Short Curved Walls and Non Core Layers

At Autodesk Revit forums I saw a post regarding disappearing curved walls. These walls were shorter than the current view range cut plane. When the Wall subcategory Non Core Layers is turned off only these curved short walls disappeared. Other walls of the same type that were straight remained visible. It looks like a bug to me.

In my testing, when the sub-category for Non Core Layers (Detail Level must be Medium or Fine) is turned off the wall will disappear when it's height is not at least 2 feet above the cut plane setting. For example, I can make a wall disappear if it's height is less than 6 feet when the cut plane (view range) is 4 feet. Enter anything 6 feet or higher and the wall reappears. This image is some full height walls and some walls that are 4 feet tall (lighter gray walls).

This is the setting I turned off in Visibility/Graphics.

This is the result, the curved 4 foot tall walls are gone.

I suppose, in their defense, they could argue that the reason it is possible to turn off non core layers is to be able to isolate, only show, the structural portion of walls. As such a curved wall that is not tall enough to reach the cut plane is not likely to also be a structural/bearing wall. At the very least it is unexpected to have a wall disappear only because it is too short and curved.

Cue Randy Newman, "Short walls got no reason..."

Overriding DWG Layers Didn't Work

A team was trying to override the appearance of the DWG layers after linking the file to their Revit project. Usually the reason for this not working is elements are not assigned to color or line pattern BYLAYER in the DWG.

In this case it wasn't working because the DWG was not within View Range's Primary Range, it was in the View Depth zone. Projection and Cut linestyles work inside the Primary Range and the <Beyond> linestyle is used for elements within View Depth.

Good catch Mia!

Revit 2017 - View Range Keyboard Shortcut

Brian Mackey wrote a post earlier today that describes two quirky issues with using the new View Range keyboard shortcut VR. It is definitely subtle, quirky and worthy of an echo.

The first quirk is having to click Apply first and then OK to close in order to make a change stick. I'd run into that too and meant to write something but Brian was quicker to the keyboard. The other, and very important, thing to know is that using it ignores when a View Template has been assigned to a view, meaning the template is supposed to be controlling the parameters for View Range. That's not good! Check out his thoughts.

As such it is no longer his favorite new subtle feature and I'm inclined to agree, too bad.

View Range Dialog

I hinted at this change when Revit Sunrise became available at the end of last summer. In 2016 R2, when you open the View Range dialog box and click the Show button this version will appear.

It's intended to provide more information about what the settings within View Range mean.

Fwiw, I still think this version would be better for View Range and Ceiling Plans.

View Range Help Doc Image

I was pointing out the View Range help documentation earlier and noticed that the plan view seems to have Thin Lines on, no particular difference in the lineweights depicted. At the very least it is a bit anemic looking. I think it would be a little more helpful to be more obvious which lines are affected by the Cut Plane by showing the Cut lineweight, like for the walls.

Fwiw, I think View Depth should be moved above the Primary Range when the View Range dialog is opened for Ceiling Plan Views...and maybe called View Upth? :)

Visibility of Floors and their Parts

Floors are unique in that Revit will show them even if they are below the view range settings of the view (floor plan). They'll be visible until they exceed 4' (1200mm) below the level. Parts that are created from floors won't. In fact parts created from a floor that is at the level of the view (in other words, normal) won't show up either.

It is necessary to adjust the View Range to permit the parts to be visible. It would be more consistent with floors if their parts assumed the same quirk capability.

View Range Redux

I'm a bit shocked that I originally posted these videos in November of 2009. It doesn't feel like it was that long ago, times seems to fly by these days. Just in case you don't have a spare 20 minutes, keep in mind that each video is between 3-5 minutes long. I recorded them using Jing's free version which limits videos to no more than five minutes. That's perfect for me because I don't want to do longer ones. I don't want to steal your attention for too long. As such I normally wouldn't put these together in one post but they are all related to each other, so I did. Besides, you don't have to watch them all now 8-).

The first video deals with plan views.

This next video is about ceiling plans and framing plans.

The third video is about site and roof plan views.

My session of Jing ran out of memory right as I was about to wrap the third video so I left it as is, lazy guy syndrome.

Video Four of Four - View Range Top Offset of Primary Range

Paul Aubin posted a video on You Tube as well, it's 20:05 minutes.

Ceiling Plans and Generic Model Families

A bit of inequity exists for Generic Model families. The casework and specialty equipment category have no problem projecting information into a RCP plan as long as some portion of the geometry is "cut" by the view's cut plane. The same family geometry that works for those two categories won't work the same if assigned to the category Generic Model. Seems unfair to me :(

Video Four - View Range - Top Offset of Primary Range

A comment on this previous post asked about the Top Offset of the Primary Range. I added a fourth video to the post to address that question. If you are in a hurry, you can click to watch it now. Here's a screen capture of the new image in the Revit help documentation for the View Range topic.

Want to read all about it there? Have you tried their new online help document yet?

How View Range Affects various Views and Elements

The blog Design ReForm posted a nice demo that shows how the view range settings are related in 3D space. I thought I'd tag on to it by creating a few that show how various view range settings affect different views. Just in case you don't have a spare 15 minutes, keep in mind that each video is between 3-5 minutes long. Jing's free version limits videos to no more than five minutes which is perfect for me because I don't want to do longer ones, I don't want to steal your attention for too long. As such I normally wouldn't put these together in one post but they are all related to each other, so I did. You don't have to watch them all now 8-).

The first video deals with plan views.

This next video is about ceiling plans and framing plans.

The last video is about site and roof plan views.

My session of Jing ran out of memory right as I was about to wrap the third video so I left it as is, lazy guy syndrome. I hope that between their video and these that view range starts to make more sense!

Added 11/05/09: Video Four of Four - View Range Top Offset of Primary Range

Shaft Opening and View Range

Cool tool the Shaft Opening, it cuts floors, ceilings and roofs that it comes into contact with. It also provides a way to display symbolic lines within the sketch so you can generate graphics to indicate openings more efficiently than drawing them separately or using detail components.

This post is concerned with the display of symbolic lines when you don't expect them to appear. If the View Range setting for Top-Offset of a level below a Shaft Opening has a Top-Offset setting that is high enough to intersect with the Shaft Opening the symbolic lines will appear. They will appear even if the shaft itself doesn't interesect with the cut plane of the lower level. Here's the view Range dialog and the Top Offset is set higher than the level above (11'-0" above Level 1).

This is the resulting Shaft Opening in the view of the level below, just symbolic lines, no opening in the floor.

In my perfect world a shaft would not show symbolic lines unless the cut plane of the view intersected the shaft, not the primary range itself. Fortunately the instances I've encountered are usually due to unnecessarily high settings of the Top-Offset value.

Added THIS POST to the HOK CAD Solutions Blog.