3D Hatches not appearing in rendered VPs (or the scaling is wrong)

[Ed Wachter]

We use 3d Polygons with a hatch to represent ceramic or stone tile. I'm currently setting up perspective VPs that include tile. At first look, it appears that the tile is not visible, but I think it is visible except it's been scaled up drastically, so that only a few hatch lines appear. Attached is a wireframe and rendered versions of one view. In wireframe the hatch appears normally. But when rendered, only a few hatch lines are seen. Any thoughts on how to get the hatch to display normally when VP is rendered? Is there a better way to show tile? (We have the 3D polygons report to schedule for tile quantities; it would be nice to retain this feature). 

 

This project is in VW2021.

 

Thanks,

Ed

B1 Render.pdf B1 Wireframe.pdf

[Jeff Prince]

2 hours ago, Ed Wachter said:

We use 3d Polygons with a hatch

 

Are you sure about that?  Hatches are a 2D graphic that can be applied to 2D polygons or 2D polygons that have been drawn in 3D space... not typically 3D Polygons.

Post the file and more detailed help can be provided.

[Ed Wachter]

@Jeff Prince Ooops! Yes, those are 2D polygons in 3D space. Regarding how they appear in VPs, now some VPs display them correctly; others do not.

 

Is there a way for me to share the file with only you? I'd also like to eliminate our titleblock, or at least our stamp and signature, before I send our VW file, but I don't know how to eliminate the TB and VW won't allow me to delete the class that contains our stamp and signature. 

 

Ed

[Jeff Prince]

1 hour ago, Ed Wachter said:

@Jeff Prince Ooops! Yes, those are 2D polygons in 3D space. Regarding how they appear in VPs, now some VPs display them correctly; others do not.

 

Is there a way for me to share the file with only you? I'd also like to eliminate our titleblock, or at least our stamp and signature, before I send our VW file, but I don't know how to eliminate the TB and VW won't allow me to delete the class that contains our stamp and signature. 

 

Ed

Backup your file first and make a copy to send.  Then, you can delete the sheet layers and design layers that are not needed for a discussion and purge it.  That should get rid of things quickly.  You can post it here and others can see it or you can send it to me via a private message.

[Ed Wachter]

@Jeff Prince Ooops! Yes, those are 2D polygons in 3D space. Regarding how they appear in VPs, now some VPs display them correctly; others do not.

 

Is there a way for me to share the file with only you? I'd also like to eliminate our titleblock, or at least our stamp and signature, before I send our VW file, but I don't know how to eliminate the TB and VW won't allow me to delete the class that contains our stamp and signature. 

 

Ed

[Ed Wachter]

@Jeff Prince Thanks. The purged VW file is attached. I've also included a PDF showing what I'm getting from the VW file this morning. Now, only one of the VPs has the hatch scaling problem, and one has a new rendering problem. Previously, other VPs also had the hatch problem. I appreciate your attention to this

TEST FILE w: polygons w: hatches vw2021.vwx Bath Perspectives w: hatch.pdf

[Jeff Prince]

If you want the same results between different viewports, you have to use the same settings for the Layers, Classes, Rendering and Lighting settings.

 

Sheet B4 is not using Foreground Render = Hidden Line, so your hatches don't show up.  Once you fix that, your Advanced Properties are not set to Black and White only on this viewport, so you get colored lines.  Correct that and sheet B4 is great.

 

Sheet B3's camera position is coincidental with the wall behind the camera, which is incredibly bad luck and amazing that it occurred in such a way for the graphics to display this way.  You can remedy this by adjusting your view.... or Pro Tip - put the coincidental geometry on a different Design Layer and then turn it off in this viewport.  Think movie set when it comes to rendering these tight interior spaces, just remove some walls 🙂. Just remember, if you do that latter, make sure you turn that design layer on where it may be needed in other viewports.  Clip cube in future versions of the software might be helpful, I don't think it works in 2021 the same as later releases.

 

 

 

Fixed by hiding the "Wall Behind the Camera"

 

 

[Ed Wachter]

@Jeff Prince Thank you! Those renderings are now good enough to send to the homeowner for comment.

The fact that the one camera was coincident with the wall geometry is a humorous stroke of bad luck. I don't consciously use cameras to set up these views. I navigate to where I want to look using my Space Navigator (more recently called Space Mouse from 3D Connexions), and then choose Create Viewport. Now I see that I can click on Edit Camera from the VP to make adjustments.

 

I appreciate your time and help!

Ed

[Jeff Prince]

17 minutes ago, Ed Wachter said:

I appreciate your time and help!

 

My pleasure.  That was an interesting workflow to look at.

 

You might want to look into using Textures that have hatches built in for hidden line rendering.  That would save you so much time.  Then, you could use staked viewports to combine Hidden Line and Shaded (or any colored rendering mode) to create dramatic effects.

 

Here are two extruded rectangles with one texture assigned to each.  Note how the Hidden Line rendering shows a line hatch and the Shaded rendering shows a texture.  This is so much easier to manage than making those 2D polys and assigning hatches, especially when changes occur.

 

 

Here is the same technique applied to your project:

 

The CMU and Glass block textures used here are built into Vectorworks, but you could make your own too....

 

The same scene in Hidden Line Rendering, note the hatches are generated from the hatch built into the Texture applied to a single object.  No need to make those 2D Polys anymore 🙂. You would just need to make textures with associated hatches and make sure they are sized correctly.  Things would get fast and easy from there.

 

[Ed Wachter]

@Jeff Prince Thank you! Those renderings are now good enough to send to the homeowner for comment.

The fact that the one camera was coincident with the wall geometry is a humorous stroke of bad luck. I don't consciously use cameras to set up these views. I navigate to where I want to look using my Space Navigator (more recently called Space Mouse from 3D Connexions), and then choose Create Viewport. Now I see that I can click on Edit Camera from the VP to make adjustments.

 

I appreciate your time and help!

Ed

[Ed Wachter]

Yes I prefer that approach with the surface hatch textures. Some members of our office use the polygons in order to quantify the tile area (into a worksheet). In my opinion, that's the builders job. In this case we even had a separate wall style for the tile, so a texture makes a lot of sense, and I imagine we could pull the quantities from that wall style.

 

Also, we usually just need a generic representation of tile. We show where we think tile should go, but it's usually the homeowner or interior designer who actually designs the tile layout. So we don't fuss too much, but the polygons are forcing us to fuss whenever the design changes.

 

Not to be too fussy, but do you know why the hatch in your Hidden Line rendering is a slightly different pattern than what appears in the Shaded version? Our office has struggled to maintain a consistent pattern between the two render modes.

 

Thanks again.

Ed

[Jeff Prince]

2 hours ago, Ed Wachter said:

Not to be too fussy, but do you know why the hatch in your Hidden Line rendering is a slightly different pattern than what appears in the Shaded version? Our office has struggled to maintain a consistent pattern between the two render modes.

 

Because Vectorworks made that particular texture and hatch.  I guess the person who made it must not have been paying close attention to the details, you see that from time to time in the Vectorworks library.  You can make them match perfectly with the right hatch design.