Student Watermark

[Hatmann]

How large and obtrusive is the watermark in the student version of the software? Is this something I could use to produce work that I can pin up for reviews, or will my boards be ruined by the watermark?

 

I understand that as a company you want to protect your intellectual property from being used commercially. However you do request evidence of my status as student.

 

Here's my problem, I'm a first semester graduate architecture student, and each piece of software I learn is a significant learning curve and investment of time. I am really interested in VW as a piece of software, however I don't have several $K to buy software at the moment. Although I get the student software for a year, it's worthless to me if I can't produce work that I can pin up in a review. I prefer the platform and user interface of VW over Revit, but I will have to learn and use Revit instead because they give me the tools I need to produce work as a student for my classes.

 

I think you have a fantastic product, but if you want a generation of architects, who are exclusively trained to produce architecture on the computer to utilize your software as one of the tools in their toolboxes, then you have to open the software up to students in a more competitive way. It would also be worth considering having an option to pay for VW on a subscription instead of a one off huge fee. I'd have to get a credit card or two to purchase VW right now. 

 

Autodesk is not the best, but they have positioned themselves to be the tools everyone is familiar with, because of their free full student licensing. 

 

Even though I want to be a VW user, it seems to me at the moment that it would be next to impossible for me to justify putting in the time to learn the software to just have products I can't use for my work as a student. I can't imagine I'm the only person who feels this way. 

 

best,

 

Aaron

[Andy Broomell]

I agree with many of your points about educational versions.

 

So that you can see what the watermark looks like, I've attached a PDF exported from a student version. The watermark is fairly unobtrusive - just thin outlines at the top and bottom of the page. This PDF is a 24x36" ARCH D sheet, so it may lay out slightly differently on different sizes.

 

Also, there's nothing stopping you from making the page size larger than the sheet border so that the watermark is outside of your sheet (a bit of a cheat).

Watermark.pdf

[PVA - Admin]

Alternative methods of purchasing and using professional versions of Vectorworks are in the pipe. I agree we need more flexibility not just for the special circumstances that students usually face, but freelancing or part time users as well as firms that regularly increase/decrease staff.

[Hatmann]

2 hours ago, Andy Broomell said:

I agree with many of your points about educational versions.

 

So that you can see what the watermark looks like, I've attached a PDF exported from a student version. The watermark is fairly unobtrusive - just thin outlines at the top and bottom of the page. This PDF is a 24x36" ARCH D sheet, so it may lay out slightly differently on different sizes.

 

Also, there's nothing stopping you from making the page size larger than the sheet border so that the watermark is outside of your sheet (a bit of a cheat).

Watermark.pdf

Thanks for the PDF, that really helps. 

[cakes]

I've been using Vectorworks 2014 Student Edition and program was having issues so I dumped all the preferences and restarted the program again, and now, instead of the watermarks being top and bottom only, they are all over the document. Is there a way to get it back to how it was, just above and below on the document? Thanks!

 

[PVA - Admin]

1 minute ago, cakes said:

I've been using Vectorworks 2014 Student Edition and program was having issues so I dumped all the preferences and restarted the program again, and now, instead of the watermarks being top and bottom only, they are all over the document. Is there a way to get it back to how it was, just above and below on the document? Thanks!

 

It should only ever place it on the bottom and top of a page. However after resetting preferences, your Page Setup settings may be tiling smaller pages across your real page size. If you set up your page size as desired under File > Page Setup, does it look the same? If so, please post a screenshot of what you're seeing.

[cakes]

JimW - Thank you so much!!! Awesome.

[barkest]

Autodesk products are licensed for 3-years and all products are available to students. VW is 1-year and C4D has to be paid for at currently around £90 for an 18-month license.

 

Dear Maxon its not the way to promote your product to students.

 

This is an issue as the students, or at least mine over the last 6-years (around 700 students), do not use C4D for onward processing as they cannot install it outside of the Uni due to cost. Why should they when the can trade .fbx to Maya for free and honestly the process is seamless. 

 

It makes no sense to me but I guess people at Nem and Maxon communicate regularly and recognise this problem (or maybe not).

 

 

 

 

[nrkuhl]

@Hatmannas someone who just wrapped up grad school, and who gets paid to use VW, don't waste your effort learning to use it in school.  If you go to work for a firm that uses VW, they'll train you.  Revit firms tend to expect at least some Revit experience, even if it's just academic.  And, honestly, the BIM programs are all rather limiting creativity wise, unless you're really, really good with them.  Put your time into a good 3D modeling program and the Adobe programs.  Those skills transfer well everywhere.