Bart Rammeloo

-- posted in the wrong forum --

About your last remark: yes and no. You can change the position of the edited points in space. Jus set the tool to "translate and transform mode" and "translate and rotate", put the cursor on the point and click. You will get a controller which you can use to drag the point around. With the tab key you can enter the translation value. AFAIK there's not yet a way to "read" the coordinates of that point thought. Obviously future versions will offer more possibilities. This is just the first iteration of the implementation. I remember when NURBS were first introduced, and that first version was also limited.

I don't doubt for a second that you experience these issues. But statistically speaking, the stability of Vectorworks has been increasing with every version for, let's say, the last five or six versions. That's what the developers can track thanks to the automated crash reports that VW generates since a couple of versions. It's that report that also allows them to focus all effort on fixing the bugs with the highest occurrence rate. In my own experience from the past 13 years, there have always been "freak" crashes that are hard to explain, let alone solve - and that is true for every software. Again, that doesn't solve your problem, it doesn't address your frustration, but it also doesn't mean that Vectorworks is worsening. The numbers show that the opposite is true. The good news is that Jim is known for not letting go - so if it can be fixed, he will make sure you get the solution.

I'd say use a wall feature, but that won't work since it's on the corner of the wall. A symbol might work (inserting it on the end or start of the wall), but it does take a bit of time to build it.

AFAIK SP2 has been made available a while ago, hasn't it? Are you saying you're still experiencing this issue under SP2?

You're right, and if there would have been a straightforward way, it would have been implemented a long time ago C4D is a polygon based modeler. And as most poly modelers, it only supports faces with up to 4 vertices. A face with more than 4 gets automatically (internally) split. You might no see those seams in C4D, but they're there nonetheless (you can show those seams in the viewport via Filter > N-Gon lines). When you export the geometry, you get a mix of triangles and so-called "quads" - regardless of how smooth your surface looks in C4D. Because even if you use the C4D "NURBS", this is just a smoothing algorithm on top of a polygon cage. As long as C4D doesn't support real solids and real NURBS, getting the information back into VW in a transparent will remain difficult.

No, I'm not wrong. Sorry, but the tools you list do not fit the regular architect's workflow. The polypen is a great tool - I agree (although I still miss some of the features that Per-Anders Edwards introduced back in the days with his polygon plugins). So are the plugins you listed. But all these tools do, is either allow you to SNAP and modify the way that snapping behaves, or to insert preconfigured objects, or to draw polygons faster. It does not, however, allow you do draw a wall-like object and define it's length WHILE DRAWING. That is quintessential for fast drawing - and for architecture. BTW, did you know there's a nifty Xpresso-based tool in the presets of the Visualize bundle, called House Builder? It offers a genuine speedup, but again it falls short in the department of an architect's workflow. It isn't geared at architects either, MAXON confirmed that during their pre-R16 meetings. In that regard, Sketchup would still be better than C4D. But why would you use Sketchup when you have the power of Vectorworks :-) Don't get me wrong, I'm a big C4D-advocate, but comparing it to Vectorworks when it comes to modeling is really apples and oranges.

I'm afraid you misread what I wrote. I said you cannot give it the proper dimensions WHILE DRAWING. You can model anything you like, but you cannot do it like an architect would do in a CAD package. C4D doesn't offer the same kind of speed when it comes to architectural modeling (read: designing a building while you draw, taking care of accurate dimensions) as Vectorworks. While we're on the topic af accuracy: no, C4D isn't as accurate as Vectorworks. It has been a long standing issue for some modelers, even back when I was still in C4D's beta test group.

Hi, If you prefer to use the English tools, you still can. It's just a matter of adding them to your workspace. Here's a video that shows you how to do it: http://videotraining.vectorworks.be/nl/video/33 However, it would help if you could somehow tell us (Design Express) how you would like those tools to work and behave. I know we have a couple of things in the works, and we're looking for users to give beta versions a spin. Would it be OK if my colleague who coordinates development got in touch with you?

Hi Scheven, I see that you're struggling with that window tool - what you see is not what is supposed to happen. I know that a SP is in the works to fix a couple of bugs with that tool, but at the same time I think that simply contacting our support to check if there are no other options to make this function as you'd expect might help a lot. http://www.vectorworks.be/nl/support/online-support http://www.vectorworks.be/nl/support/telefonische-support Or via the Service Select portal: serviceselect.vectorworks.net

I assume you're a garden/landscape specialist? In that case modeling in C4D can make sense, yes. But C4D is no good at the typical "architectural" modeling (or technical modeling, for that matter), since you cannot "draw" your objects AND give them the correct dimensions while drawing. If you'd try to create, for instance, a wall, then in Vectorworks you can define the start and end point with the exact coordinates (position), and be done with it. In C4D, you can't. Either you will place an object (for instance a cube) and fiddle around with the parameters until it has the right dimension and position, or you draw it with linear curves, but then you can't enter values for your control points while drawing - you'd have to tweak each point after completing the curve. If accurate dimensions don't matter, you can do all your 3D work in C4D. To be clear: I'm not saying C4D is inaccurate, I'm just saying it's not geared towards your typical architectural modeling. It lacks a couple of features to pull that off.

This really coasts on the edge of what is currently possible in IFC. There have been numerous requests to change IFC in such a way that it would allow symbolic information, but at its core, IFC is still about volumetric information, attached data, and hierarchy. My question would be: why do you want to include that info in an IFC file? What would be its purpose? Who is going to use this file and cannot work without that info? BTW, I'm not sure this post belongs here. Exporting and importing IFC is a Vectorworks Architect feature

It's not a German comma. It's an American point ;-) As to the C4D render engine: it's a German product, it should be able to talk Metric, no?

I would try this with Model > 3D Powerpack > Revolve with rail. - you draw the top path (ellipse?) - you draw the axis (in side view: off center) - from path to axis, in a side view, you draw the section Then you use the command. You could combine this with Shell solid to give it a thickness, and then cut or add parts, fillet edges and so on, depending on your preferred workflow.

I work for one of the distributors, we've had these questions before