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Future of 2D drafting


Carl Burns

Question

The first words of the VW training CD are something more or less like, "...VW is an object-based design program. You won't be drawing with lines anymore..."

Perhaps that's why the offset tool isn't even in the initial workspace (VWA 10.01)?

One Architect's opinion:

- I wouldn't be using VW if I couldn't draw with lines. I like the hybrid nature of the program, though I'm sure there are other ways to go about design (using multiple programs).

- My hunch: worldwide for every hour spent developing 3D models in VW, I'd say there are lots more spent making 2d drawings.

- The value of 3d drawing to the designer is overplayed everywhere now.

- The utility, precision and economy of 2d drawing conventions are undervalued everywhere now.

It's simply not an either/or situation. So it's troublesome to have the training CD repeat the fashion of the day, and tell me it is.

- Carl

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6 answers to this question

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The offset tool is in classic, standard, architect, landmark, mechanical workspaces by default.

In Standard and the IP workspaces, it's stacked with the same set of tools like 2 reshape tool, Shear tool and Fixed Point Resize tool.

VW 10 condensed the workspaces to save space screen. With most people using keyboard shortcuts, most people enjoy this new change.

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but yes you will find most users of VW agree with you about to much development time being put into pretty 3D.

or that VW team should be directing more energy into ways to turn 3D building models into those things we get paid for in the real world.

i.e. the plans we hope the building team is looking at when working on site. or council submissions, so the building can be built.

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The apparent demotion of the offset tool is in itself no great shakes for me. Thankfully it's still available. I'm more concerned that the CD actually speaks for NNA, and that they perceive 2D drafting as on the wane. I'm looking forward to getting to know VW10 in the coming months; perhaps there's been significant improvement to 2d tools.

But to take iboymatt's point, 2d drawings are what we get paid for.., and push it further, I'd say that 2d drawing remains the better design tool as well: After all, when creating a 3d model, my experience is that perhaps ironically, I'm working almost all of the time in 2d views because they are precise, and the best way to consider dimension, scale, proportion. But what I really wanted to say is that both environments are valuable..I'm hoping that NNA (thus this is in the "wish" list) appreciates the many virtues of 2d drafting, and truly continues to develop it, along with the single model approach.

- Carl

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  • Vectorworks, Inc Employee

Stop, stop, you're both right!

Just because the training CD uses some over-wrought phrase like "You won't be drawing using lines anymore" doesn't, of course, mean you won't be using lines. It means you won't be using only lines or even primarily lines. Higher level objects (walls, doors, even notations like the callout) means that, even in 2D, you don't have to think as much in terms of lines.

I often say around here, "It's misleading to think of 'models' as 3D things and 'drawings' as 2D things only." Models definitely include 2D stuff, and using intelligent objects to draw your project is a form of modeling, even if you never change out of plan view.

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I think that version 10 contains some important 2D drafting improvements in the areas of the representation of doors and windows (wish these improvements could be perfected, however!), and others including the refinement of some things that were introduced with version 9. As for working with 3D vs 2D - to each his/her own! I prefer to start with a full 3D model of the building, and find that a more efficient process. What VW has that other 2D/3D programs don't is a more thoughtful integration of the two environments.

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I feel the same way as Carl and iboymatt. I've always designed using rough 2D and 3D sketches and precise 2D drawings, and I always spend more time on 2D construction drawings than on anything else. Recent improvements to VectorWorks haven't helped me as much as some other improvements would have, and the changes to introduce those improvements have been to the detriment of some of the features I liked best about it.

I always keep the 3D model in my head, just as a habit, regardless of how I'm expressing it on paper or on a computer screen. When I make 3D models on a computer, it's mostly for showing to clients, who usually don't have that habit of 3D visualization. They like being able to walk around inside a model (if only for the futuristic thrill). But I can't afford to spend a lot of time on that. To save time, and also to maximize the show-and-tell benefit, I need to be able to edit the model while viewing it in 3D.

One of the great things about MiniCad and VectorWorks 2D drawing has always been that ability to clearly see what you're working on while working on it, as easily as if working on paper. I can edit a VectorWorks drawing while discussing it with a client. To get that same facility in 3D modelling, I've had to use a different program, Sketchup. And after using VW 9 and 10 for a month each, I've gone back to VW 8 as the fastest 2D drawing program.

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