Tuesday, May 10, 2011

Dept. of Subtle - Opening Transparent in Elevation or 3D

Quick one tonight. The opening element in window families is designed to offer either transparent or opaque behavior when seen in elevation/section views. Normally we like to "see" through glass in 3D views so we can see inside the building. In elevation/section views however seeing the "innards" of the building might be really confusing to the reader. This subtle setting determines how the opening should behave in either condition.


If you want to see through your openings in elevation, check the option for Elevation. It's usually not checked which is why you can't see through them. If you'd rather obscure them in a 3D view to then remove the check for 3D.

In the past we couldn't have more than one Opening element in a single family so we often removed them and used a void instead. I find in 2011 and 2012 that Revit doesn't mind multiple openings in the family. You can't however have a void and an Opening in the same family, one or the other. To be more accurate you CAN create a void but you'll get this message if you try to CUT the host with the void.



2 comments:

J said...

Steve,

I have to humbly disagree: the workflow you describe does not show items through glass... only through empty 'opening cuts' you know the olden days when people made doors without the door panels...

The "Transparent in 3D" choices are only about the opening cut itself; if you place any object it does not show through in Elevation no matter what one does (3D yes but Elevations no :-( That is what's baffling about the factory but I digress)

Once one places glass in the door or window & even if you have the "Transparent in 3D > Elevations" check box checked the inside of the building will still not show up through the elevation.

This is how it's worked for years and although we wish those check boxes worked as imagined...alas they do not completely get us desired flexibility.

If you can get the doors and windows to show through what's inside of glass (in true Elevation views) I'd love to see how you did it!!! Shy of having no glass that is :-)

Steve said...

True, the setting only deals with the opening itself. The material settings and assignment of the things you put in the opening will affect whether you can ultimately see through or not.

The purpose of the post was to shed a little light on why, no matter what a user did with materials, they could not "see through" the opening.