Each month there are one or more coaching calls; this is a recording of the session on June 18, 2014January – June 2014
ArchiCAD Training – Coaching Call – June 18, 2014
| Thank you for visiting the Best Practices Course website. The video lessons are available for members only. If you are an active member and would like to watch the ArchiCAD training video on this page, please login to the website. If you are not currently a member, please visit the following pages for more information and to sign up for the Best Practices Course, the QuickStart Course or for the Best Practices ArchiCAD Coaching Program. Eric Bobrow, Creator of the Best Practices Course |
ArchiCAD Training Session Notes
| QUESTION | ANSWER SUMMARY AND NOTES | START TIME |
| How to create a schedule of zones | Look at the room finish schedules and look at the scheme settings. This will show you what is included and what fields are included. You can create a new schedule here and call it maybe “Zone List”. You can then say what criteria is as zones and maybe show all including zone name, number, area, calculated area. You can then change its appearance and make the boxes fit correctly. You may need to make adjustments to your zone stamp. You can exclude zones by putting an x in its settings. | 0:01:06 |
| How do you do subheads in your zone schedule | Click on one box and shift click on another to activate both, and then under header options there is option to “insert header above”. Where it then says “merged” you would put in your new header name for the sub-head catagories. If you want to remove the header you can click in it and there is an option the delete the header cell. You can also hide the main header or column headers if you want to put your own graphic headers in separately. | 0:13:53 |
| Is there a control for the number of segments in an extruded shell? | There is no choice within the shell tool. It makes 36 segments in a circle. You could convert your shell into a morph and possibly smooth out your shell. Under the Design menu there are options to modify morph such as modify segmentation. Choose that and select more segments double segments. You can do this again to smooth it even more but you would then have more polygons. You can not modifiy the curvature or height at this point however, so you need to have that worked out before you change your shell to a morph at the last step. | 0:16:48 |
| Using a contour on the shell to make a rectangular cutout, how can you do this and get that cutout to have an angle to its vertical face? | Start with your shape still as the shell, right click on it’s boundary and there is the option to create a hole or define a contour. Choose Define a Shell Countour and then click on a series of points to define a new boundary. If your walls are set to trim to the shell then they will disappear too and that is a separate question. The shell contour will cut with one angle for the whole thing. You can play around with the button for turn the contour plane. This is a global option and might be too crude. Try using SEO as a cutting tool to get the angle you want and then you can then hide that layer that the cutting element was on so it doesn’t show. | 0:26:40 |
| Walls disappearing when they extend beyond the shell. Why do they become invisible? | They disappear because they are connected. If you don’t want them to disappear you can use the SEO instead but the walls that are outside the trim not affected. You could also do this be having two pieces of wall and have one connected and one not. | 0:35:40 |
| When you draw an arc the option is available to extend the arc to a greater part of the circle. That doesn’t seem available witht he control line with the shell. | With a series of operations you can extend the curve by adding more points with a curve that approximates the existing curve then merge the two, but this would be a crude way of doing that. You have to draft an arc guideline and then add to the curve. | 0:40:20 |
| How would you make a curved counter the same way? | To curve a counter, start with your counter, then set your overhangs. It will be square in this dialogue box. You can put a rounded bullnose. You can say no countertop. Then make your own counter with the slab tool and place it on top of your cabinet. From here you can filit the corners to create any arbitrary shape. You can even draw a freeform shape with the spline tool and then use the slab tool and magic wand it. | 0:45:55 |
| Is there a way to change the view of the object in the object’s dialogue box without changing the object’s placement in the model? | Command T will open up the object’s setting box. If you rotate the object view in the dialogue box to see the back, you have to remember to return it to its original view angle before closing the dialogue box so the angle of placement in the model is not changed. | 0:53:44 |
| Walls with extra pieces sticking out of them. How to get rid of those? How to clean up wall interactions. | A good way to trouble shoot this is to select only the elements that are problematic and then drag a copy of them and view just those elements. If the problem goes away, then it is some other element interacting with them causing the problem. Then cut a section and look at what is going on inside. One thing you can do is create a new layer for the walls that are interacting and causing a problem. If you change the interactive number for that layer it would then not interact with the layers you want to clean up. | 1:07:40 |
| Can you change layer and press update for the layer combo? | If you click on a layer combination and make a change on the right, then the update button becomes available and you have to click on it to make you changes apply. On the other hand if you are focusing on a new layer or a layer you are having trouble with, you make your change and then click in the area for visibility or number without having to do the update. The reverse however if you click on a layer combination and make changes on the right then you have to click update. | 1:23:50 |
| Foundation walls showing correctly in both 3D and plan view. | Check your floor plan cut plane to make sure it is the right height. | 1:26:00 |
| Numbering and layer combo refers to just one select layer. Each layer has a number for its priority group. When you highlight a layer on the right side all the layers on the left refer to is it visible, locked or unlocked, etc. Does this refer to only the one selected layer? | Yes. | 1:37:40 |
ArchiCAD Training – Coaching Call – June 18, 2014
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