bunch of questions from someone just starting out...

[mnewxcv]

well this is my second post. I am using the 15 day trial right now to see how it works and such, so far so good with the exception of a few problems I am sure are simple. I'm going into my senior year in high school and starting to look at architecture as a potential major in college, so trying it out.

system specs if they matter:
amd athlon x2 4200+
foxconn am2 motherboard
2 x 2gb ddr2 ram
nvidia 8800gts 512mb
36/400 gigabyte hard drives

I will number them so they are a little easier to answer (hopefully)

1. When I try to paint the outside of a house, in this case one with 6" siding, it makes it appear flat and no longer shows the siding, just as if it were a flat wall. what did I do wrong?

2. I cannot figure out how to put in a ceiling. In 3d, there doesn't seem to be a way i can figure out, and in 2d, i do it by perimeter or room select and i click and I don't think it does anything. when I drag to select the area, it seems to do it and there's an orange outline representing something (like the walls are blue, and this is orange) but in 3d there's nothing.

3. lighting: this one I am having a lot of trouble with, in 3d, I select lighting and go to wall lights, but i cant figure out how to mount them on the walls. they appear as gray wire frames but they seem really distant and smaller than they should be, like they might be way outside of the house instead of on the walls, and I can click but they do not appear. I thought maybe I was doing "invisible" lighting, but in a 3d rendering the room remains dark.

4. in vista business 32bit, I got 2 unknown errors when trying to render in basic mode, and it wouldn't finish raytracing in advanced. Using all the same hardware and the same graphics drivers in XP pro, I don't have this issue. Is this a vista thing and is it common?

5. I watched the tutorials on the imsi website for this software, and tried to duplicate the house he made. it came out ok, only a few issues. I think somehow a hardwood floor defaulted into it for some reason. Also, in the rooms I could see green from the landscape underneath.

6. I want my interior walls to appear fllush on the exterior ones, but dont want them to be so close that the interior ones come outside. Should I place them exactly on the same lines in 2d, or a little outside, etc etc? same quetion goes for foundation, if I have a house sitting on a foundation that comes out a couple inches from the foundation how do I do that?

thanks in advance, I will continue to play with it.

Andrew

[Allan Chesney]

Hi Andrew,

Numbering the questions does make it easier!

1. "paint the outside of a house".
You either have Paint or Siding (or other texture of course).  If you want the siding a different colour you have to select a different siding that is the colour you want.  If there isn't one that colour then you have to make it (lets leave that till later - if you decide to buy TFP, then we can explain about creating your own texture then).

2. "I  cannot figure out how to put in a ceiling." 
Most things are inserted in the 2D Plan view.  For the ceiling this applies too.
Ceiling by Room - just click inside the room - that is it - you should see a dotted line appear around the inside of the walls in that room only.
Ceiling By Perimeter - Again just click inside the building - a dotted line will appear around the outside of the walls of the whole building.
NOTE: If you do BOTH in one house, you will have two ceilings in the one room where you did Ceiling By Room and if they were difference colours then you will see both colours fighting with each other.  Do the whole house with ceiling by perimeter if all the ceilings are identical. If some are different, then do them all by room.
Ceiling by Picking Points allows you to make a ceiling anywhere in any shape you want - it will again overlap the other two types if used in the same space.
These same insertions (by Room, Perimeter, Picking Points) apply to floors and roof too. This is probably the cause of the problem in question 5.

3. "lighting: this one I am having a lot of trouble with"
Join the club!! - Unfortunately there are a few bugs in the lighting and rendering area but not with inserting the lights.  It sounds like you are trying to insert the wall lights in 3D view.  This can be done but it is hard to get them into place - they probably are way outside the house and hence not attaching to the wall.  Do it in the plan and they will snap to the wall.
There is not such thing as invisible lighting - that term does get used sometimes but all it means is that you have set all the bits of the light fitting to be invisible, so the only things that shows in the image is the actual lights itself. You do this if you want light somewhere but do not want to see the light fitting itself.  Occasionally you can light a room best by having a light in the middle of the room, half way between the floor and ceiling. You would not want to see the light fitting in this case, so you make it invisible by changing the texture of every surface of the fitting.  Normally however you would put lights in their normal places and would see the fittings.
Your room would have rendered dark if the light fittings were not inside the room.  If no light gets into the room from lights or windows it will be black!  There are some bugs in this area too but I am preparing some work arounds so see the Tips section shortly.

4.  "I got 2 unknown errors when trying to render in basic mode, and it wouldn't finish raytracing in advanced."
I cannot comment on Vista with this one but see my comments to your post under Gallery.

5.  "I think somehow a hardwood floor defaulted into it for some reason. "
Floors will insert automatically throughout the whole building if you have it set that way. It can be turned off (Settings/Program Settings/Building Aids). I prefer to have this off, because if you have a floor through the whole model from the start and then insert a tiled floor for example in the bathroom, you now have two floors there - a default wooden one and a concrete based tiled one and both will appear in the Materials List! We have requested a warning message to alert users to this issue.

6. "I want my interior walls to appear flush on the exterior ones"
You do not need to insert interior and exterior walls separately. All walls are both interior and exterior. When walls join to enclose a space (eg simple 4 walls at right angles), the outside of these 4 walls takes on an 'Exterior' surface automatically and the inside walls become Interior.  Check the wall Properties and you will see on the Appearance tab they have Exterior, Interior Left and Interior Right surfaces (in the dropdown list). The Exterior appearance is only available when it is the outside of the building - that is the joined walls enclose a space. Advanced rendering has some issues here too so again see the Tips post (shortly).

If you are going into architecture then TFP will be fine to enable you to quickly come up with ideas but it is really a visualisation tool ,optimised for speed in creating 3D images, not architectural plans. It will however provide a good introduction, and many even use it to quickly create the plans, then export them to a full architectural software for finalising the plan documents.

I hope the above has helped and you could follow it. If you continue with the program I am sure you will come up with further questions so just ask. 

Allan

[mnewxcv]

ok thanks a lot for the tips, I have been playing around with it and I am getting the hang of it.

I think part of my issue was that I selected the wrong floor level when I was doing things! I think that would take care of mounting lights and ceilings.

I see the hardwood floor gets put in by default, I guess I will leave that setting alone, I don't really mind deleting it and changing it. it helps in the beginning to check elevation and if the terrain is coming through.

as for the vista thing, I am pretty sure it is a vista problem as I found another topic about someone with a new hp laptop with the same problem, running vista. Maybe the programmers can get it figured out.

now there are a couple new things I have run into since last night. once again I will number them.

7. After making a set of interior stairs, I go into properties of the stair and try to adjust the number of steps, but when I put a different number in it just reverts back. Also, it appears step height is not adjustable, clicking it doesn't allow to change it.

8. Basement. probably simple, how to I cut out the terrain going through my basement? the foundation goes through the terrain so I am getting it in the middle of my basement.

9. I have about a 12ft wall in between the living room and kitchen/dining area with a 10ft x 4ft opening. The largest rectangular opening I can select is 6ft x 4ft, anyway I can do this without doing more than one opening?


thats it for now, thanks a lot!

[Allan Chesney]

Andrew,

Yes, it does help to be on the correct floor or location when you do things!! 

Re your new questions:

7. "it appears step height is not adjustable".

The step height depends on the number of steps needed to reach the next floor level and is affected by the Raiser Height and the Raiser Maximum. If you cant change the number of steps you may be exceeding the Raiser Maximum. This will cause it to switch back. If that is happening change the Raiser Maximum first then it will allow you to decrease the number of steps which inturn will change the raiser height.   
NOTE: As with all elements you can right click in the bottom section of the elements list and Add New with your own specs.

8. "how to I cut out the terrain going through my basement".

Settings / Program Settings / Terrain /  and tick "Auto-cut terrain around building" will solve that one.

9. "The largest rectangular opening I can select is 6ft x 4ft".

As mentioned in point 7, you can Add a new opening of any size you want or you can insert the 6' x 4', right click and change the size in Properties.

Allan

[mnewxcv]

thanks for that I will give it a try. Sorry for being such a pain in the neck, but 2 more issues:

chimneys, how? thats about it lol

and i am having trouble adding a second floor to a house I am working on because the roof is a 8/12 pitch and I want it to stay the same and have the walls/ceiling conform to that. I will attach the project. Anyway, I have 3 projects going and am looking for constructive critizism on them, so I will post them and please, any suggestions are appreciated!

if you didn't know, projects 2 and 4 are actually the same house. I started new projects when I began to understand something new. Now The interior of 4 is a bit messed up,  project 2 is pretty good for the exterior. I don't know the exact dimentions of the house which is why they dont match and probably why I am having some issues, but I will probably measure them in a few days (it is the house I live in.)

project 22 is my dad's rental property. I did a pretty good job on this I think..other then the dimmensions being off, which only effected the small bedroom. everything else is pretty accurate. any way I can do a bulkhead for the basement?

lastly, project K is one I did from a blueprint I found in a book which I used as the basis for my idea, but changed it around a bit. this is the one I am having issues with 2nd floor and ceiling.

[Doug.S]

Looks like you are making good progress.  OK to ask even "dumb" questions if at least you tried the help file and perhaps searched this forum....we all have to learn and questions uncover learning.

I did not have the time to peruse through your .bld files....a true test is if a rendered view looks right to you, as we don't know the requirements for what you are trying to do, unless you state a problem.  Regardless, its fun to see what others are "building".  Try making a few renders and share them here to show in gallery or here to ask questions about them.  Usually 640x480 .jpg is sufficient.

to answer your questions....or at least try....

I have not done a chimney as yet but easily done by inserting a long "cube" or "column" (or a set/collection if not same size for total height), size and elevate to your desired position (probably make collision detection "off"), apply brick texture (or desired texture; may be stucco).  If you cannot find what you want in the catalog....you can piece something together from other bits and parts or make/import a .3ds or .skp file.

I'd suggest you also get the free Google SketchUp program....very architectural friendly and useful and its output plays well as import to TFP.

If you only have one floor with a roof, and want to add a new floor, delete the roof, open the "locations" dialog window (settings menu I think) and add a new floor, then add a roof to the second floor.

[Allan Chesney]

Hi Andrew,

As Doug said, it looks like you are making good progress.  I have rendered a few views from your models and they are looking quite good.  I noticed that you are still using V12.0 - Did you realise there is a Patch to V12.1?  (There are links in the bottom section of the forum).  The patch fixes some major rendering issues, although it creates some others. (see points in Tips - http://forum.turbofloorplan.com/index.php/topic,584.msg2849.html#msg2849)

The Chimney: 
Doug's suggestions will all work quite well. You can get the 'Cube' by selecting Internal Accessories and right click in the lower section of the Elements list and select Add New. There are a number of Shapes that are all quite usefull and worth importing.  You can make the Cube to any height for your chimney and change it to brick or whatever. If you use one of the Columns, just turn off the Extend to Ceiling and set the height so it goes through the roof. You could also just use 4 walls to make a chimney.

"i am having trouble adding a second floor"
I am not actually sure what the problem is with this (Project K if I understood your comments correctly). I am guessing that your second floor is just within the roof space hence the 'walls' slope, as they are just the inside of the roof.  Is this correct?  If it is, then your second floor Location should be adjusted so that the walls (the vertical part!!) are only a fraction of an inch high. Draw the walls and insert the roof. The walls will extend to theroof, so any cross walls will extend - the perimeter walls will remain a fraction of an inch high and the inside of the roof become the walls. Change the underside of the roof to the colour you want for the ceiling/walls or insert a ceiling, change it to Cathedral and set the ceiling sides to slope to the same as the roof. I hope this makes sense - if not ask again or if I have misunderstood what you are trying to do ,then we will need more detail to be sure what the problem is.

"any way I can do a bulkhead for the basement?"
I am not sure exactly what you are trying to do here.  According to the dictionary a bulkhead is "a partition in a ship".  I know you are not building a ship (!) but the word gets used in all sorts of ways so we need more detail to answer this one properly.

I could not see any major issues with your models except for a few gaps here and there between walls and roof in places. I think the problem is in the setup of the Locations. In fact some elements on Project 2 are there 4 times - each location has a copy. They must have been duplicated to each location. In 2D plan view, select a Location, do Edit/Select All it will select everything on that Location only. Now switch to 3D Overview and go to Edit/Select Previous.  You will now see highlighted everything on the selected Location.  If you do this for each Location you will find that the plants/drive/fountain etc are on every location.  The 3 extra copies and any other things that are duplicated, should be deleted. Duplicated items can cause problems later if your try to change the colour/texture as it will only change one - the other will bleed through in patches.

Generally the Locations should be set up working from the Terrain level. The basement/foundation Floor Level becomes a minus figure to indicate the distance below the terrain (in your case -6'), add the wall height (8'), add the floor thickness (1') and you have the Floor level for the ground floor (3'). Again add the wall height for the Ground Floor (8') and the floor thickness for the second floor (1') and you have the Second Floor roof level (12'). Add the wall height for the Second Floor (8') and you have the level at which the roof will sit. This way the parts of the building should join up without any gaps.

Re the images - they all rendered quite well so you are definitely getting there!!: 
Project 22 Kitchen: I have just made the pendent light shade in the foreground semi transparent, so that some light goes through it to illuminate the ceiling.
Project K Lounge:  I have added 4 60W transparent fitting lights to increase the general lighting - looked too dark and I have added some Emmissive light to the TV screen and fire to make them look 'alive'.
Project K Kitchen:   I have not changed anything here - probably the wattage of the light on the left could be reduced a little as the bench top is a little overexposed but basically it look great.

When you have some of these finished as you want them you should enter them in the Gallery.

Allan

[Doug.S]

I forgot to mention "bulkhead" solution...I'm assuming its somewhat like a curtain or beam "cover" or a "walled -in" section to cover heating ducts or similar to the closed in space above kitchen cupboard in some designs.

You can use walls sometimes and insert openings if needed and adjust sizes to fit your needs,

But I find it much easier to use a "cube" sized to fit the needed position...texture, elevate into position....usually all done in 2D and then viewed in 3D.  Again, best usually to turn off "collision detection" during positioning.  Also helpful to make objects a bit larger than needed and overlap object into position so you don't have to match faces exactly.  There is a "nudge" tool that helps to place stuff exactly....and zoom in close to check exactness desired.