Family Orientation

It is quite common to find the orientation of families confusing, both when we make them and when we attempt to place them in a project. What we consider front, back, left and right doesn't seem to follow consistent logic. Okay, there is some consistency it just seems opposite of what we might expect. What do most of us expect? Speaking for myself at least; Front is the bottom of a plan view, Back is the top of a plan view, Right and Left are the right and left sides of the plan view.

If we examine every family and family template in the stock content we'll find that Front IS at the bottom of every plan view in all of them. The View Cube also matches that convention. The thing that confuses us is that a portion of the stock content has been modelled in the reverse. That which we think of being the front of the object being modelled is the back. Even in those families however, upon closer inspection, we will find that the reference planes are oriented correctly (if they are named at all), the geometry orientation is wrong. The direction the geometry is facing is wrong.

If we consider a chair family most if not all of them are modelled with their front toward the top of the view (which is Back). If we compare that with a desk we'll find that it is modelled with the drawers (can we agree that they'd be the front?) toward the top of the view. These two families oriented this way don't allow the user to place a desk, horizontally for example, and then a chair horizontally so that they are oriented correctly with respect to one another. In the case of this desk there is no visible clue to know which way the desk is facing during placement. We'd be rich if we got a dollar every time we noticed the desk was backward when we open an elevation view later.

Looking at the View Cube the chair looks wrong, but only if we happen to agree the front of the chair is the side our legs are on. In the context of being placed next to a table or desk it means that the chair is facing the wrong side of the desk or vice versa. They had to pick an orientation but in the case of a desk that has drawers they picked wrong. Other work surfaces and tables might not matter nearly as much. It would make more sense to me if the desk were modelled with the drawers facing front, the bottom of the plan view. This would allow us to place a desk and chair and their orientation would make sense regarding each other.

Another apparent mismatch of orientation logic is base cabinet and wall/upper cabinet casework. Base cabinets are modelled with front facing the bottom of the plan view but the wall hosted upper cabinets are facing the back, the top of the plan view, opposite of base cabinets. Placing them in a project however defies the apparent orientation mismatch because the origin of the base cabinet is at the back and it is for the upper cabinet too. This means they orient logically when used together despite being modelled facing different directions in the family editor.

Also contributing to confusion is that the original content for doors and windows all assume that their Exterior side (and Placement Side) is what Revit considers the back side of the family. I've always thought of the exterior side as the Front of a door or window, the side that faces people as they approach the house. A door was the very first family I made with Revit. Afterward I believed that Front was the top of a plan view in the family editor. At least until I encountered enough other families to realize I was wrong.

To appear more consistent, while working in the Family Editor, Autodesk would need to revise most if not all of their hosted content (and others) so that the geometry orientation respects the bottom of a view being the Front view. The placement logic it uses must compensate for the placement side orientation of the geometry not being consistent with the notion of Front. If they revised the orientation of content to please Family Editors then they'd have to be careful to also revise the placement side logic.