Chrisb222

Looking to get a mini M1. Reviews seem to say that even programs running through Rosetta, like CA, are faster than running native on the Intel chip. Is this your experience?

Start - End

Design-build. Thats what I do. It's a fantastic niche if you can get established. Training? Certification? Hahaha. Around here, training is spending a couple years fetching sky hooks, pipe holes, and board stretchers, and certification is hanging a 4' level from your gun rack. If your area requires those, I feel for ya. Knowing HOW to build a house is key to convincing people to sign your contract, IMO. I've built many, many custom homes for people who ran from another larger builder because the owner openly admitted he had no idea how to build a house. Being small and doing some of the work yourself keeps building trust with your community. Getting connected with a strong realtor can help get you off the ground. It sucks to pay the commission but if you're good you won't need them for long. Word of mouth is still the best advertising, if you want to stay small. I don't have any advertising, a website, or even a current business card. Heck sometimes I want to change my phone number, too much demand. Good subs are also key. Bottom line, the requirements will be dictated by the area you want to serve. If you're in the US look up your state's contractor's business licensing requirements, then to the local county, city, or other governing body, and go from there. They can guide you into whatever licensing, bonding, etc you're going to need. It can be a great gig but keep in mind you're never off the clock and every project is a potential time bomb, so if your phone rings on Christmas day and that house you just finished has a flooded basement, don't say I didn't warn you. Yeah, ask me how.

Manual roof planes

Can't think of why this would be a problem, even if gas. Without seeing the floorplan, I would prefer it accessed via the bathroom rather than a bedroom.

Yes true that's a limitation but my shelving company doesn't do angles either soo...

Thanks to all for the woodgrain tips. Off topic, but I use the shelf tool all the time for closet shelving. Material white, and the layer uses a dashed line. Quick way to indicate shelving in plans, and looks decent enough in 3d views too. Height is automatic.

I do. Then if I need a new SPV that's similar to another one, I open it and "Save Active View As" to create the new one. You don't export SPVs but you can import them from another file by simply going to File > Import > Import Saved Plan Views.

Thank you.

Thanks. In terms of duplicating the B&W example shown, is there a way to force the camera view to standard isometric angles? Also can the extensions of an angled dimension line be made vertical?

Yes, you can select the roof plane, and click the "Display on Floor Above" button in the Edit toolbar at the bottom of the screen.

Do you have 3D views open in another tab or window?

How did you send to layout? It looks like you chose "Current Screen" > "Live View" or "Current Screen As Image" If so, send "Current Screen" > "Plot Lines" and see if it's better

Just so you understand why that's happening, the gap is caused by the difference between your roof structure thickness and the gable fascia thickness. The software builds the ceiling to the bottom of the roof framing, even if you haven't built the roof framing. Your roof deck is thicker, or taller than the fascia, so the porch ceiling is pushed below the fascia. You control the member sizes in the Build Roof > Structure tab or in Roof defaults. Adjusting those settings is how you would get the model to conform to how it would be built, if you prefer an accurate model. You can see in the screenshot that out of the box, CA builds a roof deck that is thicker than the gable fascia, pushing the ceiling down. Or Ryan's method is an easy way to quickly straighten out the 3D view. Also, you can accomplish that design without a ridge pole, just has to be engineered to work.

You're welcome! Glad it helped.

I just hit tab.... unless I'm missing something here??

Looks like a sink. Did you drag a sink out of a cabinet? If so you can't select the sink directly, have to select the cabinet first. Wherever it is...

You're welcome. The adjustments I'm referring to run the gamut. Material properties, material definitions, ray trace settings, lighting, placement of objects... basically anything I see that needs adjusted. If by image properties you mean those within the ray trace settings, I find them very difficult to use mainly because they're very touchy, but with a limited useful range. That's why I usually need to process in a true image editor.

Another point: I try to keep auto on as long as possible when in the initial concept phase. Homeowner wants to add 2' to the garage in both directions? Bam, roof follows right along.

This. I start off auto then manually do whatever it takes. I see no point in eschewing auto roofs. Why not let the program build what it can? I'm not advocating jumping through hoops trying to force a certain automatic plane, but let it do what it can. At least it saved you drawing x number of planes. My template has auto build roof checked as default. In most cases it gets it 50-70% correct, right off the bat. That works for me, I can always edit/redraw whatever needs fixed. My 2¢: use both.

I run a tiny (like 200 pixel) test RT just to check lighting, shadows, and overall balance. Then adjust, repeat. If something's wrong, I can usually tell in one or two passes, which takes just seconds at this size. Most shots will show whether they're good to go after about 6 passes, which takes only about a minute. With this method I can get a really good idea if the shot is gonna work without spending a ton of time doing full-res trial and error. Once all is set I run 15-20 passes at full res, depending, with clean up, sharpen, and final balance done in Photoshop or Gimp. This gives me satisfactory results in the least amount of time, in my experience, and really does not take that long at all.

Am I correct that 20 and 10 are hard-coded in the Send to Layout DBX? I liked previous versions where these values could be edited when sending. Hmm, I'm using the latest version of X12 but ....? Is Help not updated with the program?

Works for me every time. MacOS FTW!!

I knew a kid once they called Trey. We used to tie him up to the ceiling. Is that what we're talking about??

They allow you to control those settings within the Layout Box Spec DBX once you're in the layout. Eh, it works.