Annotate In Plan Or Layout

[deesee]

Hey guys,

 

Feeling a bit frustrated here since I'm not sure what's the best way to work with Chief. I come from the Revit world so that may be interfering in how "I expect" things should work. But I realize this isn't revit, so it is what it is.

 

My question is, when you guys annotate, i.e. keynotes and text notes, do you do that within the view itself or do you do it in layout?

 

What I'm finding is that the layer sets is messing me up. I'll get a floor plan all nice and pretty with notes, dimensions, etc. Then I change the layer set to a plot plan view, and now I've got all these extraneous notes that I don't want to show in the plot plan. I then ask myself, do I change the layer set, the notes, or do I have a separate layer for notes on a floor plan, another layer for notes on a plot plan, etc.

 

Anyway, it just seems really nuts that way so I figured, does everyone else just get a specific drawing all nice and pretty (with appropriate layers on and off), THEN send it to layout, and do the notes there. 

 

Any advice in this regard would be wonderful and most appreciated.

 

Thanks!

[HumbleChief]

deesee,

 

The questions you ask go to heart of how Chief is set up to operate and is a bit complex when first starting out but can be very powerful once you understand how Chief works. First, each Layer Set can have anything showing you choose. In your simple example of "a floor plan all nice and pretty with notes, dimensions, etc." make sure your Layer Set is named and relevant to that 'floor plan' view. Let's call that Layer Set 'floor plan'. Within your 'floor plan' Layer Set there are layers that you choose to 'display' or not and that defines everything visible in that Layer Set.

 

Now you switch to your 'Plot Plan' Layer Set and you then again choose what you want to have visible. Let's say you "change the layer set to a plot plan view, and now I've got all these extraneous notes that I don't want to show in the plot plan." First thing to remember is those notes need to be on a layer you can turn off in your Plot Plan Layer Set. If they are a generic layer that turns off too much stuff when set to not display, just create a new layer called 'Plan Notes' and place all your notes on that Layer and turn it off in your Plot Plan Layer Set.

 

Sounds a lot more confusing than it is in practice but it is a new paradigm that needs to be learned to get the power of Chief to be really useful.

 

...and to your specific question I, and many users here will annotate in plan view and send that view to Layout instead of annotating in Layout though a combination of both methods might be necessary depending on what you're looking to do..

 

Quick video that might help.

 

[deesee]

What an awesome answer and I thank you for taking the time to respond, and the for the video as well. I will keep chugging ahead.

 

Happy Holidays!

[deesee]

Holy cow!! I just realized you made that video right now just to answer my question. What can I say!? You Sir, are my Xmas Santa this year!

 

I feel like I owe you money or something! Blown away. Thank you!

[Paramount]

X2 Larry very helpful. Thank you! This method of using layers and layer sets (filters in other cads) is nothing new just the way CA designed it. Makes a head spin if you use several different ways of doing the same thing. 

 

How did you make the vid? That would be a great way to communicate on these forums. You opened the Objects DBX fast getting use to these hotkeys I can see can be a friend. The list says ctrl-e did you rearrange that on the key board somehow to a single key? I open the obects DBX all the time. 

[HumbleChief]

No problem you guys. I use Snagit and have a YouTube channel through my G-Mail account. I make videos for all my client presentations so it's become very routine.

 

Yes Terry I use hot keys as do many users. I use the mouse in my right hand and my left hand works a couple very simple single key hot keys that I use continually. I've set up 'A' as the open dbx hot key and my left hand basically sits right on top of that area as I work. The other hot key I use all the time is 'Q' that I set up for copy and paste in place and use it ALL the time as well. 'W' is set up for panning in a render view and that's it for me. Others have many many 2 and 3 key hot keys set up, some you even have to reach across the entire keyboard to active but I'm not talented enough to use or remember such things.

 

One more thing that's very important deesee is that your question revolves around Annotations and Chief has Annotation Sets that takes the concepts of Layers even deeper and is very powerful and something you really must understand if you want to use Chief's capabilities.

 

Here's a couple of videos from Wendy, a true Chief expert, and should help with understanding Anno Sets.

 

 

 

 

And a couple videos I created with a different approach.

 

 

[Paramount]

Awesome thanks! Awesome tool for a builder to put on a screen at a model home to explain how it blows away the competition Who needs realtors?

 

I am reading in Terry Munson's book that another similar application would be using layer sets to turn on or off certain objects in multiple versions of the same view. 

 

I cannot seem to figure out what layer siding is assigned and how to turn it on and off? So I end using the delete surface tool. 

[deesee]

What can I say Larry, you're the best. Thank you so much!

[LinderJ]

Larry, thank you for the great information. Wendy's 'Annotation Sets 1 The Tour' gave me some information that I was looking for, but I was unable to replicate it on my system. She demonstrated how a plan duplicated on the same layout sheet could be shown at two scales with the text in both plans at the same height. Just what I need. I viewed her video several times to duplicate what she demonstrated, but was unable to obtain the same results, having the text at the same height. I changed the scale of the layout box and the current annotation set in the layout box specification to match the layout box scale. Didn't work for me. I also checked the annotations sets and couldn’t find anything out of order there. I don’t know how to diagnose what I am doing to discover what to change to get Wendy’s demonstrated results. Any suggestions.

Linder Jones, AIA

STUDIO LINDER ATCHITECTS

LOS GATOS, CA

 

X7 Premier, Windows 7 Professional, Dell Precision Tower 8510

[HumbleChief]

Linder, check your Anno Sets and the default text size in each. If you send a Plan to Layout at 1/4" scale with The Anno Set text default (or any text) set to 4", you will get approx. 1/4" high text. (The actual height depends a bit on your font but as an example)

 

If you send another Plan to Layout at 1/8" but with 8" text instead you'll get basically the same sized text in each Layout window. Half the scale size with twice the text size should equal the same text size in Layout.

 

Try Wendy's steps again. You just missed something simple me thinks.

 

 

Here's a quick vid that may help

 

[LinderJ]

Larry; Thank you for your response. I am thinking this might be an issue with my layer sets and not anno sets, but I am not sure. I tried what Wendy demonstrated with a plan that I created with CA out of the box. I hadn't made any changes to layer sets or anno sets. I hadn't understood the power of those. The plan was created with the default layer set and default 1/2" Scale Annotation. A bit of my background; I've have learned several CAD programs and they each handle what I would like to do differently. Based on Wendy's video it looks like CA will do this as well. I just need to understand how to achieve this. Most of my previous CAD experience has been AutoCAD and AutoCAD Architecture (ACA). In the early years of AutoCAD we had to change text size to fit the scale of the drawing on a sheet. In current ACA this is handle automatically and the text size changes depending on the scale of the drawing on a sheet. One can place the identical drawing on a sheet at different scales and the annotative objects change sizes to match the intended printing size. I assume that is what Wendy was demonstrating. Just to figure out how she did that will be my next step.

In your video, and thank you for sending that, what happens if you create text with ½” annotation, send that to a layout at ½” scale and then copy and paste the layout box on the same layout, change the layout box scale to 1/4” and open specifications for the layout box and change the current annotation set under plan view to a ¼” annotation. Are the text heights in both drawing the same? They were in Wendy’s demonstration. Mine was unsuccessful.

I often need the same plan in 1/8”, ¼” and ½” scale in my plan set and sometimes on the same sheet (layout) with same information. Such-as Room Labels, text, callouts, dimensions. I would like to set these up once and have them re-scale depending on the scale of the layout box. Wendy’s example seemed to do this. Any suggestions?. 

Thank you, Linder

[HumbleChief]

You are over thinking this my friend, and probably have otherCAD thinking getting in the way as well.

 

If you know how to create a new Anno Set, then do so and set the text to 2", call it what ever you like, perhaps 1/2" Anno; create another new Anno Set and set the text 4", call it 1/4" Anno, and yet another Anno Set to 8" text, call it 1/8" Anno.

 

Send each view to Layout at 1/2", 1/4" and 1/8" scale respectively. All the text will be the same size.

 

If you don't know how to create a new Anno Set then watch all the videos again.

 

Don't worry it's a new way of thinking and will just click one day and seem very easy.

[LinderJ]

Thank you Larry for your patience with me and your continual effort to assist me. I do understand how to create Anno Sets. I have each of the 3 sets set up. The only way that I can get the text to be the same height in layout in the 3 different scaled layout boxes is to enter the same text in the plan using the 3 different Anno sets. That is not what I was hoping for. And not what i saw in Wendy's video. Do you have any idea how I can contact Wendy?

[HumbleChief]

It's sounds like you're 'hoping' Chief will behave like a different software program, perhaps one that automatically scales text as you change scales sent to Layout. Unfortunately Chief doesn't work that way. It's designed to have unique Anno Sets for unique sets of text and er.. annotations. The text won't change size to match various scales, it has to be set up in the Anno Set...but not really sure what you are hoping for.

 

I suppose you could look for one of Wendy's posts and send her a PM but I don't have any special contact information that I could or would share. Best of luck.

[Linder]

Thanks Larry for your thoughtfulness. I will search for Wendy. I hope I find her. I understand what annotations is doing.  It was pretty amazing what I saw in Wendy's video, "Annotation Sets 1 The Tour" starting at 16.5 min. into the video through 17.75 min. I hope someday I can find out how she did that. I started using Chief in July of this year, I like it very much. I practiced and learned the program by private tutoring, and transferring about 8 of my projects in design from Auto Cad Architecture to Chief. 

 

 

Have a Happy New Year.

[HumbleChief]

Thanks Larry for your thoughtfulness. I will search for Wendy. I hope I find her. I understand what annotations is doing.  It was pretty amazing what I saw in Wendy's video, "Annotation Sets 1 The Tour" starting at 16.5 min. into the video through 17.75 min. I hope someday I can find out how she did that. I started using Chief in July of this year, I like it very much. I practiced and learned the program by private tutoring, and transferring about 8 of my projects in design from Auto Cad Architecture to Chief. 

 

 

Have a Happy New Year.

Starting at 16:50, first she changed scale, which made all the existing text on that Anno/Layer Set too small, then she changed Anno Sets and look at the text - it's completely different, not the size but the content. Room Text looks the same (which is probably controlled by the Anno/Later Set but most of the other text is missing. It didn't change scale automatically - it's gone because the new Anno/Layer Set doesn't include any of that original text.