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3D Home Planning Software?
thorar asks: "I'm willing to move to another flat in town (or to restructure the one I'm currently living in). I'd like to create a detailed map of the apartment to study alternatives without much pencil and paper, possibly with appropriate furniture and 3D rendering. I'm not an expert in Studio Max nor similar softwares. I'd like something as simple as IKEA Kitchen Planner, but all Google serches lead to some software suite that looks unprofessional or Windows95-stylish. What would you use?" There are numerous commercial alternatives for such an application, but is there anything like this available via Open Source?
I went searching for something like this just last week, and didn't really find anything. I ended up going with a tract home where I'm picking from one of 10 different floor plans, but if I had gone custom, it would have been illustrator or nothing...
Radiant.
Widely supported, runs in Windows and Linux, has a huge community behind it, and I'm sure a little digging will turn up plenty of furniture for your lev^B^B^Bhome.
Direct away from face when opening.
Only on slashdot would someone be requesting software to perform a task that any woman would do for free or actually pay you to do. Next on Ask Slashdot: "Can someone recommend an open-source software tool that assists me in selecting shoes?"
GMD
watch this
It's not smooth around the edges, but I'd try Moray. It's a modeling program that can use POV-Ray to render the images. Just create rough shapes in the size of your furniture and drag them around the room. The more time you spend, the better looking and detailed you can make the furniture.
I went for cheap and just downloaded Moray. I plugged in accurate measurements, added a few simple textures, and could imagine the space easily. Traced out in POVRay, the pictures are pretty and cost zippo.
You'll have to find good models for your smaller items, if you want to use models. I didn't use them. There are plenty of models for Pov-Ray, but not a lot for dedicated to Moray. I haven't looked into that side of it much. However, building your basic nighttable/bed/lamp is easy in CSG, just for verifying that your space will fill as you imagine.
Space planning and room "look" was very nice with this, and very quick, since Moray has some crude group tools. Sadly, it doesn't seem to do low-level renderings (non-reflective,etc) and the CSG Evals are still only wireframe (and messy on big pics). Your quickest bet for POV speed is smaller pictures, which are useless.
Export the scene text, plug the camera math into a "clock" POVRay variable and you can spit out a directory of frames, with pretty good quality, overnight on most machines/scenes. There's a cl MPG builder to link them up, allowing for frame pauses and other simple tricks. This gives nice walkthroughs.
It is more labor intensive than the pro tools available, but it costs nothing. You learn a simple modeller, and with POV-Ray you can raytrace shiny things to your heart's content.
You shouldn't really need to be an expert with 3D software to approximate a new layout. Basically most furniture that people have can be approximated by various sized rectangles anyway.
The biggest challenge is going to be that your going to need some pretty close approximations of the sizes of all of the stuff in your house, within the nearest half a foot or so. Depending on how you plan to lay stuff out, you might find that you need something even more accurate. With this in mind, your biggest problem might be just getting accurate approximate measurements of all of the things in your house, and keeping to that scale when you put things into the program.
Famous Last Words: "hmm...wikipedia says it's edible"
I know that a lot of people don't bother to play with their Sims but rather prefer to use the game as a house design tool.
Granted that the grid-based system that The Sims employs for house design means you cannot get an exact scale model of a property. However, you do get a variety of different furniture items with the game and it is possible to design and import your own wallpapers and floor coverings.
I've got a fever and the only prescription is more COBOL.
Yes, but only with Radiant will you ever be able to test the defensibility of your new home design.
Direct away from face when opening.
In about 1998, the "Computer Life" (no longer published, but it was the best PC magazine ever, with everything from the latest screensavers to modding an exercise bike to play doom) magazine ran an article about doing this with the Duke 3D level editor. I don't have the magazine/cd still, or I'd scan in the article and upload the level files, but you mioght find something if you google long enough.
Jordan's Furniture has an online room layout program. In theory it's designed so you lay out a room and then get advice about it from Jordan's, but that didn't prevent me from creating a 2D representation of my entire apartment, sizing furniture to match my own, and dragging things around for hours. Even though it's Web-based, you can save multiple layouts and come back to them months later.
POV-Ray is great for rendering images if you want a nice picture (and have the time to play with textures and lighting). However, POV-Ray is not great for modelling because it only supports its own scripting language natively. I doubt anyone would want to script their house-plans in POV-Ray SDL.
Others have suggested Moray, which is a CAD-like modelling program meant to be used with POV-Ray. It isn't free like POV-Ray is, but it is inexpensive, and well worth the price. Still, even Moray isn't the greatest CAD software, and it only runs in Windows right now (I tried Wine, but I couldn't get it to work).
These are actually quite good for mapping buildings. Quark is quite good. But yeah, I would recommend against using 3ds max. I just spent a day modelling a japanese house for the LessShift project. Such a pain in the arse. Even people who are good at 3ds max probably find it a dog to work with.
How we know is more important than what we know.
"I'd like something as simple as IKEA Kitchen Planner, but all Google serches lead to some software suite that looks unprofessional or Windows95-stylish."
& cid=
r /home.php
You're doing something on a non-professional level, and expect professional level results on the cheap? I don't think its going to happen.
You could use some fancy 3d modeling program, but it sounds like all you really need is pencil and paper:
1. Draw out a floorplan. Its not that hard, just use graph paper. You were going to measure it out anyways (RIGHT?).
2. Make photocopies of the floorplan. These are to come up with layout ideas on.
3. Sketch or take photographs of the area, maybe move some furniture around so you mostly see the walls.
4. Photocopy the sketchs/photos, and draw over them so you can get an idea what it would look like furnished.
Pencil and paper are great tools, you shouldn't be so quick to discount them just because some program exists. They've been around for a long time, so there must be some advantages to using them.
The majority of people who probably use home design software are probably not OSS geeks. I'm willing to bet a lot of them are (gasp!) interior designers, landscapers, and architects. Hell, they just might still use Windows 95.
In any case, here are two possible candidates.
http://www.imsisoft.com/prodinfo.asp?t=1&mcid=244
https://secure.chiefarchitect.com/xcarthd/custome
Not sure if it's still made and it's not free, but I've used 3D Home Architect in the past. It does exactly what you want. DON'T use level editors.
Please, do not laugh, but I do remember that there was an archtecture department in one of the colleges which relied on Doom engine to visualize walk-through the building. Perhaps now in the 21st century Quake is more appropriate (will give you true 3D view, not 2.5D like Doom did).
Paul B.
But there are better options:
Microspot Interiors, etc
Sketchup
VectorWorks 11.5
Form*Z
PowerCADD
VersaCAD
Cadintosh
But there is no current Mac version of AutoCAD, Pro/E, or Microstation. Bad news if you're planning on designing a new aircraft carrier on your new Mac Mini...
Ok, so my mom wanted something like that just a few years back. Turns out that Sierra has a product suite for $30 called Home Architect. You can recreate your entire house easily. I'm a blender adept, but for something look for that thing. It's got fairly comprehensive tutorials, many templates and you can take digital pictures of your furniture and have your existing home in place to later modify and experiment with. Hope this helps. It works on windows XP. I might try it on wine, but since I still have an XP box at home, I just let my mom use that.
---- I am certain of only one thing : I know nothing else.
Punch! Pro and BH&G Home Designer are each $100 or less, and even those are probably overkill for what you need for redesigning an apartment, but either would get the job done. I settled on BH&G Home Designer (the Pro version, about $500, because it had features I needed for the design approval and permit process). Both have some annoying aspects, but are pretty easy to use to lay out a house or other building. Punch! Pro is probably the easier to use of the two, but BH&G Designer is more powerful, and produces nicer-looking overall results and particularly nicer-looking 3D renderings. The 3D renderings part was important for me not for the design and permit process, but because my wife has a harder time visualizing things in 3D, and the renderings I could create with BH&G Home Designer let me easily show her what different design changes would mean.
One definite advantage that Punch! Pro has is that it lets you design your own 3D objects, which is nice for rendering a particular fixture or piece of furniture that's not included in the library. Making your own objects is definitely harder than just drawing a house, though. And that's where a fair number of the quirks in Punch! Pro reside -- the 3D custom workshop where you create your own objects.
All that said, I'd be interested in hearing about any open source alternatives as the follow-on question by Cliff asks. I've learned enough in the process of designing my own addition (and rendering the current house) that I'd be interested in contributing to an open source program of this nature, too.
I've used an earlier version of this to do office and house layouts. There is a 30 day demo version available.
I'm an architect and my best tool is trace paper and a pencil.
We have a full blown suites of AutoDesk software, but in early design phases you want to explore ideas so quickly that no software is going to react as quickly as sketches suggesting what your brain is thinking. That's the trick. Depicting reality before you've considered the possibilities locks you in, it restricts what your mind can consider. Once you're confident of having tested all kinds of crazy approaches, then you can start trying to depict it. Using light scribbles still keeps it fuzzy and flexible enough until you've worked out the next level of design.
What then? If you want to waste a lot of time learning software, by all means use CAD. That can help you build a scale and measurable model that can be dimensioned and taken off for construction quantities. I've been using CAD for 16 years now and it is certainly my tool of choice for drafting. (As opposed to the old ink on bond/vellum/mylar.)
After that, you might want to use some sort of visualization software. I've used Max and Vis, but have been learning to use Blender lately and find it can do just as well. (Plus it's Free! And multi-platform.)
But you are going to spend weeks and months coming up to speed on software when you could much more easily draw some scaled drawings that will do just as well. Remember, it's only been the last twenty years that *any* building has been digitally rendered... there is quite a bit of architecture accomplished without it.
I learned in school that you can't draft what your mind hasn't yet conceived. Drawing is a tool to help you see, to explore something that doesn't exist yet and to consider it's properties on your own terms. Of course it might be fun to make a huge solid block in Blender and slowly carve it away into a room. But it's certainly not the easiest!
Hope that helps.
There is no need to use a SlashDot sig for SEO...
. . . a reason not to use software?
Surely the decision to make one-time use of free software for performing a quantitative task in a non-professional environment ought to be made based on something other than whether it comes with super-nifty 3D shadowed buttons in your favorite candy-apple color.
I say, give those windows95ish program a try, and don't ask for alternatives until you've found them lacking in function rather than style.
Besides, just think of all the fun you can have with those extra cpu cycles that won't be wasted drawing pretty pictures around the border of your software.
Which morons modded the parent down? Repent! Or get married, and learn what women are really all about. (-:
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
I'd do it, but I'm not a coder. :(
"No, no, no. Don't tug on that. You never know what it might be attached to."
http://www.cycas.de/
The free limited Linux version is all I have ever needed up till now. I am about to design a hous for my family so we will see how it goes.
realkiwi
A few years back I tried all the different specialized applications and even experimented with CAD software.
;)
In the end I used models build using Lego. Accurate upto 5cm in my models, which was good enough.
My parents are now using cut-out paper models to plan the furniture rearrangements of their new home. Use sticky notes for the furniture if you want to keep your designs
Unless you want perfect lighting/coloring preview and are willing to put in the huge effort, I'd just go with models you can drag around with your own hands; it's a LOT faster and more flexible to experiment with.
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I once had to re-arrange furniture in a *very* small studio apartment that was shaped more like a long rectangle. I had the space divided with a closet so that one part was TV/soho, and the other was bed area.
;)
I used MS VISIO.
When planning for it what I've done is to setup a detailed (to the mm) floor plant and mark all electricity points, doors, windows, etc.
Next, I would draw a top view of all the furniture pieces, again, detailed to the milimiter.
Then, it was just a matter of dragging/rotating them around in the canvas to play with different setups. Sure it was not as prety as a 3D rendering, but it was very accurate and gave me good insight before I started moving the actual pieces in real world.
just my 0.02
I'll remove the Karma Bonus on this posting so as to keep it off the main thread but I'm curious as to the rating of the above message. Somebody criticizes spelling and isn't moderated as flamebait. I call them on it and it's flamebait.
Odd.
I don't really care about my Karma - it'll be what it wants to be ( good ) but I do get peeved over idiots moderating. (Hmm, it'd be nice to have a reply to anonymous moderators function so I could grumble to them instead of on the main thread).
There's a gorilla from Manilla whose a fella that stinks of vanilla and has salmonella.
If you want to split hairs, there's no such word as Lego either. "Lego" is as much made up as "Legos." Just because some trademark attorney would like us to believe it doesn't make it so.
I can remember reading this piece of bogus corporate PR on a Lego brochure when I was a kid. Something to the effect of: "Parents, when referring to Lego-brand construction blocks, please make sure your children say 'Mother, I would like ever so much to play with my Lego-brand construction blocks, please'".
I knew it was a load of BS then just as it is now.
Legos. Legos. Legos.
As for your lego rant, I've been playing with Lego bricks since I was a little kid, and the colloquial use has always been "Legos". I still have a pile of them, and I still call them Legos. Saying "Lego Bricks" is too cumbersome, and saying "Playing with Lego" makes me feel like I should pronounce the TM. I clearly am not as worried as you are about trademarks.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I have not actually used this, but I saw it recommended somewhere http://www.roomarranger.com/ It is shareware now, but the older version is freeware.
For a super-cheap, excellent modeller, try SketchUp. Cheap to buy, and a 14 day free demo.
We use this tool to concept for our MMORPG (it exports) that is in development, it is incredibly powerful, superfast and so simple, my mother could use it.
In the SketchUp in Action section, they have a couple of vids that you might want to check out.
If you are looking for more interior design options, make sure you pull the "components" stuff from thier download section.
Good Luck
P.
There is a downloadable demo of 3D Home Architect available online (I'd link to it, but it seems to be slow right now. Just Google for it). I wasn't very impressed with it though.
I don't know if there is a demo of the B&G product, but their web page is here.
"Legos" is only colloquial use in the US, i.e. it's not used at all in the rest of the English speaking world. The same as with "nucular" (and we know what we think of people who say "nucular" don't we?).
On more serious matters, you're spot on about having to have quite a lot of bricks. Especially if you're designing a large house, ha ha. For simplicity's sake (and to avoid the need for lots of expensive nonstandard pieces) its best to build to a scale where a standard 4x2 lego brick equates to a standard housebrick. That way you can easily substitute the cheaper knock-offs which can be bought by the bucket load from Toys R Us. If the purpose is just to be able to visualize the 3D layout, you don't need to worry too much about putting in door and window frames etc. You're not trying to win any prizes; plain holes will do.