ACT ceiling system without tiles

[rrothwel]

has anyone found a way to have the ceiling grid without the ceiling tiles yet? I know it is just a fill pattern with a material. We do large interiors and want grid and no tile for designs but did not want the manual CAD work to have to do.

[saeborne]

Interesting... What if the material color of the tile was transparent? Would that give you the surface pattern of the grid, but not the "Solid" look of the tile?

I haven't tried it yet, so I don't know if it will work.

[twiceroadsfool]

I use a Curtain System on the face of a mass, with the T-grid as mullions and empty panels... Works great... But its laborious on the hardware...

[cliff collins]

Tried the "transparent tile material"--did not work when rendered.

Perhaps:

1. Make a custom ceiling family with only extrusions for the grid.

2. Use model lines drawn onto the face of a generic ceiling.

3. Create a custom hatch pattern to use in a surface pattern on a generic ceiling.

cheers..................

[rrothwel]

I will have to test some of these out. I like the mullion idea, and the custom family would not be sooo bad but the size of the model is gonna blow up. I tried a fill and it just did not do it. Oh well, the fun is in the challenge right????

[twiceroadsfool]

I use the Curtain System for some ceiling stuff... When i need to show coffered ceiling panels, or something. Of course, i use it for tray ceilings occasionally too.

What sucks is the CS is by face, so if you decide in the design process to change to a regular ceiling, you cant just switch it. You have to delete it, and then sketch in a new ceiling.

Lights are a pain too. They obviously wont host in coffered curtain panels, so you have to have custom curtain panels.

But if its that or in-place, thats what im doing... At least then i only have to edit the sketch of the mass and update...