Each month there are one or more coaching calls; this is a recording of the session on November 20, 2012July – December 2012
ArchiCAD Training – Coaching Call – November 20, 2012
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ArchiCAD Training Session Notes
| QUESTION | ANSWER SUMMARY AND NOTES | START TIME |
| Fills not showing up in ArchiCAD project | Eric demonstrates “virtual trace” working on the first floor and coordinating the first floor window positions with the ground floor window positions. He used the “transparent fills and background feature”, to achieve this. If this feature (“transparent fills and background”) is accidentally left on, it will make the fills in your project invisible. This is particulary noticable when you have fills that don’t have any linework accompanying it; then you wouldn’t see anything at all, and thus this is the reason why the caller couldn’t see any of his fills in his project. | 0:01:15 |
| The renovation filter settings not showing in 3d window. | The caller was finding that the renovation tool setting does not affect the 3d window and you have to set it via the menu. Also when he looks at his building in plan using the planned status filter, and then flicks to 3d it defaults to existing filter. Unfortunately, this is how Graphisoft has set up how the 3d window works with the renovation filter. To get around this Eric sets up the 3d window to the status he wants and then saves it as a view. He does this for every status, and thus all the status’s are just a click away in the 3d window. Eric also describes the overrides feature in the renovation filter (in this case giving the new construction elements a different color in the 3d window). It is only the new construction elements that are shown with a different color (to highlight to the client the changes) – “planned status” in the 3d window is shown in its natural colors/materials. | 0:09:34 |
| Walls not cleaning up properly | A gentleman caller had two composite walls that were joined together via an offset (he needed the offset because the external composite was a cladding panel and needed to be placed away from the insulation). The walls were not cleaning up correctly in certain places. Eric first opens up composites and checks the wall priority numbers – options>element attributes>composites – this is not the solution on this occasion. Eric thinks the problem lies with the position of the reference line (because of the wall offset it is being pushed far out – much further than it normally would be), and he advises making a patch to solve the issue. Eric also gives advice on positioning the reference line. | 0:20:00 |
| A lady caller also had a problem with walls – in her case the skins were in reverse order to what she needed. Eric explains what to do and how the reference line affects things (see Eric’s slightly earlier explanation on reference lines). Eric also shows the lady how to set up the composite in reverse order. Note: remember when in composites the skin at the top of the list will be the closest to the reference line. The lady was a new ArchiCAD user and found setting up (very complex) composites confusing, so Eric showed her how to set up and work with a basic (no composite fill) wall, and advised her to come back at a later date when she was more confident, set up the composite wall, and then just eyedrop the composite wall created into the project. A caller at time 0:43:00 advises the lady to create a composite wall at the required thickness and give it a name. The caller suggests that this composite wall should be given just one blank fill (for example airspace), just for the time being, and when she has completed the project (and perhaps feeling less stressed and more confident) she could come back to the composite wall and edit it; creating all the necessary fills that go into the wall. The beauty of doing it (editing it) this way is when she has finished creating the fills for the previously created composite wall the entire project will update at the same time. If you do decide to make your composite walls this way then be careful if you then decide to draw the internal walls from the centre reference line. | 0:35:18 | |
| A single plane roof is placed on story 3, and the caller wants the projection outline to show on story 2 | The caller said he had no problems doing this before ArchiCAD 16 came along, but now for some reason he is unable to do it. First Eric checks the “show on stories” in the roof selection settings – floor plan display settings, and after finding this was set correctly (home story and one story down setting) he then goes to options>project preferences>construction elements, and found this was set correctly too. Eric then goes back to the roof selection (floor plan display) settings and changes the floor plan display from projected to projected with overhead. and now the roof shows the projected outline on story 2. | 0:49:30 |
| How to create a curtain wall corner detail that has a butt (glass joined) corner with no frame. And very quick explanation on how to put a curtain wall in another wall e.g. brick wall shop front | At first there was no ideal solution found for this issue, but right at the end of this question slot at time 1:21:30 a solution is found, but personally I would watch all this tutorial question answer, as Eric and the caller take us through the different selection settings. The solution involves first changing the corner mullion to corner frame and making the dimension zero, then make it invisible (so you end up with invisible for type, and custom frame for frame class, set at zero – the order you do this procedure appears to be very important). Eric also gives a tip for creating a curtain wall inside a traditional wall (for example a shop front) – he says create the traditional wall and then create a “wallhole”, and now you can put the curtain wall inside the “wallhole” space. If you don’t know how wallhole works then look through previous tutorials; Eric has explained this several times in the past (if you are struggling to find one try this – Coaching Call September 11, 2012 at time 1:12:23) | 1:00:00 |
| Is it best to use layers to organize building elements such as columns and beams, rather than have them on a separate story? | In general, it is better to let the stories organize your project vertically (each story referring to a discrete vertical level) and use layers and layer combinations to show or hide elements on each story to create specific plans. Eric demonstrates what to do and he also describes how mastertemplate can improve your workflow (template available through Eric). Eric has also made another thorough video tutorial on this topic – see link on the right. | 1:30:30 |
| How to turn off the 3d grid in ArchiCAD 15 and above | View>editing plane display | 1:40:00 |
| What are the differences between drafting, cover, and cut fills? And how to get a vectorial fill to not show in plan, but to show in section. | 1:51:28 |
ArchiCAD Training – Coaching Call – November 20, 2012
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