Kevin McAllister

This is a very interesting discussion. I have often wondered what "Emitter Brightness" does. I would suggest that it is poorly labelled for what it does, since essentially it's a global multiplier..... Kevin

Definitely needed. KM

I've been working working on a project that uses some Wall and Column objects. Initially everything was behaving well. Some of the Wall and Column objects were grouped to make the drawing easier to edit. When I converted some of those groups to symbols, things started misbehaving. I am wondering if other people have had trouble with Wall, Columns or other plugin objects when they are within groups within hybrid symbols. The various problems that have shown up include - - sometimes you are unable to snap to the Columns in Sheet Layer viewports. - sometimes the Walls get confused and parts disappear or are displaced in 3D views. - sometimes things ungroup themselves. The issue is clearly related to the screen plane / layer plane adventure and VW trying to separate the elements to create a hybrid symbol. The obvious solution is just not to use groups in hybrid symbols involving these elements. However I often use groups for easier editing because it is an easy way to isolate specific areas. Is this a known workflow limitation? Are other people running into these quirks? Thanks, Kevin

Has anyone else had trouble with doors and Features In Walls? I am drawing an existing theatre space which has two instances where there are indentations in a fairly thick. The indentations are about 5' wide by 9' high. Each of these indentations also contains a door centred left/right within it. I used the Create Wall Recess menu command successfully to create the indentations. However when I insert the door Vectorworks gets confused and each end of the door returns the full depth of the wall. Is this a limitation of the Feature in Walls object? Also, is there a way to make the door plug in draw what I would call a "stop". Essentially its the rectangular piece of molding within the jamb that the door hits against so it won't swing all the way through. Thanks, Kevin

There is a menu script at Vector Depot ( http://www.vectordepot.com/plug-ins/ ) that says it will do this. I haven't tried it but I think it will only do all of the Classes in a document. You don't say what version of Vectorworks you are using but its probably worth a shot. Kevin

No kidding! Thanks for the tip. Kevin

Kevin, Is there intention to release it in an electronic (ie. iPad version)? When I saw it I thought it might be a great thing to own but I have been trying to reduce the footprint of how much physical stuff I collect... Kevin

Is there a way to lock and hold a highlighted automatic working plane? I often find myself wanting to draw a guideline that starts off the surface itself but this currently doesn't seem to be possible without losing the selected plane. Another piece of software I've been using has a key you can press to hold a working plane. Does Vectorworks have this other than reverting to old style working planes? Thanks, Kevin

In my experience its likely a corrupt object (often text or viewport). The best way to troubleshoot it is to batch PDF by process of elimination (ie. batch process the first two sheets, then the first three etc.) to find out where the process is stalling. The other thing you might try is turning off Autosave. Kevin

Glad to help. This is something that catches me all the time. "Show only black and white" is a great feature, it often saves me from colour overload when I import Autocad files from associates. But why it affects the annotations associated with the viewport puzzles me.... as does why its buried under Advanced.... Kevin

I wish we could redefine what tool the space bar defaults to in boomerang mode. Currently it is set to the Pan tool but I wish I could reassign it to the Flyover tool. I almost never pan (I use the scrolling feature of my Magic Mouse) but constantly need to reorient the view with the Flyover tool. Another option would be if it defaulted to the Pan tool in Top/Plan and on Sheet Layers, but to the Flyover tool in 3D views. Kevin

I know what you mean. I think a possible solution would be an option to automatically generate the 2D portion of a hybrid symbol. It's options would be much like those in the Resource Browser for generating thumbnails of symbols (choose your view and your rendering mode). Kevin

I wish for dynamic clipping planes for working within the modelling environment like this - I am currently modelling a rosette style scaffolding system that sits diagonally across a set of concrete risers in a stadium. The initial layout was the easy part. Figuring out the shorter uprights as the scaffolding crosses the risers was a little harder but by far the most complicated task is sorting out where diagonal bracing can go. I have set up various design layer sections for important lines of uprights and have a complicated group of classes for removing various scaffolding pieces but the repetitive nature of the scaffold elements makes things pretty hard to discern. If we had dynamic clipping planes the whole task would be so much simpler. I could dynamically drag across and see all of the interactions so easily. Kevin (Note that the software in my example sells for under $500? If I wanted to be greedy, I'd also ask for collision detection :-) )

I don't have Vectorworks in front of me at the moment, but if memory serves me correctly many of the detailing tools have a 3D version of the tool nested below the 2D version on the Tool Box. There is definitely a 3D I-beam tool as an example. Kevin

Are other colours showing up in your viewport? It may be set to black and white (accessed by clicking the Advanced radio button in the OIP when the viewport is selected). KM

There was another thread recently where it was pointed out that Unified View is missing from Vectorworks Fundamentals. If this is true (I am running Designer so I don't know) then serious 3D work would be hard if you only added Renderworks. A few years ago I upgraded from Spotlight to Designer and have never looked back..... Kevin

I like Chris' idea but I also agree that many other improvements are needed. I can't count the number of times I've grouped and ungrouped simple 3D objects just so I can centre them by entering the XY coordinates in the OIP. Kevin

To have the viewports saved as rendered when you save a file go to File>Document Settings>Document Preferences and check the "Save Viewport Cache" checkbox. KM

Definitely. And beyond that, shouldn't numeric values (ie. the offset distance with the offset tool) show up when you tab through the heads up display? KM

Ha. I remember that debate. Mike, if the oval tool draws an accurate ellipse as you say (and as I've always assumed), its an "Ellipse Tool" and technically doesn't do what the original post asks for :-) Kevin

bcd, I originally started there, but the pleats of the curtain object taper to a straight line along the top edge of the curtain, so the resulting corrugated material is thinner at the top than at the bottom when viewed from the side. Did you find a way to get around this? Kevin

True enough. In my case I had already done both those things. KM

The end result of my explorations were pretty successful. The original file size was about 37.2 mb. By rebuilding the 3 symbols and purging a few unused ones I brought the file size down to 13.4 mb. That's a huge savings in a file that only has vector based geometry. The leading culprits were actually generic solids. Some of the geometry had been brought in from a Parasolid file and imported in that form. The geometry was pretty simple and easily rebuilt as extrudes, shrinking the file size. Kevin

I was trying to find a way to improved the efficiency of a 3D corrugated material I modelled for a project. Along the way I discovered some things I though I would share in case they are helpful to others. The main tip is extruding a NURBS curve using Tapered Extrude from the Modelling Menu and setting the taper angle to zero. I bet many of you have tried using Extrude with a NURBS curve and gotten the illegal objects error message. For whatever reason, Tapered Extrude works. This approach is slightly simpler than using the Loft Surface tool. The resulting Tapered Extrude is pretty efficient and when converted to NURBS forms a single surface. Kevin

I've been dissecting a file to find out why its so big. The file has no textures, bitmap graphics or viewport caches. Essentially its all 2d and 2d vector based objects yet it is 25mb in size. I started deleting things with a test version of the file to see what objects visibly affected file size. It turned out that the majority of the file size could be attributed to 3 symbols (about 16mb). It was a great learning experience and let for me to wish the following - - all resources displayed in the Resource Browser should have a size associated with them. - when high size geometry is created using various functions Vectorworks should give you a warning. Vectorworks file sizes seem huge at times and mine are only small design projects. I can't imagine how big the file for a 10 story building might be. Kevin