before that

I also evaluated iguide as they can generale elevations and could generate door and window sizes (with a grain of salt). They had a pretty good price package and the camera price was reasonable(~2k) when on sale. The only issue is in order to get an elevation one needs to be perpendicular to the building face. Here, where the houses are 4ft to the PL or less most of the time, it would not work for side elevations. If I have to build the CA model to get side elevations, I might as well build it to get front and rear elevations. But it was very tempting.

you can use schedules to sum up the room areas and it is dynamic If you want to exclude certain types of rooms, then you need to add a new item in the object information panel, and add in a macro to include or exclude the room. (...edit: if you want to use the built in CA radio button of include or exclude in living area in the room properties) There is at least one post on the topic from last year or maybe the year before AlaskanSon and Renerabbit both have it predone and sell it, I beleive, if you wanted to contact one of them to purchase

one way...create symbols out of two of the houses, and then place them on the third plan file. Or create a plan file with no house and put all three symbols in it

rene's first one is one I tend to see from some of the bigger outfits: