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Kevin McAllister

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Posts posted by Kevin McAllister

  1. So I've been trying a 3D Connexion Space Navigator out. I actually bought it to use with Cinema 4D. It integrates very naturally, much like your holding the model and turning it in your hand. Because you use it with your left hand (or non-mouse hand) and because of the way the Cinema 4D interface is set up, you can essentially model with one hand on the Navigator and the other hand on a stylus or mouse. Pretty great workflow.

    Anyway, I tried the Space Navigator in Vectorworks. It works, but in a very non-intuitive way. It would be great if some of the finesse of its use in Cinema 4D was available as an option in Vectorworks. This may actually speak to the general way you navigate and model in Vectorworks as well.

    Kevin

  2. Based on my own experiences I would say Vectorworks isn't really optimized for anything yet. There have been some small steps forward in recent versions but probably not as fast as many users would like.

    It doesn't take much detail in a 3D model to start to bog things down on any machine (try a full stadium and scenery and it chokes). Take a Vectorworks model into Cinema 4D and see how much better it is at dealing with it. No slowdowns or hiccups. Faster rendering. Cinema 4D is built for use in production pipelines where seconds add up. That industry expects it.

    I'm sure that Vectorworks has a lot of legacy code. Apple is probably the company most likely to push things forward. It has no problem jettisoning old processing models in favour of the future and does so with each new release of its operating system. At some point Nemetzchek will likely have to choose either the power of the future or backwards compatibility of all the old PIO etc. I'm sure that Autocad for Mac has a great advantage in the area of optimization since it was build clean from the ground up.

    KM

  3. Now that we have sheet layers & camera viewports please fix perspective view so it no longer uses the adjustable "crop" box that was previously used for presentation. The perspective view should fill the entire drawing window all the time, so the drawing window is the viewport. This would make perspective view so much more useful in everyday 3d modelling.

    Kevin

  4. I'm curious to know how other people are working in 3D. Are you -

    - working in a true 3D view most of the time or a projected view (top/front/side etc.)?

    - do you work in Vectorworks standard 3D (what Cinema 4D calls parallel) or in perspective (the cropped perspective "viewport" Vectorworks creates)?

    - do you class or group so you can easily isolate components?

    I've been working on a 3d model for a project that involves modular scaffolding running diagonally across the stepped audience risers of a stadium. I've found that its essentially to get right "into" the model to check interactions between the stadium structure and the scaffold. If Vectorworks had dynamic clipping planes this would be easy (see my wish in the Wishlist Forum) but unfortunately its more of an adventure than I'd like. Today I discovered that I could somewhat do what I needed by working in the perspective viewport and using the translate tool to move in and out of the model. Perhaps there is a better way but I haven't found it yet....

    Kevin

  5. Its coming but you start to wonder when. Clearly two different marketing strategies....

    A week ago an invite was sent out and today a new iPad was released....

    A teaser on January 10th, a trailer of sorts on January 31st and then silence for over a month, the Vectorworks "Cloud" seems MIA......

    KM

  6. There was a plugin at Vectorbits called VB XY. It would display its XY position. Unfortunately it seems that the Vectorbits website is dead.

    There is also a plugin called "Coordinate Dimensions" at vectordepot.com

    It gives you individual plugin objects for x and y. Unfortunately the demo file containing the symbol examples was created by an illegal copy of Vectorworks (you get the warning when trying to open it) so its hard to see how to implement it....

    I guess that's not so helpful.....

    Kevin

  7. 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

  8. 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

  9. 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

  10. 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

  11. 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

  12. 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

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