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Dark windows and Renderworks backgrounds


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I want dark windows to my elevations but I also want to use a background for the sky. The problem is as soon as you use any RW background it has an effect on the windows, tinting them grey or whatever colour the background is.

Is there any way to achieve dark windows + use a background?

Edit: One method is to use two viewports. One with no background and one with the sky which is sent to the back. However is going to make my PDF files bigger than they need to be (plus it complicates things, if someone else comes to edit the file they'll need to work out that there are two viewports). I guess the other way would be to just use a polygon behind the viewport with a gradient fill.

Edited by Christiaan
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Convert to Lines makes the objects you have select flat in that view. So instead of having multiple viewports, you could have multiple line objects in different view angles on the same layer.

But I think a render bitmap would work better like you mentioned in one of your previous posts on having 2 viewports.

The polygon, is that the window or the background?

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That's a thought. Its a shame you can't control this on viewport by viewport basis though, because I want the reflectivity in other views.

Hi...

Here's a thought... (dunno if it'll work though!)

Duplicate the texture for the glass of the window, leaving one as the original (with reflectivity on), and tone down (or turn off the reflectivity on the other). Using class overrides, and changing the texture, you should now be able to have different textures on the same windows in different viewports!

HTH

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That's a thought. Its a shame you can't control this on viewport by viewport basis though, because I want the reflectivity in other views.

Hi...

Here's a thought... (dunno if it'll work though!)

Duplicate the texture for the glass of the window, leaving one as the original (with reflectivity on), and tone down (or turn off the reflectivity on the other). Using class overrides, and changing the texture, you should now be able to have different textures on the same windows in different viewports!

HTH

This could be a good solution except the viewports I need to do it with are Sheet Layer viewports of Design Layer viewports. So I would need to do the overrides on the Design Layer viewports but then that would effect my other drawings where I do want the reflectivity.

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  • Vectorworks, Inc Employee

Christiaan,

Why can't you do the overrides in the sheet layer viewport?

As for the white parts of the viewport rendering transparent: If you want the white areas to be opaque, select the viewport and give it a solid fill via the attributes palette.

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Christiaan,

Why can't you do the overrides in the sheet layer viewport?

Because when you create a Sheet Layer Viewport of Design Layer Viewports the classes within the Design Layer Viewports are not available for overriding in the Sheet Layer Viewport (at least not when the Design Layer Viewports are derived from Workgroup Referenced files). You have to do the overriding in the Design Layer Viewports, which would defeat the purpose because that would affect my other views too where I want to keep the reflectivity.

As for the white parts of the viewport rendering transparent: If you want the white areas to be opaque, select the viewport and give it a solid fill via the attributes palette.

Brilliant. I did not know this, thanks.

Edit: actually this doesn't work how I'd need it to because it whites out the entire background (including the sky) not just the bits of building that have rendered transparent.

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  • Vectorworks, Inc Employee
Because when you create a Sheet Layer Viewport of Design Layer Viewports the classes within the Design Layer Viewports are not available for overriding in the Sheet Layer Viewport (at least not when the Design Layer Viewports are derived from Workgroup Referenced files). You have to do the overriding in the Design Layer Viewports, which would defeat the purpose because that would effect my other views too where I want to keep the reflectivity.

Can't the overriding could be done in either? If you select the sheet layer viewport and click the "Classes" button, is the "Class Overrides" checkbox checked under "Use embedded design layer viewport settings" ? If so, try unchecking it, then se the overrides.

Brilliant. I did not know this, thanks.

Edit: actually this doesn't work how I'd need it to because it whites out the entire background (including the sky) not just the bits of building that have rendered transparent.

Is the sky the actual render background of the viewport? It sounds like you're using a white render background with a sky image beneath the viewport's rendering. If that's the case, try setting the render background of the viewport.

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Can't the overriding could be done in either? If you select the sheet layer viewport and click the "Classes" button, is the "Class Overrides" checkbox checked under "Use embedded design layer viewport settings" ? If so, try unchecking it, then se the overrides.

No they don't show with it checked or unchecked. Presumably because they're Design Layer Viewports as opposed to Design Layers. Or because they're WGR'd Design Layer Viewports.

Is the sky the actual render background of the viewport? It sounds like you're using a white render background with a sky image beneath the viewport's rendering. If that's the case, try setting the render background of the viewport.

Ah right, yes, but in this case the method involves using a separate sky image/polygon so I don't have to set a RW background (so I can have dark windows and reflectivity).

What I've done is use a gradient fill polygon for the sky, then on top of that a separate viewport for the background buildings, then on top of that a semi-transparent white polygon to grey out the buildings, and then on top of that my proposed buildings viewport.

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  • Vectorworks, Inc Employee
No they don't show with it checked or unchecked. Presumably because they're Design Layer Viewports as opposed to Design Layers. Or because they're WGR'd Design Layer Viewports.

Oh yes. Makes sense because the classes are not imported into the document and are not available in the SL viewport. Without switching to the old style referencing, you'd have to duplicate the reference viewports to other layers, change the class overrides in those DL viewports and show those in the SL viewport. Certainly not ideal...

What I've done is use a gradient fill polygon for the sky, then on top of that a separate viewport for the background buildings, then on top of that a semi-transparent white polygon to grey out the buildings, and then on top of that my proposed buildings viewport.

Wow! Quite a bit going on there!

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  • Vectorworks, Inc Employee
Christian, could you use two separate DLVPs? One for elevations (with glazing texture overridden) and one for other views?

Yes. billtheia put it in a much less convoluted way than I did. :-)

If that's too much bloat for the file, you could reference everything you need to another file and override class attributes from there.

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I tried overriding the glass texture but just couldn't get the results I'm after.

The technique of a HDRI White lighting and no background is perfect for rendering glass with dark windows but also with reflections and transparency.

In using a RW background and overriding the glass texture while I could make them dark they also looked dead and flat.

I had similar problems with glazed balconies. Look great with HDRI white lighting and no background. Look horrible with a RW background and couldn't adjust without killing off the transparency.

In the end I have gone for two SLVPS. One has the background buildings and sky (along with a grey out mask traced around the buildings) and the front one has the proposed buildings. This is slightly better than my previous technique because it means I have more control over the sky. However it still produces a wee bit of a anti-alias halo effect around some parts of the proposed buildings, which is especially noticeable if the sky is dark blue.

Attached is a 1:200 street elevation (although I need to re-render because there's something wrong with the balconies on the middle building).

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This is an example of the halo anti-alias effect. It's not normally this bad. Most of the effect in this image is the result of reducing the file size with Colorsync. This is a real problem because we've had to issue 60 MB files to planners today instead of 10-15 MB.

I don't know why Colorsync makes it worse but it only does it to files where I've used this multi-viewport technique.

ubbthreads.php?ubb=download&Number=7135&filename=reduced.png

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