Multiple Buildings

[THBlack]

Modeling a complex that has a set of separate buildings, some having multiple floors. Learned that once I defined Building A, which has 3 floors, and then I go onto Building B that is supposed to have two, when I select Building B and try to add a floor, the new floor is added to building A.

 

Looking for the best approach to handle this.

 

I have X12 and delayed upgrading to X13. Does X13 let me do this and manage multiple buildings with multiple floors? X12 has a limit of 30 floors. Does X13 have the same limit?

 

Assuming that there is no difference for what I am trying to do, from poking around in the forums, seems like the way to go is to have a master plan with just terrain stuff and then make each building off of a copy of the master plan. Then, convert each building to a symbol and plop them down onto the master. If I want to change a building, would need to delete the building from the master, edit the plan with the building in it, and convert/import..

 

Is this the best / only way to do this?

 

Which training videos / resources are best to get me up to speed on symbology?

 

Thanxabunch. You guys are great.

 

- Got one more question coming up on Colors.

 

Harlan

[Chopsaw]

Yes the symbol method is likely the best approach. I think multiple structures can be achieved in the same file but it gets rather technical if there is any sort of an elevation difference using absolute elevations.  The other issue is that "Plane Jane" may not be up to the task if your surface counts start getting out of control.  I would go with the symbol method as the better option. 

[THBlack]

Thank you very much again Chapsaw!

[glennw]

Quote

Modeling a complex that has a set of separate buildings, some having multiple floors. Learned that once I defined Building A, which has 3 floors, and then I go onto Building B that is supposed to have two, when I select Building B and try to add a floor, the new floor is added to building A.

I would not recommend using symbols - not dynamic enough for me.

It sounds to me like you are not understanding how floor levels work in Chief.

You do not create floor levels on a building by building basis.

Once you have say 3 floor levels in your plan, you can use those same 3 levels for a separate building and specify different floor levels (on a room by room basis) - thus, you could have 3 floor levels, but you can also have as many room floor levels as you want on each of those floor levels.

The limit of 30 floors does not effect how many different room floor heights you can have on a floor.

ie, you can have 3 floor levels, but you, can have many, many different room floor levels on each of those floors.

I am probably describing this clumsily because of the "Floor Level" terminology.

Have a play and post back if you don't understand what I am saying. 

[THBlack]

Thanks so much, Glenn. What do you mean by symbols not being dynamic? What would I lose? If there is a later mod then I'd just go back to the plan that had the stuff before the conversion, change it, and re-create the symbol. Right?

 

Also, I don't have a very powerful computer. Am doing this for a special project, not to make a living from it.

 

I saw that the more I futzed around with floors and other buildings, the more CA became fussy.

 

Does this match your experience?

[joey_martin]

Just delete the floor in the other building. 

[glennw]

1 hour ago, THBlack said:

I saw that the more I futzed around with floors and other buildings, the more CA became fussy.

Does this match your experience?

No, a little bit of effort to understand what is happening will pay off.

Do you only want a 3D view or do you want interactive floor plans?

 

Try this:

Draw a 3 storey building with 1 room on each level - using the derive floor from the floor below option.

Just use the defaults for the platform levels.

Draw a cross section so that you can see what happens as you change the settings.

Go to the level 3 plan and draw a room that is like a seperate building from the existing one.

It's floor levels will use the defaults which place it platforms same as the level 3 floor defaults.

Now change the new room/building floor level to zero and set it's Relative Ceiling Heights to the default - they would have been at the level 3 ceiling height default.

The new single level room/building you built on level 3 in plan view now appears as if it was drawn on level 1! 

[THBlack]

Thanks Glen and Joey.

 

I do not know what 'interactive floor plans' mean. All I want to do is draw the buildings, be able to see them in 3-D, take pictures, walk through them, let others walk through them. That's it.

 

Given my short shopping list and a puffy computer, do symbols now make better sense?

[Chopsaw]

18 minutes ago, THBlack said:

Given my short shopping list and a puffy computer, do symbols now make better sense?

 

There are still a lot of factors to consider.  How "puffy" is your computer and how large and detailed is the overall project ?

 

If it is really only comparable in overall square footage and complexity to something you have drawn before then by all means put it in one plan file.

 

You could do one structure and the terrain in one file and dump the other two onto that terrain as symbols.  There are a lot of possibilities.

 

[glennw]

57 minutes ago, THBlack said:

I do not know what 'interactive floor plans' mean. All I want to do is draw the buildings, be able to see them in 3-D, take pictures, walk through them, let others walk through them. That's it.

 

By interactive floor plans I mean floor plans that you can edit, dimension, note, and change at will.

Once you make a symbol of a building, it is static and cannot be edited.

Why don't you try the various methods so that you can assess them yourself?

Nothing like learning some new tricks.

[lbuttery]

Glenn and others have the ability to do multiple buildings in one plan

 

I found it easier to use the symbol method 

 

make a change to a building - create the symbol - insert the symbol

repeat if needed 

 

which is the better method ?

 

Lew

[HumbleChief]

20 hours ago, THBlack said:

Modeling a complex that has a set of separate buildings, some having multiple floors. Learned that once I defined Building A, which has 3 floors, and then I go onto Building B that is supposed to have two, when I select Building B and try to add a floor, the new floor is added to building A.

 

After re-reading your post the issue you describe that a new floor is added to the wrong building sounds like you may be thinking that Building B needs its own separate and unique second floor? Remember that since this is a single plan file, once that second floor is created for Building A there is ALREADY a second floor available for Building B. Simply go to Building B, select the floor you want to draw on (first, second or third which are already there from Building A) and start drawing Building B's floor plan.

 

If that solves the initial post's issues then there are more questions like how many buildings? Different first floor heights? Flat terrain? Sloped?

 

I prefer using a single plan file for multiple buildings for the (interactive, changeable) reasons Glenn states. If there are too many buildings and the plan file gets unwieldy for the computer's power then symbols work but each symbol is then a static representation that can only be changed by opening each building's plan file, make changes, recreate a symbol and re-import that symbol.

 

 

[Alchemyjim]

If there are no more than two buildings you can do the following...

1. Create the terrain, roads, etc. Then copy into two files. 

2. Create house #1 in file 1, house #2 in file 2. 

3. Have both files open. In file #1, use the Reference Display to show file #2. In file #2 you will need to turn off all the layers except the house itself. 

 

This is useful in many ways. It allows the structures to be created independently and keeps the file size down. But you can edit the structures "live", unlike the method of creating a symbol. 

 

[THBlack]

Thank you so much.

Larry, your video was very helpful.

Please tell me how you got the dialogue box to see the floor references and select them.

You said that you had a bunch of references. Where can I find out more info about them and try your magic?

[HumbleChief]

Reference display is your good, good friend. A little complex to grasp initially but incredibly powerful. I've simply defined a few different Ref Sets for different needs.

 

https://www.chiefarchitect.com/videos/watch/5435/using-the-reference-display.html

[THBlack]

Thanks, Larry!

[Kiwideziner]

This is 5 seperate dwellings on the 1 lot, still at conceptual stage. I have a seperate file for each for working on each in the correct location to suite the site so I can copy-paste-hold pos

between the files. Once I get fully developed I probably wont be able to manipulate the large file, but all con docs will be produced from the seperate files individually.

[Chopsaw]

1 hour ago, Kiwideziner said:

Once I get fully developed I probably wont be able to manipulate the large file, but all con docs will be produced from the seperate files individually.

 

Very nice Graeme, Even if you need to turn off framing and furnishings and possible other stuff you will have a useful file. Nice technique and it seems to be suited well to the construction technique on a level lot.

[MJanelleQ]

Haven't been using CA long, so some of this is very new to me. I have been developing a house plan with a disconnected garage that is set at an angle from the house.  I found this thread because I have been frustrated with getting the elevations to show only one of the structures at a time.  So after reading this, I made 2 files: -House and -Garage.  Love the paste & hold position for a -Combined plan to show the overall things that I will need (site plan, etc).  My question now is, can I send send the layouts from the -House and -Garage to the -Combined layout file so all my construction documents will be in the same file? Or do I have to have 3 files and convert to PDFs and combine PDFs?    Xref (external reference) in CAD worked wonders for this type of thing.  Could manipulate the original files and it would automatically update any file that had the Xref links. The ability to link files would be AWESOME! 

[Gawdzira]

Janelle,

Multiple .plan files can feed into one .layout file. In other news, you can back clip the camera when taking an elevation view to remove the background building (for you next project).

[MJanelleQ]

Thanks Alan! Didn't realize back clip would work as well and maybe better. . Still learning not to think CAD thoughts and applying to CA.

[Kbird1]

2 hours ago, MJanelleQ said:

Thanks Alan! Didn't realize back clip would work as well and maybe better. . Still learning not to think CAD thoughts and applying to CA.

 

Not only Back Clip but Side Clip as well........

 

M.