In this video, we'll discuss cross section and elevation views,
how to create them, edit them and save them for future use.
We'll start by taking a look at the elevation cameras in general.
Then we'll look in particular at cross-section and back clipped cross-section
views. And finally,
we'll look at wall elevation tools and some of the options that we have for
editing elevation cameras and saving them in our project browser.
We'll start in this plan by taking a look at our elevation camera options.
In Chief Architect,
elevations are a type of camera view that we can create automatically from the
plan that we've already built.
We can find our elevation cameras by going to the 3d menu.
Then down to create orthographic view,
where we can find our three elevation options.
You can also find them in your architectural toolbar here.
When I select that tool, we'll see the child tools over here on the side.
The first option we're going to look at is the cross section elevation camera.
This is the one that we'll typically use for exterior elevations,
as it looks at the entire home.
And it looks at everything in front of the camera, as far as it can see.
So if we had a structure in the back of the home, it would see that as well.
So to create a cross section view,
we'll select the tool and then click and drag in the
direction we'd like to look. So in this case,
we're going to look at the front of the home.
This elevation view is still a live view of the model.
So if I move a window or delete a roof plane,
I've altered those objects in the plan as a whole, not simply in this view.
To go back to my floor plan view,
I can either select this tab here or I can exit out of the elevation view.
Right now, I had not saved that view. So when I exited out,
I would need to use the elevation camera again,
to get back into a front elevation view.
I'll show you a couple of different ways that you can save your camera views
here in a minute,
I can also generate all of my exterior elevation cameras with a single click.
If I go to 3d create auto elevations
and then down to all elevations,
it will place all four cameras with a single click.
It will also automatically name the cameras and save them in my project browser.
Project browser is over here. If it's not already open for you,
you can find it by going to view, project browser.
The project browser allows you to see a snapshot of all of your views of the
home, including any saved cross-section elevation views.
So if I expand this out, you can see the four views that were created, the back,
front, left, and right elevation.
And if you select one of these cross sections,
you can see a preview of the view down in this preview pane.
So while it's helpful to make sure that each of your views are named correctly,
so it's easy to find and locate them.
You also can double check what the view is simply by selecting on it,
to see a preview. So now let's work with the second type of elevation camera,
the back clipped cross-section view.
So this camera will take a slice of the home starting with where you initially
draw the camera and stopping the view where you release the mouse.
So if I want to take a sliver showing the stairs and then zoom in a little bit,
using my mouse with the scroll wheel,
I can click to start and then release the
camera. I'm just clicking and dragging. I'm going to release my mouse,
where I would like to stop that clip. So as you can see,
it doesn't show the wall behind the stairs and then even cuts out parts of our
cabinets and fixtures,
because we're only taking a small slice of the home.
If we look back at the plan,
you can see that our back clipped cross-section has a start and an end point.
So that's the sliver of the home that we're looking at in this elevation view.
And if we look at that camera, you can actually move this back and forth,
depending upon how far or where into the home you would like that view to go.
And when you go back to the elevation it will update the view,
depending upon where you've drawn that back clipped section. And,
if you want to, you can turn off the layer for cabinets, furniture,
and fixtures, so they don't show up in this view. But,
if we look at our current layer sets,
we can find our layers right here in this display options.
It's going to show me that we are using our section view set.
And currently in this plan,
every elevation view that I create is set to use this exact same layer set.
So, if I go down and find, for instance, my furniture
and turn off this layer,
I'm going to be turning off the interior furniture layer for all of my section
views. And I actually would like to see it in a view later.
So it might be a good idea to create several different layer sets for your
section views, some with and without furniture with, or without framing,
for instance, and we cover creating and managing layer sets and another video.
We have several options to edit the elevation camera.
So to edit the active of camera under tools,
I can go to active view and then edit active view.
You also can find this option right here in my architectural toolbar.
So first of all, I can give this cross-section a name.
So I'm going to call it the stairs section. And then as soon as I renamed it,
it automatically checked this option to save it. But if it hadn't,
I can select this check box to make sure that my camera is saved.
I have some options here to change the rendering technique or to change the
color, add a watermark or shadows, depending upon the elevation view,
shadows can be a great way to show some depth in these elevation
views. And then down here, I have some clipping options.
So because we used a back clipped cross section camera automatically,
this check box for back clipped is selected.
So I can change a cross section elevation to a back clipped cross section or
vice versa by selecting or deselecting this box.
And then once I have selected then,
I can choose how far after the camera starts do I want to clip
the back.
We can also clip the sides of the view by selecting this box and we can
clip the top and bottom of the view by selecting this box.
And finally, there's an option to clip to room,
but we're going to take a look at that one closer when we do a wall elevation
here in a bit. So I'm going to select,
OK to clip the sides and the top and bottom,
and that's going to create a clipping polyline.
So if I select this polyline you can see, I have edit handles.
This is going to function just like any other polyline within the program.
So if I want to change where this is clipping to,
I can increase or decrease the size of this,
how far we're clipping on either the sides or the top and bottom.
So in this instance,
I'm going to flip down to show just the relevant parts for our staircase.
So I'm going to clip to the sides for this area.
Then once I've done that,
I'm going to go ahead and exit out of this stair section.
And because we saved that camera,
it's saved here in the project browser under stair section, like we named it.
So finally, let's take a look at our third elevation tool,
the wall elevation camera,
and we're going to create two different wall elevations.
So first I'm going to select this wall.
I'm going to go ahead and click and drag toward that wall.
So notice how I have a vaulted ceiling in this room,
and it automatically extends the camera view to show the full vaulted wall up
to the ceiling platform. If needed, I can edit the camera and clip it down.
So then I open up my edit active view again,
and we have an option to ignore walls above.
So if I don't want to see that vault,
this would be the option that I would check.
So I'm going to cancel out of here and this time to save my camera right next to
the edit active view, there's an option to save active view.
So I'm going to select to save that it's going to add that elevation to my
project browser.
And then I'm just going to click on this view a couple of times until it opens
up the ability to rename it.
So I'm going to call this my book case wall,
just so it has a unique name and I know how to find it again.
Then once I've done that, I'll exit out of that view.
And we're going to take a look at just one more wall.
So I'm going to take a look at the shower wall within my primary bathroom.
Again, I'll click and drag towards the shower wall.
And it only shows me one section of the wall because there are walls
dividing the shower from the remainder of the bathroom.
So if I want to extend this camera further, I'm going to, once again,
select the edit active view, and I'm going to,
de-select the option marked clip to room.
Select OK,
and what that's going to do is generate again a clipping polyline.
So I can extend out this view.
And what I would like to see is I want to go all the way into the
toilet room.
So I'll be able to see this full bathroom wall.
And maybe I even want to extend out to show, the wall on either side.
Maybe we clip inside or outside, depending upon how we want that to look.
So we have a lot of options.
We can even go up and down by having this clipping polyline.
We have the ability to really extend where that's going to show and how
much detail we see within this view. So as you can see, Chief Architect's,
elevation cameras allow you to easily create and modify elevation views that you
can save in your library to use later in your final construction documents.
And because they are all live models of the home.
If you make any changes to the home, the views will update as well.