Kitchen drawing strategy

[dscheckman]

Hello, I'm grappling with a good way to approach drawing a custom kitchen within a house design with vectorworks 2010. The stock vectorworks kitchen objects are not flexible enough for our approach to custom woodwork. Interiorcad is too big an investment at this point. I'd like to work with floor items for counters, and extrudes for the cabinets. What I can't figure out is how to work on the extrudes in elevation or front/side view, in a design layer. The front/side views all start outside the building. I could turn off classes to get to the interior but then I'd be turning off walls, windows etc, which I still want to show while working on the kitchen cabinets. I think I'm missing something easy. Any help or general advice on this or other strategies is appreciated.

David

[Ray Libby]

You would show your elevations as sections using viewports. You need one of the designer versions to do this (it would be good to add which version you have to your signature). Do a search of "create section" in VW help.

I've attached an image showing this. This is not from a 3D model, but it shows a section though walls and the kitchen elevation.

[dscheckman]

Thanks, I added to my signature that I'm using 2010 architect version. I've tried using the section drawing but I can't seem to figure out how to put the section on a design layer, so the model will update. I'm still missing something.

David

[Ray Libby]

You can't put the section viewport on a design layer, only a sheet layer.

[dscheckman]

That's what I thought. So if I want to work on the design layer I would have to create all my extrudes in plan and check them with, say, the flyover tool? It seems like I might be better off working in a new file just for the kitchen and not trying to work within the house plan, then I could just draw the kitchen objects and view them in 3-d easily. Then, I suppose I could either copy and paste them into the house drawings or make them into 3-d symbols and place them. Am I missing something? Thanks, David

[Ray Libby]

Why not use sheet layers and section viewports? You can check the view whenever you want.

[dscheckman]

I must be missing something. I create a section viewport and put it on a sheet layer. I draw the cabinets the way I want them. How do I then look at them in plan or in a different view from the one resulting from the section I created, with the perspective of the rest of the room?

[gmm18]

It is unfortunate you can't work in a section view in Design Layer mode!

Looking forward to that feature!

It seems like I might be better off working in a new file just for the kitchen

Try keeping it in the same file, just put the kitchen in a different Design Layer from everything else...

Then you can turn all other layers to grey and see your kitchen in all different views, side, front, walkthrough, flyover, etc... in OpenGL or wireframe rendering.

Set up saved-views to make going from view to view really fast.

Still...being able to actually work in section view would be much less schizophrenic.

[Ray Libby]

Viewing it in plan should be simple, what problems are you having with that?

Do you have Renderworks?

Maybe you could post a screenshot of what you are trying to do.

[dscheckman]

Yeah, Interiorcad looks very slick, but just too pricey for us right now. Your approach would work if we ever did the same thing twice, but the types of projects we do are really one offs. I think once I find the right approach it won't take me too long to just draw each one. Thanks, David

[dscheckman]

Yes I have Renderworks. Like I said I know I must be missing something. How do I look at an edited section view in plan ? Sorry I don't have a file to post I'm just messing around trying to find an approach.

David

[VincentCuclair]

What I can't figure out is how to work on the extrudes in elevation or front/side view, in a design layer. The front/side views all start outside the building. I could turn off classes to get to the interior but then I'd be turning off walls, windows etc, which I still want to show while working on the kitchen cabinets. I think I'm missing something easy. Any help or general advice on this or other strategies is appreciated.

David

I would do it thus.....create a separate layer for you're interior, then set the opacity for the other layers to 15% (set the layer(and class) view to show/snap), you can then work with your interior in all views using Unified view, and working planes if you wish..........basically the same as gmm18 suggested, but nicer graphics.

Edited March 5, 2010 by Vincent C

[Ray Libby]

You can use the Renderworks Camera to view perspectives. Create a saved view to easily return to a view you like.

[Ray Libby]

How do I look at an edited section view in plan ?

David

Are you talking about a plan section?

[dscheckman]

Thanks, This approach seems to work more or less the way I'd like. Like gmm18 say's it's a bit convoluted. Now I guess I'll try to move ahead. Thanks for everyone's help.

[Jonathan Pickup]

for drawing the cupboards, what about starting with the base cabinet and edit it as much as you can. then use the convert to group command in a 3D view. edit the group to change the cabinet to suit.

If kitchens are really important, what about interiorcad XS

[Hans Martin Kern]

Please excuse this shameless plug ;-)

Looks like interior xs is a great option for you (http://interiorcad.org/index.php?id=387&L=1). It includes the interiorcad cabinet plug-in object plus our worktop object for a way lower price than the full, production-ready version of interiorcad.

Disclaimer: I'm one of the developers of interiorcad / interior xs.

[dscheckman]

Yes, Arconcad, that is basically what I did. This method works pretty well. Interiorcad xs could be in our future if we get enough cabinet work. Thanks for all the help from everyone.

David