Presentation Graphics challenge

[ron.sanpedro]

I have a designer who wants to show a very specific image, and I am having the devil of a time getting it to work.

Basically we have a 4 story building, and we want to do a section perspective view, but not a simple overall. He wants a separate 1 point section perspective of each floor, with eye and camera height at 5'6 above the appropriate level, with the section cut to scale. Then he wants the 4 perspectives composited with a 2D view, so you see each floor in independent section perspective, and you see the other wing of the building in elevation beyond. And to make matters really interesting, the ground floor is much wider than the other floors.
I have showed the team the various images from Phil Read's AU class, but I think in this case the image they are trying to produce may really be the image they need. The main problem being getting a section perspective where the cut plane is to scale.

Thanks for any help.

Gordon

[HawkeyNut]

Gordon,

I don't have an exact answer for you. But in my experience, there is only so much snapping and aligning Revit allows you to do. It annoys me, for example, that I cannot get view of different floor in the exact same position on different sheets.

Having said that, you may have to 'eyeball' your composite view. Have you played with placing a camera and orienting it to an interior elevation view? That will give you the perfect 1-point perspective you are looking for. However, being a perspective, it will not allow you to scale it. For this I would use the snapping the elevation crop-grips give you in plan. After creating these views, you can place them over the view where the remaining wing of the building is shown. Then it's simply a matter of resizing the perspective to the crop area desired...unfortunately by eye!

I'm sure you have already examined some of these possibilities, but it's just my food-for-thought...

[Andre Baros]

The key here, once you've created all the separate views you'll need (by eye as Bob noted), is the order you place them a sheet. Since you don't have any control over draw order for views on a sheet you'll need to place the perspectives on the sheet first, then the elevation beyond and finally the section on top of everything to crop the other views. Once they're all there in the correct stack order you can move them around all you need. You'll probably have to include some extra filled regions in your section to crop the perspectives just right.

I've scene these drawings used before for hotel lobbies and theater's and they're beautiful drawings when done right.

[ron.sanpedro]

Perhaps related, perhaps not. When I Show Camera, I get a red dot and cross-hairs on a line coming from the camera, and a blue dot on a line connecting the view angle lines. The blue dot appears to be nothing more than the grip to select view depth, and at first glance the red dot seems to just be the grip for controlling view angle. However, I can also stretch the line that controls view angle. Any chance this can be made to affect where the "cut" happens? Or is this simply the target point?
It seems like there has to be a way to get a section perspective to scale. If not, perhaps this is a wish list item, along with improved alignment tools. I really don't think eyeballing is a good habit, even in Revit.

Best,
Gordon

[cphubb]

Gordon,
We looked into this and the eyeball is the only way. Most programs when they go into perspective mode cannot do anything to scale (Think Dview) and Revit is the same. We were able to get sections with cameras but perspective is turned off and cannot be turned on once aligned to a view. By the very nature perspectives do not have a scale, the actual title for what you are trying to accomplish is a perspective oblique.

[ron.sanpedro]

Gordon,
We looked into this and the eyeball is the only way. Most programs when they go into perspective mode cannot do anything to scale (Think Dview) and Revit is the same. We were able to get sections with cameras but perspective is turned off and cannot be turned on once aligned to a view. By the very nature perspectives do not have a scale, the actual title for what you are trying to accomplish is a perspective oblique.

I guess it seems to me that the "size" of the perspective is arbitrary, so at least with a one point perspective it really shouldn't be that hard to make the cut plane be to scale. I can do it by hand really rather easily.
As for eyeballing, how does one eyeball the size of the perspective on the sheet? I can get really close, but it shows a width of 3 13/16", and I need 3 25/32". When I hit Apply both Apply and OK go grey, and it just sits till I hit cancel. Like it can't handle a change that small. I tried changing the units to 256ths, but that seems not to affect this. Is 16ths as small as you can tweak the size of a perspective?

Thanks,
Gordon

[SCShell]

Hey there,
Although you loose a bit of quality, you may want to export each view to a rastor image (JPG) and then bring them in to paste it all together. At least with JPG images, they size and adjust pretty easily.

Just another thought for discussion.
Good Luck and please post your final solution. As Aaron said, these types of presentations can really look good!
Steve

[truevis]

..Although you loose a bit of quality, you may want to export each view to a rastor image (JPG) and then bring them in to paste it all together. At least with JPG images, they size and adjust pretty easily...

Can use PNG now -- better quality. Trouble with doing that is that the view will be dead.