Using dependent views

[patricks]

Let me see if I have this right:

If I want an overall floor plan of a large building at a smaller scale, to fit on a sheet, and then I want to break the building into sections so I can show each section at a larger scale to fit on a sheet, then I have to make a separate smaller scale overall plan, and then a larger scale overall plan from which I create my dependent views, right?

I was just trying it yesterday, and I noticed when I enlarged the scale of one of the pieces of the building, the entire overall plan changed to the same scale.

So now I have to have even more views cluttering my project browser. :?

[sbrown]

Dependant views should be the same scale. Basically what it is for is to let you annotate one overall floor plan but place the dependant views on the sheets. Then other smaller views can show the match lines.

[davidcobi]

I like to think of dependant views as just exact snapshots of the bigger picture for breaking it down into small enough pieces to fit on a standard architectural sheet (with the exception that element graphic overrides in the dependent view are not inherited by the parent view and visa versa).

[eldad]

First time when I heard of dependant views I got really excited, I thought this will save me so much work as I deal with large floor plates and breaking up the drawings to smaller chunks and working only with one view is a dream come true,

boy was I wrong :( I was expecting to have the ability to change scale in the dependent view independently, turns out you can't! so what's the point? why would I want to break down my floor plan to dependants views that are the same scale??
Are we still stuck with copy and paste annotations? How are you guys dealing with this?
At the moment I do copy with detailing, cropping my view, changing scale, rotating and placing on sheet, this method leaves room for mistakes with annotations and lines...

[Matt Brennan]

First time when I heard of dependant views I got really excited, I thought this will save me so much work as I deal with large floor plates and breaking up the drawings to smaller chunks and working only with one view is a dream come true,

boy was I wrong :( I was expecting to have the ability to change scale in the dependent view independently, turns out you can't! so what's the point? why would I want to break down my floor plan to dependants views that are the same scale??
Are we still stuck with copy and paste annotations? How are you guys dealing with this?
At the moment I do copy with detailing, cropping my view, changing scale, rotating and placing on sheet, this method leaves room for mistakes with annotations and lines...

I too got really excited about it. I even thought I could use it with my detailing. Instead of copy and pasting annotation from call out with in a bigger scale of a call out, I thought the dependent views would be great since you can reference them. But with having the scale to be the same, my idea was shot down.At this point, I do not see the potential for it.

But I am curious on how other people are using it. Any one have some great positive solutions for this new tool?

[Scott D Davis]

So now I have to have even more views cluttering my project browser. :?
Really, thats not something to worry about. Thats why you can organize the broswer with your own sorting and grouping. If you are worried about cluttering the browser, well, soory to say but thats not what Revit is about. Revit is about being able to create any number of views at any time, because they are all just different views of the database. I cut sections everywhere in my plans, and use about 10% of them on sheets. I place cameras all over the place to see my design.....may not use any of them in CD's....its just a part of Revit to have views.

So use dependant views! You want mixed scales? Lets say you have an overall floor plan at 1" = 10'-0"...too big to fit on a sheet at 1/8". You use dependant views, and make an 1/8" scale parent view and 2 dependant views and the 2 dependent views go on sheets, while the parent view is simply a "working" view. Use the tenth scale plan as the overall because it will fit on the sheet, and it will have its own set of annotations. If there are certain annotations you want on both, then make a detail Group of the annotations and place the Group in other views. Editing one will update the others.

So what if its one more view in your browser.

[eldad]

So use dependant views! You want mixed scales? Lets say you have an overall floor plan at 1" = 10'-0"...too big to fit on a sheet at 1/8". You use dependant views, and make an 1/8" scale parent view and 2 dependant views and the 2 dependent views go on sheets, while the parent view is simply a "working" view. Use the tenth scale plan as the overall because it will fit on the sheet, and it will have its own set of annotations. If there are certain annotations you want on both, then make a detail Group of the annotations and place the Group in other views. Editing one will update the others.

So what if its one more view in your browser.Not sure I follow you here Scott,
a dependent view will carry the parent scale, change any one and it will change the other... that's the point I was making :)

[dhurtubise]

Well i have to agree with eldad. Dependant view's scale should not be tied to the parent view. But hey, we are still saving a view in the process compare with 9.1 :-)

[Steve_Stafford]

The annotation in overall plans is usually different than the scale of partial plans. So the idea of dependant views allowing different scales than the parent won't fly much of the time, you'd need to move annotation around in the parent and the children and you're back to where you were originally.

If you want a concrete example, consider the UP/DN text in stairs. It is the same annotation everywhere and will only really work at one scale. In any other they end up in the wrong place. I know it sounds like I'm making excuses or defending it....I'm not, it is just the reality of things, these views are fundamentally different more than not.

The ability to annotation a master plan and divide it up for sheets is what the feature was developed for, not to provide key plans.

[sbrown]

Scale HAS to be tied to the the parent view. Otherwise your notes and dims don't make anysense. I think the posters are confusing a Dependent view with a KEYPLAN. I think what we still need is a keyplan tool. It sounds like the issues arising are a misunderstanding of the use of the tool. I look at dependent views this way.

In acad in model space you would have one big floor plan with all your notes and dims on it, then you would create diff. viewports of that model space to show your plan on diff. sheets. Basically this is what the dependent view is doing. this is a great feature especially for exporting backgrounds to consultants, now the Parent view(is not on a sheet) is the export view. the dependents are the sheet views.

[Scott D Davis]

Not sure I follow you here Scott,
a dependent view will carry the parent scale, change any one and it will change the other... that's the point I was making :)
sure...so have your set of parent views/dependent views. They are at a scale. Then have ANOTHER overall view at a different scale. What goes on a sheet? The overall view at a scale, and the two dependent views at a different scale. The parent view is just a working view and does not go on a sheet.

[cphubb]

Scott,

I see your workflow point of view and I agree with it entirely. However this is not how the VARs and Autodesk have been promoting this feature and so the users here are a little confused just like the other posters on this thread. There needs to be a better explaination of how the PROCESS works not just the cool new features.

[Scott D Davis]

Parent Views/Dependent views were created specifically to deal with a few issues...

one was being able to open a "master" view and doing all annotations there, and then have those annotations show up in other views. ie a large floor plate broken up into smaller sections. Annotate in the large overall plan, dependents update.

There used toi be a problem of trying to create "parts" of a plan to fit on sheets...you had to Duplicate with detailing, then change all the crop regions. Room tags were left floating in space. Annotations didn't persist across views. Users had to go to the individual pieces to annotate.

These issues have been fixed with dependent views. How are dependent views being presented to you? Every time I show them, I state "change the scale of one, and the other parent/dependents change too."

[cphubb]

Scott,

Its not so much the scale as how the process has been presented. Based on some feedback and this thread people think these are partially dependant or snapshots or something else all together. Its not that I think there is something wrong with the views just the way they have been presented and the lack of work flow or process associated with having 2 or three views that are linked to another larger view.

We currently present the Work / Sheet process and the dependant views play into that scenario very well and once we understand the ins and outs we will be moving down that road quickly especially with larger projects.

[cstanley]

I've actually found this new tool to be extremely useful. my concern is that you (the collective "you, not the individual "you") typically shouldn't (or wouldn't) place the same notation in different views...and if you do, it probably is at a different scale (after all, there must be some reason to show them at different scales.) which means you'd need different-scaled notations, because they'd be too small or too large, then you'd need to move them anyway. i'm still a big believer in "show it once in the right place."

I am very happy about it. Have you ever tried keeping up with several hundred plan views' notations, particularly room tags? it's a nightmare and much more economical at that point to just do it in a referenced cad file.

Used properly (like almost all things revit) it works quite well.

now for key plans, that's an idea i could get behind!

[eldad]

Thank you all for your input, I just had a Homer moment :)

my 1:250 plan will fit nicely on an A1 all I have to do is duplicate this plan (with detailing) change the scale to 1:100 and THAN create dependent views from this plan, my 1:250 will only be used as a key plan and now I'm working on 1 plan (1:100) with my 6 dependent views automatically updated with annotation.
the way the feature was "sold" to us was a bit confusing, but after a good night sleep things are back to normal :)
cheers,

[sjsl]

We are very happy with the way DV's work. We overcame the overall plan hurdle and moved on. Our company has stopped using overall plans on a large project becuase it became confusing to the guys in the field. We have found everyone seems to like using 1/8" a foot and DV's have helped big time there. Duping and Croping everytime we wanted a view was getting to be counterproductive to our work flow.

We give DV's an 'A'

[Mr Spot]

I've said this before but i'll re-iterate.

I love dependant views and i've used them on 4 different projects already!

From this experience though I've discovered they could be improved...

For instance the process of dividing them up and adding view reference tags is rather labourious.

I envisaged opening your parent view, selecting the matchline tool then drawing your matchlines and as the parent views crop region is broken up the dependant views are automatically created with their (non-rectangular crop regions would come in handy here too) crop regions automatically set to the correct extents and add view references at the edges.

This seems like more of a revit way of doing it...

There would also need to be overlapping parameter. For instance we overlap our views by 3 metres or so and hatch half the overlapped area so the joining point is more apparent and information isn't lost at the join.

Perhaps next attempt at dependant views could incorporate this...

[dbaldacchino]

DV's are a great addition to this release. It's a complete nightmare to manage changes in a large floorplate that is split in 6 or more sheets. Rooms move and you have to chase room tags around all plans. You get errors and warnings all the time. Now you work on the entire floor plate and all your sheet views will reflect those changes. As stated, this is not meant for keyplans. Just use a Generic annotation family to do that and nest it in your titleblock, with visibility parameters that can be checked/unchecked to highlight which area the sheet pertains to.

I'm still waiting for the 2008 version to be deployed and installed (haven't pushed much as I wasn't intending to upgrade the current project due to some bugs with the first build). We're going through some painful revisions in our project and I can't tell you how much time DV's could have saved me. I would have been able to maintain one plan, make all the changes there and break up in multiple DV's and place on small letter or tabloid sized tblocks. Instead, I'm having to duplicate a lot of views etc. and making sure to correct annotation everywhere it needs changed. Even clouding would be easier....you do it in the parent view. I think DV's are very powerful when in addenda/post-addenda phases. Basically, each parent view could represent an addendum/ASI. And each DV from that parent is the plot view. Making revisions to elevations is a nightmare n 9.1 (unless the view was a callout view, in which case you could duplicate with detailing). But in 2008, you can create a DV easily from an elevation, making the revision process that much smoother. Can't wait to start using it on the next project (and hope I won't have to push revision methodology on this project later on, like I had to do on this!!).

[john.105939]

Have I missed something here? How do you get view referances on an overall plan to reference the dependant views. It seems like the only place the view referances show up are the parent view and dependant views. If I want an overall plan let's say at 1/16"=1'-0" and the dependant views at 1/8"=1'-0" is there any way to get the match lines to include view references on the overall plan which was created by "duplicating with detailing" the parent view?

[eldad]

That's right John,
in effect you are working on 2 plans. I have my first plan at 1:250 that will fit on A1 sheet, on this plan I don't have much annotations, just a matchline, a line representing where I divide the plan and some more basic stuff, this plan is to give an overall view of the project and where sections are cut.
I than duplicate this plan and call it my working view plan, here I change the scale to 1:100 and create dependents view from this one, this is where all my work is done.
this is something that I do later on in the project once most of the work is "almost there" before design development

[dhurtubise]

Have I missed something here? How do you get view referances on an overall plan to reference the dependant views. It seems like the only place the view referances show up are the parent view and dependant views. If I want an overall plan let's say at 1/16"=1'-0" and the dependant views at 1/8"=1'-0" is there any way to get the match lines to include view references on the overall plan which was created by "duplicating with detailing" the parent view?

That's to me the biggest bummer. How do you show the View Reference on that large scale view which is disconnected from the dependant view. Well you use manual coordination.
Hoopefully it's gonna be fix in the next release/build.

[MTristram]

Has anyone tried using Dependant views on Views that have had Scope Boxes applied to them? I don't seem to be able to modify the extent of the DV at all...

Reason we have applied a scope box to the particular floor plan, is it needs to be rotated by 90 degrees to actually fit on the sheet.

Any suggestions?

[MTristram]

OK fixed my own problem - just remove the scope box from the dependant views and voila it works...

[Jay Zallan]

Has anyone had the misfortune of duplicating dependent sections and elevations? (or had users in the office do that)...Then place some on sheets just to find there is a whole world of hiding that needs to occur with all the section and elevation markers that now abound....

Since we (most everyone) uses working views distinct from sheet placed views there could be a choice to duplicate the tags too...OR AT LEAST if they need to be automatically placed they could have a default offset.

Also GIVE US THE ABILITY TO DUPLICATE MORE THAN ONE VIEW AT A TIME....and NO I don't mean Apply Dependent Views... (That is such a GREAT function why isn't there that same attention to detail in the rest of Revit, I wonder....

[dbaldacchino]

Has anyone had the misfortune of duplicating dependent sections and elevations? (or had users in the office do that)...Then place some on sheets just to find there is a whole world of hiding that needs to occur with all the section and elevation markers that now abound....

Hmmm you bring up a great point, I hadn't thought of that. The section or elevation markers get all piled up on top of each other. When using DVs to create addenda sheets, you still end up messing your original set of drawing with this method.

Having said that, you could use the "Hide at scales coarser than" feature to have some control, especially for "working views". This way you can set this parameter to a really fine scale that is not used in your document set, keeping it free from "tag litter".

[eldad]

Yes!
that why we were asking for ages to have the ability to "hide in view" for sections and elevations tags.
that way you can duplicate section type, say, Wall sections. Blockwork etc... and hide what you don't want to see.
this comes very handy when doing packages...

[Calvn_Swing]

Yikes!

That would be such a nightmare to keep up with! Every time I see or hear "hide in this view" I get the shivers...

I'm much prefer an automatic system with some user control. How about the ability to hide section and elevation types in VG rather than just ALL SECTIONS and ALL ELEVATIONS. Then, your addenda can be a section type that doesn't show on your original sheet views...

Or, how about a complete re-hash of the whole revision methodology in Revit because it is the MOST CAD like thing in the whole program. I should be able to say "Today is the CD issue!" and everything I change after that should automatically cloud for me! This information is already in the database! It's just a matter of writing the interface. Come on!!!

Back on point,

I love the feature, but I also think it could be improved. I don't know how I lived without it in 9.1. And, I really like the suggestion of parent views for ASI's. Very nice idea indeed!

[tiffanyharrington]

I would like to know how you cropped the views.

[Jay Zallan]

I would like to know how you cropped the views.

Which views and which "you" are you asking about? :-)

[cphubb]

Each view can be cropped independantly so you just crop each view.

You can use the matchline or a Reference plane or grid line to let you know where to place the crop

[Jay Zallan]

you can also use scope boxes