Multiple designers working on a Project

[CBuserIndia]

I run a Interior Design studio & we design multiple homes every week. We deliver Interior design only ( no exterior elevation). Every time we get project we split house among multiple team member ( 2 or 3 designers ). If there are 15 rooms in all, each takes up 5 or more rooms.

 

Each designer takes separate rooms & completes it. We deliver separate rooms to end customer, all reports, walkthroughs, images & plans are kept separately ( room-wise).

 

Do you guys have any suggestion on how I can eventually merge all rooms in to single plan ? or in case you have any suggestion on what can be better approach if multiple people are completing a project.

 

Thanks

[joey_martin]

I have worked similarly a couple times before. The builders was using a few guys, and we each had our area to work on (Foundation Plan, Framing Plans, etc...). Rather than make multiple copies of the same model, we had a set number of days on a schedule to get our portion completed so that the other guy could take over the file and do his portion. We worked from Dropbox so that the file was easily accessible to everyone when their time in the schedule came up.

 

Worked great. As long as everyone stays on schedule that is. If you have multiple homes, you could do the same type thing. Designer A has access to plan A for a set number days/hours, while designer B is working plan B and so on. That way everything stays in the same plan file.

[lbuttery]

I agree with Joey

 

you have to have a management plan that works on a single plan file

 

I suppose you could create a model with all the rooms

 

then use edit area tool to separate each room into a separate plan file

 

at the end then use the edit are tool with hold position to recombine the rooms into one plan

 

somehow I think that would be a PITA to recombine

 

to keep track of who last worked on a plan I use _LBX8 in the plan and layout names

and my partner used JKX8

 

Lew

[javatom]

Multiple users on the same plan is not the softwares strong feature.

[CBuserIndia]

Thank you guys for all ideas. The projects I undertake are usually single level/floor with multiple rooms. Each designer creates separate rooms. We define walls of a room & then most work is of interior. There is no complete plan of the house, everyone has separate rooms. I wanted to know if there is easy way to merge these rooms in to single project once they are ready.

[glennw]

Lew has the right idea.

You first need to start with a complete floor plan.

Then, when you separate the rooms into their own files, they will remember their position for when you want to recombine them into one plan.

I just had a play and this seemed to work.

 

Start with a complete plan file with all the rooms.

Separate your individual rooms to their own plan files by selecting the room.

Make Standard Area Polyline - this will include half the internal walls and all of the external walls.

Edit Area.

Copy.

Paste Hold Position into a new plan - ideally a template plan with the same defaults as your floor plan.

Do this for each room.

Then, when you are ready to recombine all the rooms into a single plan, use the same method - Edit Area, Copy, Paste Hold Position into the new plan.

The rooms will locate accurately and reform as the original floor plan - Paste Hold Position is the key.

 

There are probably a few things that could be improved upon and refined, but that was my first try and it basically all worked.

[MarkMc]

There are only two of us, and emphasis is on cabinets but we do need to move accessories, finishes, doors windows etc... but principal is the same-very much what Glenn suggests.

 

We always draw all relevant rooms. This can be entire house or even if just working on one room the adjacent rooms are at least blocked out and some sort of a closed building. (helps a lot when showing to clients live)

The main difference is we use "save as" and each would be working with an entire plan even when working in different rooms.

Original plan can start from a template, or import defaults from a prior project, at the very least all defaults are set first.

We try to set all cameras and elevations before placing objects since those do not copy (much easier to delete than to duplicate). Perspective cameras are all set on their own layer and controlled by a layer or anno set- so they can be hidden while working.

Keep in mind that anything being imported back into a plan that you do not want to have use default settings must have any "dynamic defaults" set without a "(d).

One final plan is kept separate from the save as.

 

For some reason (beyond me but I'm happy about) I can use edit area, copy and paste a room into the master plan and not end up with conflicting walls. While it does copy the walls (if pasted into the wrong place they will show) I don't get duplicate walls, windows or doors.

BUT NOTE that ALL other objects pasted on top of existing objects WILL create duplicates so make sure the room is empty before pasting.

 

I have yet to work out a system for copying and pasting schedules that works well. Since we do schedules by room they lose the connection when moved. Any re-arranging previously done to the schedule numbering is lost and must be redone. This is mostly an issue for me with cabinets as those are the only schedules I use often.

Beware copy/paste of schedules in X8 is currently subject to assorted crashes.

 

Remembered one other thing- you want to have all texture and material files consistent between machines. I don't have that worked out yet but some folks are using cloud services to sync files may be the way to go. I just added a personal cloud and will be trying to sync data files across machines to that (when I finish out-swimming the alligators)

[Diamond-built]

I have the same problem also I called Chief support and they talked about using a Icloud to save my drawings to so I can retrieve them at any computer. Does anyone else use an icloud that can fill me in on how to go about setting one up? 

[johnny]

I have the same problem also I called Chief support and they talked about using a Icloud to save my drawings to so I can retrieve them at any computer. Does anyone else use an icloud that can fill me in on how to go about setting one up? 

icloud, like similar "cloud" (i.e. networked drive) should show up locally (your computer) as a hard drive you can save files in.  I use Dropbox which is nearly the same thing.  All this really does is allow you (or your team) access to a file but it does nothing for multiple people working on the same file.

[Diamond-built]

Is Dropbox a program like a icloud? 

[Rashid_Garuba]

Dropbox, Icloud, Box, Idrive, Google Drive.. etc. They are remote storage services where you can store your data and access from any computer, anywhere. Icloud, however caters more to Apple devices.

[javatom]

The process - Send plan to layout.  From layout, hit "back up entire plan".  This will put everything in one folder including materials that may be unique to your system.  The next person to work on it loads the plan file and gets the same thing you were working on.  Make sure the plan you are working on is the one that feeds into the layout.  If you change the file name of the plan, you have to relink it in the layout.  You can also just keep it named the same throughout the process.