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SOLVED!

3D AXONOMETRIC RENDERED VIEWS

Tom Elliott
Contributor

Dear Community,

 

Has anyone tried to create a set of axonometric 3d views for rendering in cinerender? I have a building I'm trying to create 3d floor plans for with all the lovely textured detail of the cinerender engine. I set my 3d cut plane in the perspective window and then change to axonometric birdseye view, set the image how I want it and redefine the view with current window settings. It works beautifully with the only exception that I can't then change the 3d cut plane whilst keeping the same set up, the result being that the 1st floor doesn't match up with the ground floor.

 

My workaround to this at the moment is to stick scotch tape on my computer screen, mark where the walls corner on the ground floor and then try to line up the 1st floor view to those marks. I'd have hoped that in 2023 we'd have progressed further than resorting to these sort of workarounds!! Have we? Please? It's painful!

 

I thought maybe if I put the rendered images on a layout I could then line them up using trace reference but I'm having trouble with image resolution and size.

 

Is there some other way of setting a consistent view point in axo or laying out images so they line up with each other correctly?

 

Tom

AC27 3001 INT FULL

Macstudio M1 Max

32Gb Ram Ventura

MacStudio M2 32Gb Sonoma 14.6.1
Archicad 27 5003 INT FULL
1 ACCEPTED SOLUTION

Accepted Solutions
Solution

Create a section viewpoint and use that to control the height of the cutting plane (works in general but explained for this case):

  1. Set up the wanted axonometry in a saved view.
  2. With the saved view active in the 3D window - change to the generic axonometry viewpoint which will keep the projection settings from the saved view.
  3. In the section viewpoint, change the height of the cutting plane and go back to the generic axonometry viewpoint which then will have the new cutting plane.
  4. Save the view and repeat as needed.

So no need for tape - but there should definitely be a better way to do this...

View solution in original post

10 REPLIES 10
jl_lt
Ace

Hi! Question: are You using 3d documents to save your settings?

Tom Elliott
Contributor

No, I find the resulting image of a 3d document is extremely basic whereas the rendered image is top quality. The object of my project is just to create presentation images rather than accurately dimensioned drawings.

MacStudio M2 32Gb Sonoma 14.6.1
Archicad 27 5003 INT FULL
Eduardo Rolon
Moderator

Firstly Cinerender cannot render monometric or custom Axonometric view (if the Z-axis is not vertical, or if the x-y axes have been distorted), see https://help.graphisoft.com/AC/27/INT/index.htm?rhcsh=1&rhnewwnd=0#t=_AC27_Help%2F100_Visualization%.... You should have seen a yellow warning sign when saving the view.

That means that they will distort and they might not align.

 

One trick is to place small columns on specific corners to render with transparent background (under Detail Settings -> Options -> Generate Alpha Mask)

 

Quick ugly test below, 3 renders, ground floor, second floor and columns (which will be deleted after aligning)

 

 

EduardoRolon_0-1702135183065.png

 

Eduardo Rolón AIA NCARB
AC27 US/INT -> AC08

Macbook Pro M1 Max 64GB ram, OS X 10.XX latest
another Moderator

Tom Elliott
Contributor

Ahh that's not a bad idea! Thanks Eduardo.

 

Forgive my ignorance, I haven't come through traditional architectural training. Would you be able to tell me what the type of image I've created in the file attached is called?

 

Many thanks for your help,

Tom

MacStudio M2 32Gb Sonoma 14.6.1
Archicad 27 5003 INT FULL

It is a floor plan.

If you want to be more specific you can use either:

  • rendered floor plan
  • finishes and furniture plan
Eduardo Rolón AIA NCARB
AC27 US/INT -> AC08

Macbook Pro M1 Max 64GB ram, OS X 10.XX latest
another Moderator

Tom Elliott
Contributor

Hi Eduardo,

 

Of course it is! Don't I feel silly... It was the fact that I generated the image using the axonometric 3d view from the 3d window. In my head floor plans were always 2d black and white line drawings! Rendered floor plan works well!

 

Anyway, that aside I'm still not sure I know how to generate the 1st floor image keeping walls aligned, your idea of using columns I'm not sure would work in my case any better than sticking scotch on my screen anyway it's kind of like trying to align a perspective view in 3d without the use of saved views or a camera.

 

Any other ideas?

Thanks again,

Tom

MacStudio M2 32Gb Sonoma 14.6.1
Archicad 27 5003 INT FULL
Solution

Create a section viewpoint and use that to control the height of the cutting plane (works in general but explained for this case):

  1. Set up the wanted axonometry in a saved view.
  2. With the saved view active in the 3D window - change to the generic axonometry viewpoint which will keep the projection settings from the saved view.
  3. In the section viewpoint, change the height of the cutting plane and go back to the generic axonometry viewpoint which then will have the new cutting plane.
  4. Save the view and repeat as needed.

So no need for tape - but there should definitely be a better way to do this...

Tom Elliott
Contributor

Genius, you're a genius!! Thank you so much that works perfectly

MacStudio M2 32Gb Sonoma 14.6.1
Archicad 27 5003 INT FULL
Karl Ottenstein
Moderator

@Tom Elliott Another option, along with all of the tips given so far, is to approximate an axo view with a perspective one.  Even though the parallel nature of view lines in an axo view cannot be completely reproduced with a perspective... a virtual camera placed at infinity with an insanely good telephoto will give what appears to be an axo view ... which CineRender could render.

 

Rather than infinity, find a combination of far-away values for Camera Z and Distance (1000' in my screenshot) and focused view cone (2 degrees in screenshot) to get the desired zoom ... and other positioning... and you'll get pretty close to an axo view and can let CineRender do its thing.  (CineRender offers to approximate the axonometric/parallel by basically doing this.)

 

Screenshot 2023-12-09 at 11.10.38 AM.png

 

PS. Please keep your signature up to date... showing build 3001 for AC 27, but the current build is 4030 which I would assume you've installed.

One of the forum moderators
AC 28 USA and earlier   •   macOS Sequoia 15.2, MacBook Pro M2 Max 12CPU/30GPU cores, 32GB