Slashdot Mirror
Architecture / Home Design Software?
shroudedmoon asks: "I'm looking for a solution to create a printable floor plan (line drawing) and 3D walkthrough of a house that I'm preparing to build. I've got a rough design on paper that I want to tweak on the screen, and then show to my architect/father so that he can create the finished and buildable blueprints. I've know there are consumer packages out there like 3D Home Architect from Broderbund, but I've heard that the graphics and navigation are less than spectacular. I also recall a Slashdot article, a couple of years ago, about the possibility of using the editor of one of the 3D shooters (Doom, maybe?) as an architectural tool, but I can't seem to locate it. Just curious if anyone out there has had any experience with anything similar, or which of the current 3D Shooters might have the best editor for something like this."
I use q3radiant for all my 3-D designs. Scale: 1 unit = 1 inch for large items (house, shed), 1 unit = 1/8 inch for furniture. I've got scans of various woods, plus scans for the colors we use (paint, carpet) and a photo of our fireplace for the house model. I even have a perl script to produce a "cut list" for certain types of furniture projects.
The problem lies in trying to control things in 3D from a 2D view. The only great GUI for that is the first-person shooter... You're gonig to have user-interface difficulties no matter what program you use.
Repeal the DMCA!
It's a bitmap to quake map converter. I've never tried it, but it appears to use different colors to distinguish between different floor and ceiling heights. Click here for the webpage.
there is a tribes 2 mod called construction where you can build stuff. its pretty easy to build complex buildings, although i dont know how easy it would be to turn the buildings you make in game into a blueprint.
> consumer packages out there like 3D Home Architect
> from Broderbund, [...] I've heard that the graphics
> and navigation are less than spectacular
True, especially for older versions. Newer ones are quite good, though. Still, for a quick-n-dirty layout you could do worse than spend $10 on 3D Home Architect Deluxe 3.0 at Wal-Mart. It takes a lot of the drudgery of drawing walls and structures out of using a package like AutoCAD, where making radical design changes can be pretty expensive (time-wise). Plus it can export to DXF, if you want to keep working with a more "serious" tool (I just tried it, and my house plan loads fine in AutoCAD 2004, and all the object entities were preserved). It's got a definite Windows 3.1 interface, but for $10 it does quite a lot. I'm completely renovating an 1890s house and am using it for laying out new floorplans and playing what-if, and it works just fine.
I've tried Broderbund's 3D Home Architect, and I've found that the design is horrible. I tried making a simple floorplan for an apartment so I could see how/where furniture can fit in, and it was such a headache. The obvious thing a user would do is to draw the lenghts of the walls they measured, and then plug in the furniture. But when I did that, I found I was coming up a few inches short, even though I knew certain things would fit. That's because the damn software would draw the walls with the space between the exterior and exterior wall! WTF?!? There wasn't even an option I could use to turn it off. It was impossible (maybe a feature that wasn't documented in the help file) to draw a simple plan with dimensions that one measured to get a feel for a place.
So in response to your question, I have no idea, but I agree with you in that 3DHA is a nightmare to use.
Lest you might have to constantly fight strangers dressed in karate outfits only to walk into the bedroom and get kicked in the head by your girlfriend.
I previously used this editor Valve Hammer Editor 3.4.exe for Half life map making, but it works for Quake and other bsp using games. It has what they call 'furniture' items, which are libraries of pre-built meshes. These may be useful to you or may not (many are lab items for half life ect..). Anyway, this is a nice editor and of course any FPS is nice for previewing the house.
Here's a halflife and other fps tools page url: http://www.valve-erc.com/content/?page=utilities, which you are sure to find useful
puts ("Python r0cks\n");
You asked about FPS but I have recently started using Punch Software's applications and like them. One interesting bonus is the ability to print out sections to make a cardboard house so while its not an FPS you could simulate one with some old actionfigures :) Seriously though its great software and comes with a 90 day no questions asked 100% refund policy. Now thats great! I often wonder how many people just use it then return it? Well its a keeper for me.
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You're prepared to spend large sums of money making a building. You'll be stuck with this building for some time. Hire an architect. An architect will have experience and expertise in areas that you won't. Even if the basic design is yours, the mundane things that can ruin your life can still be handled by a professional.
I think it's interesting that because everybody has everyday experience with buildings, they assume that a high degree of expertise is not needed to design one. There's a reason that states require architects to have a license.
While you may be of the opinion that an architect is too expensive, it is my opinion that if you can afford to build it, you can afford to hire an architect. Cost is just one of many parameters that they work with. Also, consider that in most states, if you don't have your drawings stamped, you are liable for any injury caused by failure of your building for the rest of it's life.
I can't sing great praises of it, but I found Cycas to be very capable and it runs well on Linux. I was able to use it for very accurate floor plans prior to moving into my house. I traded emails with a guy that designed (and apparently built from) a new kitchen with it and was planning his dream home with it.
However, expect a certain level of frustration learning any advanced draw program.
It uses POVRay to render and is partially free beer.
http://www.cycas.de/
I tried several, including one from DataBecker and one from Punch. I liked 3DHA the best.
Pros:
* Very consistent behavior. I can get floorplans that exactly match my measurements. The others were a bit too wizardy, and they would mess up my plans.
* Doesn't require too much studying or screwing around to figure out the interface.
Cons:
* Rendering is not that great, and the walk-throughs are a bit strange. I wish it worked like Quake, but oh well...
Well first thing I should say is that I used to work for ViewBuild. That said, ViewBuild is an ass-kicking piece of software for whipping up designs fast.
It doesn't do the floor plans - yet. Since it's very plug-in friendly (everything down to the "Quit" menu option is a plugin - though they're packaged away), I'm sure the guys are working on it. Since this is Slashdot, many of you may be keen to know that it uses Python as a scripting language.
The main focus of ViewBuild is getting a design up as quickly as possible, and be walking around it and editing it as fast as your machine can push it. Some of the stuff people have been building in it is just incredible. It's a lot faster than traditional CAD packages. The difference is that it isn't focused on accuracy. It's more like a drawing package where you're more concerned about how it looks than if two sections are lined up at 60 degrees and are 6.225 feet long.
It has a few geek-cool features as well, though I don't know what made it into the final package. Multiuser mode was really cool. We had a whole group of people wandering around editing the same building.
Python scripting rocked. You could build a plug-in in no time.
It really pushed the graphics hardware. We used OpenGL, and made things really fast.
So, my (probably biased) vote goes to ViewBuild.
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GtkRadiant is the latest version of the Quake3 level editor. Other games are supported of course.
- Latest version can be downloaded here
- Or by using the download selector
- The list of supported games
Disclaimer: I'm an intern architect currently taking my architectural registration exams.
There's two reasons not to use software to represent your designs. First, it's much slower. Unless you're a professional, you can't possibly draw contract document quality drawings with software at the same speed that you could with a pen and a good parallel bar. Even as a professional, drawing with CAD is about the same speed as by hand. The real advantage is working collaboratively (file reference sharing) and making modifications once everything already exists.
But the better reason for not drawing with some software package is that they don't design. A floor plan is just a fraction of the total picture! Just because you put lines on a page doesn't mean it can be built. There are countless details even in simple residential construction that can cost you *serious* dollars if you instruct a contractor to build something one way and in process it's discovered that some adjustments will be necessary. (Best example: Sydney Opera House. It was 700% over budget, because it required computer calculations even to design, during the 60's, and was re-worked three entire times before being completed, something like 10 years off schedule. Yet it stands today as the most significant architectural icon of the entire continent, despite remaining a miserable place for opera. :)
Rather, you should draw by hand. Having to make the marks yourself will force to you ask a lot of questions. These are questions that you need answered, questions that no CAD software can answer. An experienced architect can draw an accurate floor plan in just an hour. I've seen interns take more than a week to resolve a bathroom. It's a matter of what you know, not the manual act of drafting. Using a software to draw glosses over many of the questions you need to have a handle on prior to signing any contracts.
Trust me, I work on incredibly expensive laboratory buildings every day for a very large international firm and I know that there does not yet exist software to construct something in 3D that can be accurately sliced into construction details for bid or construction. (I've got AutoDesk's AutoCAD, Viz and Studio on my machine at work.) There are numerous vendors who, through smoke and mirrors, will attempt to peddle their products at such, even at the high end. But I've found none that can stand up to the prodding of an experienced architect in less than five minutes. Maybe some day, but not today. And certainly not for an amateur.
Which leads me to my final point: software will *never* be able to design in the highest sense of the word (at least not until AI is beyond human capability). Design is more than scientific, it is creative. There is no mathematically correct layout for the most efficient space, much less the most beautiful. Add in user personality, material efficiencies, fire protection, accessibility, re-sale value and durability and the whole thing becomes this big balancing act, best handled by an experienced architect. There's a reason architects do 5 years of school, 4-5 year internships and take a 9-part exam here in the US before even becoming licensed. And like a brain surgeon, you probably don't want to hire an architect whose still wet behind the ears.
I love using the Sydney Opera house as an example of great architecture because it fails in every way imaginable for what we expect in a building, except one: beauty. Despite all its failings, it is the best investment Australia ever made because of the incredible richness that it expresses.
Design with your mind and use a pencil. Draft it with a computer only after the design is finished.
There is no need to use a SlashDot sig for SEO...
I've used Worldcraft in the past, which is the editor that came with the first versions of HalfLife. I did model my house (which wasn't build yet) in it, and included several nice 'breakable' things like windows, openening doors, and even breakable walls. Being able to copy stuff, I actually modelled the entire block (4 houses) with simple gardens and stuff. After showing it to my girlfriend how our house was going to look like, I shot it to pieces with my shotgun. And yes, she still lives with me :-)
Did make a nice multiplayer level too.
I found rampage the perect package to model any contruction work.
Karma: Bad due to google bombing - Robert Watkins woz 'ere.
He's already used pencil and paper. He now wants to tart it up to impress his Dad.
It's going to take a long time for him to animate a 3D walk through with a pencil.
Karma: Bad due to google bombing - Robert Watkins woz 'ere.
... you can create the 3D model in AutoCAD, and install a package called Accurender which gives very good results in a relatively short time.
I build houses for a living (just found a programing job, so that will change in two weeks). We have a real problem with houses for enginners. Most want to build a thousand year house, but don't care to learn what makes a house work. They end up specifying the strongest materials, without knowing that those materials are strong, but cause the house to rot out, and their "thousand year house" ends up unsafe less than 10 years.
Mind you, climate has a lot to do with it. Build in a desert and I don't think you will have this problem. We in the industry have no confidence in the ability of any house that meets code (without bribing inspecters...) to not rot out. At best a few will be around for 100 years, but we fully expect that most will not, despite looking for materials that wick water away.
Last advice: Make several acceptable drawings, and once you think you like a few, see if there is a print out there already that is close enough. Many home drawn prints are great in most ways, but end up shoving a lot of problems in an extra large, oddly shaped closet because things don't fit togather the way they want them to. Of course if you can't find any print you like, the architech will design that wierd close for you...
Instead of doing everything from scratch, why don't you see if you can find a house that is similar to what you want at a site like this.
Or, go to Home Depot or Lowes and finger through a "450 Two Story House Plans" or similar book. If it has something you like, then buy the book (they usually cost less than $15).
If you buy a set of blueprints, you can then to takeoffs pretty easily.
The downside is that the plans will cost you $500 - $600 for a single copy, which, in the scheme of building a new house, is not that much.
- Tony
In my case, I have given up on the outside of the house. As for inside, it has been very usefull to be able to 'walk-through' the design. I like the fact that I can put plants in the yard and when I do the walk-through, I can see what it will look like through the windows! The software definitely needs some work, but it is worth the money just to be able to get a preview of what the inside will look like!
Why not blend the two. Its not a exculsive situation.
Draw using a pen and paper, then once you are done scan it in. Import it into a serious design tool. My friend does this with SGI tools. Check out how Nike designs its shoes.
Thats the problem with architects, they are creative but only in one way. Programmers are this way too, but they don't disillusion themselves by thinking there isn't a better way of doing things. When I was in architecture school they would be blown away by Doom quality graphics in walk-throughs when at home I had Quake3 stuff going on.
>Which leads me to my final point: software will *never* be able to design in the highest sense of the word
This is pretty stupid. Given enough resources and time, computers will. Just because you can't see it doesn't mean that its an impossiblity.
Fire codes are codified.
Material properties are known
Accessibility concerns are designed horribly now.
This doesn't sound like human architects are that sucessful at it right now.
>and the whole thing becomes this big balancing act, best handled by an experienced architect.
There are huge number of buildings which are damned ugly, have to go through multiple revisions just to meet local fire code (my sister works as a city plan insepectors, she has the worst time with architects) and routinely go over budget. Is that the best experienced architects can do?
>There's a reason architects do 5 years of school, 4-5 year internships and take a 9-part exam here in the US before even becoming licensed.
Is there really? Most architects don't become good until they are late in their careers, how much does schooling/testing help? Before they didn't even need formal schooling, just internship. And if they are so good, why does a civil eng. need to certify plans?
>Sydney Opera house as an example of great architecture because it fails in every way imaginable for what we expect in a building, except one: beauty
So if its late, overbudget, doesn't do what it needs to (horrible acoustics from what I know) but as long as it looks pretty, its good architecture? Architects need to address real world concerns. Being pretty isn't the end all.
The surprise isn't how often we make bad choices; the surprise is how seldom they defeat us.
FWIW....My father used the Super Home Suite from Punch Software when he was having his house built. I don't have firsthand knowledge of this software, but he seemed to think it was quite capable (and his house is still standing!).
However, I do know that he also tried "3D Home Architect" from Broderbund and liked the Punch suite much better.
Don't worry about a "spectacular" graphical rendering. I assume that you want to make a 3D model so you can get a feel for what it'll feel like to be in the finished building. Great, I'm with you there. I do the same thing.
BUT... Really, all you need is a renderer that does basic shading. You don't need textures of any sort, to say nothing of of a gazillion-polygon-per-second engine with NURBS support and bump-mapping. Remember, this is a 3D rough sketch.
Pretty much any consumer-grade 3D home design program will work for you. I've been using an ancient copy of "Total Home 3D" for a few years now. It's klunky and has a few very non-intuitive "quirks", but on the whole it works and generates usable walkthroughs. It's easy enough to get a visual feel of the space you've laid out, and to populate it with standard appliances, cabinets, furniture, etc.
Stay away from the FPS engines, unless you want to use your home design as a deathmatch arena afterwards. (Which would be way cool, of course!)
Chelloveck
I give up on debugging. From now on, SIGSEGV is a feature.
I used 3D Home Architect about 4 years ago to redesign the floor plan to our new house. It's not the greatest program out there, but I was actually delighted that I was able to accomplish my goal in a short amount of time.
The nice thing about it is that the whole program is centered around house design, so it makes many tasks easier than if you used a more generalized, expert tool like AutoCAD.
The one thing I remember having trouble with is getting wall segments to line up just right to account for the thickness of the lumber being used. It just meant you had to double check all your dimensions and tweak things occasionally.
The real kicker for me was that I went through all the trouble of doing this work and then the builder turned around and charged us $1000 for the design changes. All they had to do was transcribe my work into their drafting software. He should have paid me!
Good luck!
"No matter where you go, there you are." -- Buckaroo Banzai
You might consider using straight OpenGL to do it. Just keep track of your position and angle of sight with variables, and render your scene. I've designed buildings like that before. It is very similar to a 1st person shooter, but without the rocket launchers. (it would be cool to frag your house though).
Another very good option, used by a lot of architects, is ray tracing. You don't get live animations, but the still images are excellent - photo quality if you are good. There is a really good open source ray tracer called Pov-ray. I use it all the time. I've also used it to design a room.
Slashdot Syndrome: the sudden, extreme urge to correct someone in order to validate one's self.
For my money I would use Rhinocerous 3-D (Rhino).
This very capable 3-D program can do just about anything you want with surfaces. It's Solid modeling capabilities are little limited, but for a house that certainly doesn't matter.
It is far less expensive than the other true 3-D programs out there, and while more expensive than a simple home design program, it is sooooo much more capable. The renderings come out beautifully, and if you have any experience with Autocad, it is really easy to pick up, especially if you stick to simple shapes like flat surfaces or simple curves. We use it for designing pleasure yachts, so you can imagine the capabilities.
Back about 3 years ago, I was in a situation - Buy a new house, or add on to the one I was living in
Started with a few quick pencil drawings, and that SEEMED to work.
I then went out and did 2 things
1)Bought a copy of "Floorplan", which I liked, and used it to model the existing house as best as I could
2)Payed an architect for a consult on zoning rules for my house
I then spent a few weeks desiging an idea that I liked - Nope, not down the the exact inch, but close - doing walk throughs, deciding on general things like window locations (Modeled the sunlight angles) and the like
THEN I went back to the architect and said "Here is the idea of what I want - yeah, it can be tweaked/changed - but this is the FEEL"
It comes down to this - some of us draw better on a computer, and are really comfortable with CAD
Of course, 3 weeks after the second stage with the architect, we found a new house - the joke is that the extention on the NEW house was almost exactly what I modeled on the old house. Paid the architect for work done till that point, and considered money well spent. It was only a few hundred at that point, as we hand not gotten serious
-- 73 de KG2V For the Children - RKBA! "You are what you do when it counts" - the Masso
I've been stuck in the architecture and engineering field for over 10 years. The way that the professionsals do it is using either AutoCAD or Microstation. With both you can take a hand sketched drawing, scan it, trace over it with your vector tools and then extrude the floors and stack them right on top of each other (I think that would be the easist way to a begninner to start using it at least).
You'll of course need to add things like door headers and porch roofs and windows and the like, but most of these products come prepackaged with 3D examples in ANSI sizes for you to play around with.
Of course it takes forever to do. Expect to spend an hour or so tracing each 2000 sq ft - and the curve for the 3D stuff is pretty steep.
The advantage of it though is being able to draw in real size, apply materials and textures to surfaces and render ray-traced walkthoughs. Oh and you can take the CAD file to a 3D printer if that floats your boat (it floats mine). Most importantly, when you actually take it to a real Architect to polish the design he can use your CAD documents saving you time, and it might save you some money too. Maybe enough to cover the $2000 cost of the software, but I wouldn't say that for sure, student pricing is pretty darn good though.
My wife and I are both in the field and we use it every time we move. Measure up the walls, draw it up and presto, instant furniture arrangement. Sure beats carrying that sofa while she decides where it goes...
Oh yeah, make sure it's AutoCAD 200x, the LT series doesn't do 3D. AutoCAD is faster for expert users (custom macros, keyboard command entry) and I think has a better 3D library, but Microstation has a better GUI and rendering options. Enjoy.
softplan
No joke! Really!
... I didn't have any 'architectural' software available (spur-of-the-moment, y'know), but had purchased 'Lego Creator' for my young son not much earlier.
;-)
I was suddenly struck by an urge to model what my kitchen would look like if I tore out the pantry between the kitchen and my living room
It actually didn't work out half-bad - walkthroughs, animated characters... great stuff
At US$5 a pop on Amazon, it's worth a shot...
Lego Creator - and don't blame me if you forget about your design project, and just start playing it...
Have fun!
OldFart 8-)
A fun alternative would be to use The Sims. It can't do anything that is structurally complex, but you will be able to try out furnature layouts, carpeting, and wallpaper.
i can't believe nobody here has mentioned Sketchup. it's incredible. it's like using Adobe Illustrator but then you can rotate your drawing in 3D and add surfaces on the other side. and you can export your work as PDF, DXF/DWG, 3DS, and bitmap images. it's amazing. check out the gallery at www.sketch3d.com and download the demo (works for 8 non-continuous hours and is very easy to learn).
I used Punch! Pro to re-design my kitchen and living room.
I took initial measurements and drew up the original, placing furniture, etc... When I finished, I had something that was fairly close to reality and the walkthrough felt right.
I then proceeded to knock out walls and move things around to get my new design. I set up the walk-through and showed the new design to my wife an contractor. The contractor had a few additional ideas and we made some mods.
3-months and many $$$ later, we ended up with something that looked much like the design, and I can say that I was happy with the end result and how close I was in predicting the "feel" of the new environment.
My wife is thrilled with the results, as are the kids and the contractor (who wasn't computer savvy, but really impressed with what a computer geek could pull off in a few hours).
More recently, I took the same package to help my son come up with a new color scheme for his room. (moving into the teen-age years, the rainbows and clouds wallpaper was killing him)
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Ruby Sleeps
But i am biased because It is my company but also because i hate all the software out there that provides a stupid 2D cad interface.....this is the Noughties right? That is such a clunky way of doing things. Our viewbuild software has had over 6 years of refinement, tweaking and use so i'm not making the stuff up - We can build anything from a doghouse to multiple city blocks and be walking around it adding landscape or interiors quicker than it takes to read the license file on some of these CAD packages. Oh the other thing,,, it's cheap ! ViewBuild works in REAL TIME 3D not this ridiculous Floorplan mode with an uncontrollable view. Scans, Digital Camera images, DXF, 3DS files may all be loaded in.....And the faster your 3D card....the faster ViewBuild runs. And some of the plug-ins coming will rock your socks....."X" trees, Sprite trees (you know the ones that follow the camera and look stupid from top down/side on) They are about to be eliminated by the addtion of beautiful leafy trees that sway with the breeze....mmmmmm. House building/ design is not only about the walls and windows it is about being there and getting a sense of the space.
A shrubbery