Tray and Vaulted Ceilings and wall affects

[kart97]

Hi Everyone...

I have just become bald ... ripping my hair out.. trying to figure a couple of things out.

 

1) I setup a tray ceiling using... see attached pic.

I raised the ceiling after turning off auto-rebuild roof... then I placed the soffits as shown. Getting the corner pieces in place was a real chore and it seems as though there might have been a better way. I even tried poly lines but I don't understand all the functionality yet. Any suggestions to redo this properly would be appreciated.

 

2) In another room on the same plan I built a vaulted ceiling... see second attached pic.

Why don't my walls go all the way to the ceiling? I spent no less then 2 hours trying to figure out just how to get the low edge of the ceiling plane to match the existing flat ceiling plane for the adjacent room... and that seemed like a crap shoot with eyeballing in 3d mode. Is there an easy way to do these things. I buy software to make the blueprints easy... I could have manually built it in the same time.

 

Thanks for any help... and I apologize for being so frustrated.

 

[Kbird1]

Try this Tutorial and some videos on ceilings

 

http://www.homedesignersoftware.com/support/article/KB-00160/

 

videos

 

http://video.homedesigner.chiefarchitect.com/?search=ceiling

[kart97]

The videos helped a bit before I even completed what I did... But I watched them again and saw part of what I had done wrong.

 

On the room with the vaulted ceiling I had not started the ceiling plane at the outside of the top of the wall plate... I started on the inner edge. By correcting the edge I now have walls that go to the ceiling. I tried redoing them from scratch initially and had some other issues related to the roof. My roof planes don't actually go in the direction of the ceiling so they end up having to be rotated, etc. I ended up just changing the edge of the wall to resolve the issue. I still have a minor issue related to the wall at the end of the stairwell... see the new picture. Is there a way to make that go all the way to the ceiling?

 

On the room with the soffits... I probably should have better explained the problem. The first four sides that actually touch the walls were not the problem. It was getting the angles on the corners to create the octagonal effect. The soffits only allow me to create rectangles... and they don't bump nicely into the corners. Is there an easy way to do this using polylines or something similar.

 

Thanks for all the help so far.

 

[Kbird1]

I see a horizontal line and what looks like a beam sticking out of the wall at the RH end....

 

The horizontal line is I think cos the Attic wall isn't aligned with the stairwell wall , go up to the attic , select the wall and see if you have the option to "align with below"

 

Not sure about the "beam" if that is what it is?

 

M.

[Kbird1]

(Re your no#1 question , you should probably have used custom ceiling planes ,since you have Pro, rather than the Soffit Tool , per video 2245 on the link above.")

 

 

Actually not sure what the trouble is with your no#1 ?, I just tried it for my own "lesson" and it works fine . might help to place the big 45° angled boxes first then join the others to it and resize 45° as needed . that seemed to be the only issue I had. it doesn't matter if the Soffit goes into the wall some on the back so it fills the hole in the back corner.

 

 M.

[Elovia]

On the room with the soffits... I probably should have better explained the problem. The first four sides that actually touch the walls were not the problem. It was getting the angles on the corners to create the octagonal effect. The soffits only allow me to create rectangles... and they don't bump nicely into the corners. Is there an easy way to do this using polylines or something similar.

 

 

Yes.  For years, I used soffits as you described and lamented their limited use, but then learned a different method.  Now before I describe the new method, I'll add a disclaimer that whatever you choose to do, choose it for a given purpose; that purpose may simply be to give a 3D visual from the model, or it may be to assist with framing or inclusion on the material list.  The method I'll describe is for the former (a visual), not necessarily for the latter two, and if you want framing and all those other goodies, then you may need to add and/or account for them yourself manually.

 

That said ... use a slab instead of soffits.  One of the biggest advantages to using a slab is that you can then create custom shapes - including vertical surfaces curved in the horizontal plane.  Without walking you through the entire process, I'll just say that you can create a slab with a hole in the middle by using the break line tool and wrapping the slab around the room in sequential fashion.  Recognize that a 45° triangle has equal length sides, so again use the break line tool to create a square "stub out" in the corner, and then drag the exposed point of the square to one of the side corners while holding the Alt-key.  Go around to each corner and do the same to create an octogonal shaped hole in an otherwise square slab.  In the slab's specification dialog, you should set the height of the slab's top to the elevation of your room's ceiling, and set the slab thickness to be whatever depth you desire for the tray.  Change the material, and you're good to go.  Oh, one last thing ... did you want or need crown molding inside your tray?  If so, either start with a custom countertop instead of a slab, and add molding via the countertop's specification dialog, or convert your slab to a custom countertop via the conversion tool (and check other settings to ensure they didn't change due to the automatic program defaults).

 

Good luck, and hope this helps.

 

 

 

 

 

[Kbird1]

Nice use of those Tools Elovia , I'll add that tip to my toolbox , thx.

[Elovia]

The tip comes with a courtesy nod to Katalyst who mentioned it (or something very similar) while assisting another user on the old forum ... from that comment, I had a "lightbulb" moment and began to further explore slab objects beyond their intended obvious use.  Pardon the pun, but it sometimes helps to think outside of the box. 

[jlliles87]

Yes.  For years, I used soffits as you described and lamented their limited use, but then learned a different method.  Now before I describe the new method, I'll add a disclaimer that whatever you choose to do, choose it for a given purpose; that purpose may simply be to give a 3D visual from the model, or it may be to assist with framing or inclusion on the material list.  The method I'll describe is for the former (a visual), not necessarily for the latter two, and if you want framing and all those other goodies, then you may need to add and/or account for them yourself manually.

 

That said ... use a slab instead of soffits.  One of the biggest advantages to using a slab is that you can then create custom shapes - including vertical surfaces curved in the horizontal plane.  Without walking you through the entire process, I'll just say that you can create a slab with a hole in the middle by using the break line tool and wrapping the slab around the room in sequential fashion.  Recognize that a 45° triangle has equal length sides, so again use the break line tool to create a square "stub out" in the corner, and then drag the exposed point of the square to one of the side corners while holding the Alt-key.  Go around to each corner and do the same to create an octogonal shaped hole in an otherwise square slab.  In the slab's specification dialog, you should set the height of the slab's top to the elevation of your room's ceiling, and set the slab thickness to be whatever depth you desire for the tray.  Change the material, and you're good to go.  Oh, one last thing ... did you want or need crown molding inside your tray?  If so, either start with a custom countertop instead of a slab, and add molding via the countertop's specification dialog, or convert your slab to a custom countertop via the conversion tool (and check other settings to ensure they didn't change due to the automatic program defaults).

 

Good luck, and hope this helps.

 

corner.jpg

 

corner2.jpg

 

corner3.jpg

Can anybody demonstrate this process in further detail? I've got my slab in place but I have no idea how  "create a slab with the hole in the middle using the break line tool"

[Kbird1]

I think you took Elovia 's "Slab with a whole in the middle"  a little too literally , Pro doesn't have the Tool to make Holes but what you do is use the break line tool ,to break the edge of the slab and drag it back to the desired width on 3 sides and then break it again on one of the "legs" and drag it over to meet the other "Leg". 

 

don't for get to set the height (default is only 12") and the depth , and set the material to Drywall , or your ceiling color as needed.

 

The Slab can easily be converted to a "plain polyline" (edit toolbar) and then converted to a Countertop if you want to have Crown Moulding inside the tray ceiling too, I don't show that in the video below though.

 

not a great video but I think it will give you the idea....where you don't see me click the break icon , I have used the no#3 shortcut key instead.

 

http://screencast.com/t/x4CIHXgX