CarrieS

I'm not entirely certain what you're asking, but if the question is "how to control the material under the cantilevered area?" You can control what material displays on the underside by opening the Room Specification for the upper floor room and going to the Materials panel. 

An easier way to do this in Home Designer Pro would be to:

1. Turn on the Origin Indicator for plan views (Preferences> Coordinate System)

2. Use the Edit Area All Floors tool to group select everything (Edit> Edit Area> Edit Area (All Floors))

3. Use the Point to Point Move tool to pick a point in your selection to move to the Origin. 

This article outlines the part about Edit Area:
https://www.homedesignersoftware.com/support/article/KB-03124/troubleshooting-origin-error-messages.html

This article was created for Chief Architect but we have the Point to Point Move tool in Home Designer Pro.
https://www.chiefarchitect.com/support/article/KB-00734/using-the-point-to-point-move-tool.html

You'll still want to inspect your plan for anomalies since there are a lot of interactions between structural elements, but you shouldn't have many with this process.  

Carrie

Retaining walls typically slope with the terrain around them. This article's main image shows an example of this:

https://www.homedesignersoftware.com/support/article/KB-00990/creating-a-retaining-wall.html

If you need to make the wall slope differently than the terrain, you could use the wall polyline to change the shape of the retaining wall if you have Home Designer Pro, like we show in this article:
https://www.homedesignersoftware.com/support/article/KB-01809/creating-a-stepped-foundation.html

Carrie

Hi, 

That definitely seems like odd behavior. If you could send the plan with the problem into our Technical Support Center, we'd love to take a closer look for you. 

https://www.homedesignersoftware.com/support/article/KB-00717/using-the-technical-support-center.html

Carrie

We have updated Home Designer 2025 to resolve this without downloading the certificate manually.

If you have a Home Designer 2025 product and updating to the latest version doesn't resolve it for you please give Technical Support a call.

Thanks!

Hi Andrew,

It looks like you need to lower the elevation of your garage using the Floor and Ceiling Heights of the Garage. You'll need to do this for both the 0 level and the 1st level.

This article has the process:

https://www.homedesignersoftware.com/support/article/KB-00564/displaying-detached-buildings-at-different-elevations.html

Hope this helps!

Carrie

VR is very subject to the hardware you have and the scenes you're displaying. You have to keep in mind that we're rendering the scene multiple times, one for each eye and on screen. Camera views can be hefty by themselves let alone 3 times (or 4 if you're showing both eyes on screen).

You can sometimes increase performance by simplifying the scene like turning off shadows, reflections, and bloom, as well as Ambient Occlusion. Ambient Occlusion particularly can be a hog on resources.

All of these settings can be found in the Camera Specification.

The Rendering Technique used can also affect performance. Physically Based is a lot heftier than Standard.

This article has some additional considerations you might review: https://www.homedesignersoftware.com/support/article/KB-03092/virtual-reality-and-chief-architect-products.html

There is an "Update Lighting on Teleport" setting in the VR dialog that you might double check if your lighting isn't updating as you travel around.

As for if the trouble you're seeing is due to Hardware or Project? You could send a copy in to Tech Support and see if we get the same performance on our side with different hardware. 

Hope this helps!

Carrie

Terrain data usually comes from a surveyor. There are businesses out there that can map it out for you with a drone too or your city or county office might have something on file. 

Depending on the format you might need to

A. Trace over a pdf or picture with elevation lines. Terrain> Elevation Data

B. Import a text file (XYZ comma delimited) using File> Import> Terrain Data

C. Import GPS data from a .gpx file using File> Import> Import GPS Data

Depending on the complexity of the lot and the needs of the project but sometimes it is easier to get it close visually using just Elevation Lines and Regions. 

Hi,

There is not a way to change the layer associated with an object in Home Designer Suite.

Hi bixelps, 

That darkness can typically be resolved by enabling Texture Compression. 

Go to Preferences then to Render and you'll see Texture Compression as the last checkbox. 

This article has some additional things to try if you need it::
https://www.homedesignersoftware.com/support/article/KB-00897/troubleshooting-3d-camera-view-display-problems-in-home-designer.html

Hi!

You can kind of lessen the slope by adjusting the pitch of each segment of wall to compensate but you wont be able to make the ridge parallel to the ground with that angled wall. 

Another option would be to square off with an invisible wall. 

If you have Home Designer Pro you could turn off the Auto Roof builder and manually change the shape of the roof.