Laura Stone

I am having the same issue, I think it is a bug because the guidance talks about the alpha channel importing when making the image resource. Other clues: In top view, rather than top/plan, the transparency is there When you scroll across the area, or zoom in and out, the transparency momentarily appears.

I was given a tip a while back to use landscape areas and not hardscapes for the hard surfaces (just with the plants switched off) and I do find that it works much better. This was after finding that hardscapes and landscape areas don't play nicely together. So for angular geometry I use grade networks and for curved areas I have the following workaround: Make a wall style called 'kerb' (or 'edging') and use a curved wall on the area you want. Set the top level to the level you want at the one end of the kerb and put into a 3D view. You can now use the reshape tool to move the other end of the kerb up or down to the correct level. Now use the 'extract' tool to extract a nurbs curve along the top edge of the kerb and convert it to a 3D polygon. Close the 3D poly and add any necessary additional vertices. Move the 3D poly into the Site- DTM - Modifier class to grade the site model. I have grades at the top and bottom of kerbs which gives a slope between them but use the wall style to represent the kerb and landscape areas for the hard surfaces each side so the slope is not seen in the modelling, only on the site model which I don't export to IFC.

Using grade networks to model levels on a site at the moment, but living in terror of the day that the FFL of the building gets changed, this happens a lot. It would be very useful to be able to select a number of grade objects and just move them in the z dimension to fit a new FFL. At the moment the process would be very laborious, manually changing the two levels at each end of the grade. I probably have over 200 of them on this particular site. Is this something that could be incorporated?

Will this include the OzCad railing/fence tool that sends to surface and allows the top rail to be below the top of the uprights?

I'm trying to draw a fence on a slope, but once over a certain gradient the top rail of the fence flips to vertical position. Looks like a bug to me. Laura fence rail flip.vwx

Working on a drawing that already had landscape areas, all of the new ones I draw (or convert from shapes) have a square attached to them in top/plan view. It is not visible in other views. I have used different landscape areas, including ones I used before in this drawing without any issue, and get the same result. I can't select the landscape areas by their edges or fills, they can only be selected by selecting the attached square. Anyone have any idea why this is happening? Thanks Laura

And if I export only the trees and uncheck 'export site model' they export at the correct height, but only from the new file. Laura

And another update, if I export the site model as well the trees export at the correct height. But I don't want to include the site model in my IFC file. Laura

Update on this, double checked the trees and they are displaying z=0 in the OIP but they are actually at the correct height in VW. Then when exported to an IFC file they all drop to zero. Laura

Hadn't seen those before, I usually import things from sketchup files on 3D warehouse. We use generic low-polygon trees for models but have given up on shrubs. It depends what the other disciplines are going to do with them. Laura

I have exported existing trees to IFC with no problem in the past but having issues with a particular file. If I try to export the trees I get an empty IFC file. If I copy and paste the trees into a new file they export with no issues but they are all at z=0 If I paste the site model into the new file the trees do nothing when I send them to surface. Anyone have any ideas? Thanks Laura

As far as I know IFC only supports modelled plants, not crossed plane image prop symbols. I have tried using modelled plants but it makes the Vectorworks and IFC files far too heavy. Laura

The dialogue box says 'press a keyboard letter to go straight to that part of the list' but nothing happens when I do so. Laura

It would be really useful to be able to set a default site model layer for landscape areas that is used at creation. Most of the time I would only want to use one site model and it takes a long time to change the setting for every landscape area on a drawing. Laura

I would like to be able to create custom railing panels. This is one that I have bodged together by making a custom 'post' that is actually a panel and then using a frame to form the post. Also 'send to surface' so that I don't have to laboriously set the correct heights at the beginning and end of each run. Laura

Jesse, Thanks very much, that works just as I wanted it to. Much appreciated Laura

Hi Jesse, Thanks very much, I would like this option please - "add lines of code to set all the attributes of the selected items to be By Class" I don't normally have 2D attributes by class (it is only fill and pen attributes that I need here) it's just quite handy to have the site modifiers by class, then I can see which ones I've finished. Laura

Great, thanks Jesse that works perfectly and will save me a whole load of time. Just to make it a bit more complicated, when I do the change manually it gives me an option to change all attributes to the new class defaults, it that something that could be written into the script? Laura

Is there a way of making a similar tool that would move a selected object into a class (in this case Site DTM Modifiers) without changing the active class? I am using 3D poly modifiers and it's very time consuming to scroll dow through the list each time. Custom tool used to do things like this without any programming knowledge a long time ago. Thanks Laura

Thanks Haven't got all the levels yet so I think a site model with blanket level zero is in order.

Can anyone tell me why my plants are floating in their landscape area style? The more components I add the higher they float. Thanks Laura floating plants.vwx

Hi Mihail It seems like my colleague has solved the mystery. We exported using these settings (attached) and it worked. I had unchecked the export site model box on the grounds that I wasn't exporting the layer with the site model on, could that have been the problem? Laura

Hi Mihail Here is a small extract from the file, I have just included some hardscapes and landscape areas. The Architects are using Revit 2021. I sent a revit export but it had the same issue This is the latest from them: "I’ve attached a screenshot from the previous model (27/11/20) showing the IFC parameters I mentioned in the first email that enable material changes below." The previous model was the one that they could work with. Thanks Laura IFCtest.vwx

I have exported an IFC file and it opens in Solibri but the Architect, who is using Revit, tells me that it "won’t allow us to add on material properties, the model components seem to be made up of import symbols. As a result of this we’re unable to render the model as it comes out coloured grey" The objects are hardscapes and landscape areas, I can see that the hardscapes have nothing filled in under 'material' in Solibri. Could this be the issue? If so what IFC data maps to material? A file that i had sent earlier that was just extrudes made into symbols with IFC data attached was apparently fine and they could attach materials. I have tried sending an rvt file but it is very big and according the export will have no data, just geometry. Any help greatly appreciated. Thanks Laura

Thanks very much - worked perfectly Laura