Jo_Ann

Like I said, lots of glitches. But I think this plan is more user friendly for you to apply to your own plan (to play with). If your remodel involves the roof, then you have to leave 'auto roof on', otherwise, I think it's safe to turn 'auto roof' off. I hope this works for you, so that you can easily convey your ideas to the architect. A 3d pic is worth a thousand words! gambrel roof with dormers2.zip

Update. After looking at your pics, I re-worked the plan with a new strategy (2nd floor ceilings are now raised and auto roof is still 'on'), and this is how it turned out. Lots of small glitches, (but nothing that can't be hidden with a few soffits or shapes) but I guess it has to be expected when using the limited tools that Suite & Architectural offer. If you still want the plan to look at, let me know and I will upload it.

Holy Moley! You grabbed the camera and took pics (looks like it was raining, too) !!!

Ha ha ha! You guys are funny! In image6 that you posted, it appears that you are trying to use your exterior walls as 'knee walls'. Knee walls are interior walls, drawn within the room. Put the exterior walls back where they belong. The new pic of the real room is confusing. It looks as though there are 2 dormers on each side of the roof? In the real full house pic, I see only 1 dormer on each side of the roof. ?????

Kbird: "Not sure why you have a wall missing between the 1st and 2nd dormers? though you may have mistaken the Soffit for an invisible wall in plan view? I'm guessing the soffit was to make the roof edge look more like the photo?" Adding a wall there messed things up, and I have no idea why. Yes, the soffit was added to show stpete111 how to fake the roof break on that upper level (shown on the real pic). When auto roof is turned off and the ceilings get raised, that clears up a lot of the wall mess on the 2nd floor. Whatever remains, can be tweaked. stpete111: Home Designer does already offer a discount on upgrades. Look on the website. There is a link on the forum page.

Post a jpeg of your 1st floor 2d floor plan.

stpete111, Don't judge a wall by it's color. If you click on the wall to view it's properties, you will see that it is a thinner exterior wall. A thinner wall was the only way that would allow me to extend the front walls of each dormer, out further (to lengthen them). The dormers have to be done manually. I don't know what is going on with your attic walls.

stpete111, 1. If you have to change ceiling heights back and forth for an entire floor, you will know why it was not beneficial to yourself to have many rooms to change (on each floor). You'll see... 2. HDA has many more tools and more versatility than Suite. If you plan to dabble in the software for more than just one project, I think it is well worth the upgrade. Play with the trial download, and you'll see for yourself. P.S. Although you can't save anything in the trial....you can open both my plan, and your own plan at the same time (within the trial version) and tile them vertically. It makes it convenient to change your settings and see how it affects your model, without having to open and close 2 plans in different programs. Experiment...you can't damage your original plan.

Mick, I wish I could have opened the plan you uploaded, but I can't. What version program did you use? If I had been able to open the plan, I could have done a better re-creation of stpete111's house plan. stpete111, This version of the plan was done in HDA10, so to open it you will have to download the free trial version of HDA2016 (HDA is the MOST similiar to Suite...Pro has too many choices and that would be confusing). You will then be able to see the settings that I used, and apply that to your own plan. I had to raise the 1st floor ceiling (of the main house) to 9', to make the front roof eave (height) look correct. Overhang settings are also critical. After your roof is entirely correct, you can turn off 'auto build roof' and re-lower the 1st floor ceiling to 8'. On the 2nd floor, you would then check 'ceiling over this room' and raise the ceiling to 8'. You can then begin tweaking the walls upstairs, too. If you have already added interior walls to the entire house, then you have somewhat sabotaged yourself. You can never ever never rebuild the roof again after you have changed these settings! gambrel roof with dormers.zip

That's not going to work, Mick. He has to manually build dormers on the 2nd floor.

Look in the 'templates' folder within the Home Designer 2016 application folder. I counted 61 various editable samples in there.

For HD Architectural, this is similiar to Kbird's post. Use the 2nd floor blank option to draw these walls. You will probably have to play with all the settings, including the wall placement, to make it behave in your own plan. At least, it should help to get you started in the right direction. Attached Thumbnails

Thanks, Mick.

Thanks, David. I hope that SeattleEric can get it to work with his own plan.

Start a new sample plan to play with this. Use all the settings shown in the pic. When you opt to build the 3rd floor, choose 'blank plan' and turn on the floor reference display (so that you can align with the walls below). If you get the roof to build correctly in the sample plan, then start adjusting the ceiling heights in the sample plan to match what you have in the real plan. Keep adjusting until you get it right. The 3rd floor is the key. I put a soffit (with roofing material applied) on top of the steeple to simulate the roof.

Draw an invisible wall, dividing the porch into 2 rooms, and lower one of the rooms. If it is a foundation wall that you want...go to level 0, turn on floor reference, and draw foundation walls. Right click each new wall, and select 'align with wall above'.

Um, Keith, After removing the check mark on 'ignore 1st floor' in the build roof dialog, the 'ground' floor walls returned. I left the roof in 'auto rebuild' mode. Then I opened each room on your 'ground' floor and put a check mark in the 'roof over this room' and 'ceiling over this room' box. The roof magically reappeared.

Did you delete the attic wall, or turn off the 3d display of attic walls?

You just aren't explaining well enough what it is exactly that you are trying to build. Way too many variables.

http://www.homedesignersoftware.com/support/article/KB-00359/52/Home-Designer/Roofs/Automatically-Building-the-Basic-Roof-Styles.html

http://www.homedesignersoftware.com/support/article/KB-00264/246/Home-Designer/Layers/Turning-on-or-off-the-Display-of-Objects.html

Use the 'edit area' function to draw a selection around the entire bathroom, then copy. Open a new plan, tiled next to the original plan. On the tool bar>edit>paste into the new plan. Save this new plan with a descriptive name. The bathroom layout will now be available whenever you want it.

http://www.homedesignersoftware.com/support/article/KB-00442/167/Home-Designer/Roofs/Dormers/Creating-an-Automatic-Dormer.html

http://www.homedesignersoftware.com/support/article/KB-00191/260/Home-Designer/Architectural-Blocks/Creating-an-Architectural-Block.html

Just a suggestion, but why not download the free trial version of PRO, and open your plan in that program. Do a 3d view, open the camera defaults (as suggested in KBird's post and kb article) AND do as it says.... "You can also increase the Clip Surfaces Within setting in your Perspective Full Overview Camera Specification dialog. The default will be 24", but you can increase this to a larger value, such as 300". You may need to test different values in this plan in order to create the results you want in the overview without experiencing Z-Fighting". This eliminates a lot of the Z fighting (but not all of it). Your terrain is just too vast. Unfortunately for you, HDA does not have this ability. But at least you will be able to have a decent perspective view of the house and terrain, if you try this.