Layout Book – Part 2

ARCHICAD Training Lesson Outline

BEST PRACTICES AND ADDITIONAL OPTIONS

DRAWING NAMES AND TITLES

Titles for Drawings may be placed as part of the drawing using one of the many Title Type library parts, or omitted when not relevant by choosing No Title.

The name of the drawing can be set manually, specifically for this placement on the layout sheet, or inherited from the View name (which can be inherited from the Project Map Viewpoint name).

The best practice I recommend is to name the Viewpoint as you plan or wish to use as the drawing title on the Layout, and maintain the View Settings to use this Viewpoint name, and have the Drawing Settings to use this View name. That way, it's easy to coordinate and keep track of everything.

Exceptions: There will usually be several different Views for each Story, so the Story Viewpoint name (e.g. "Ground Floor") will need to be modified in the View Map to create Ground Floor Plan, Ground Floor Reflected Ceiling Plan, Ground Floor Electrical Plan, etc. The View name (manually set) can then be used as the Drawing title (automatically picked up).

A variety of Drawing Titles are available in the standard Archicad Library; each one has different options and styling. You can turn on or off the display of the Scale, change the length of the line (or turn it off), and manipulate other options.

Eyedrop a Drawing to set the Drawing Default Settings so that whenever you add a new Drawing it uses the desired style for the Title.

WARNING: If you eye-drop a Drawing that has a manually set Name, then whenever you place a new Drawing it will have that Name. This will require you to manually reset the Name each time. Be sure to set the Name to use the View name as a Default.

DRAWING UPDATE OPTIONS

Drawings can be set to update automatically whenever you open a Layout sheet. This can take a bit of time for Elevations and Sections, or for sheets that have a large number of Drawings; it can be annoying or frustrating when you're flipping through Layouts to review the set or adjust placement of the Drawings.

TIP: Change the Drawing Settings to Manual (vs Automatic) Update and you'll be able to flip through the sheets without any delay.

• Use the Update button in the bottom section of the Layout Book palette to update all the drawings on the sheet.

• To update specific Drawings, select them before clicking the Update button.

• To update only one Drawing, right-click the Drawing and select Update.

Drawings can be placed from:

• Internal Views (within this project)

• from a different project file (useful for larger projects) or

• from an outside file such as a PDF or DWG

If the Drawing comes from an external source, you have a choice whether to include the data within the current file (usually a good idea) or only maintain it as a reference (makes your file smaller, but you're then vulnerable if the external file is unavailable).

DRAWING FRAME

You can set the Drawing Frame to automatically expand to show the contents of the full View. This is a good default for Drawing Settings.

You can crop the Drawing to only show relevant areas, and to make it fit better on the sheet. The boundary is a polygon that you can edit with the Pet Palette, using the standard polygon editing methods (including adding a hole using the subtraction option). This allows you to overlay information more easily.

TRACE REFERENCE FOR OPTIMIZING PLACEMENT

Right-click on a Drawing to Open Source View to edit the model or the annotation on Plan or in Section, Elevation, etc.

Right-click and select Open Source View with Layout As Reference and you'll be able to work on the active View while continuing to see how it fits onto the sheet in relation to other Drawings and the sheet background.

Use the Trace Reference palette to jump back and forth easily for further optimization. Use the Update Reference button in the palette to see the latest view of the sheet.

USE THE ORGANIZER AS A POWER TOOL

Bring up the Organizer palette from the Project Chooser button in the upper left of the Navigator palette. It is a double-wide version of the Navigator, and allows you to quickly drag Views onto Layouts for rapid setup or reorganization of the Drawing Set.

On the left side, you can choose which area of the Navigator you want to see. Drag items from the left side to the right side, dropping the Views onto Layouts. (You can also use the Organizer to set up Publisher sets for printing, plotting or export to PDF or DWG etc.)

You can also drag Drawings from one layout to another using the Organizer.

After you drop these Drawings onto a Layout, you'll need to review their placement on each sheet.

If you have a large screen or a second monitor, it is possible to use the Organizer instead of the Navigator, since it contains all of the Navigator features.

IMPORTING DRAWINGS FROM ANOTHER PROJECT

Use the Project Chooser to reference another Archicad project, either one that is currently open (in another instance of Archicad) or an external file. You'll be able to see the Views and Layouts from that project, and can drag them onto the Layout Sheets.

These external references will update if the source file changes, using the standard automatic or manual update process.

This can take a substantial amount of time. To manage this in bulk, use Drawing Manager (also available from the Project Chooser popup menu).

DRAWING MANAGER

In Drawing Manager, you can see all of the Drawings placed onto Layouts, or external Drawings placed onto Worksheets or other Views.

You can select some or all of them to be Updated en masse, in preparation for printing or publishing output.

You can also relink or break links for these Drawings.

Relinking (using the Link To option) allows you to swap in a different version of a View or an external file.

Break Link allows you to freeze the Drawing so it won't look for updates.

If you select multiple Drawings you can use the Read From option (which appears in place of Link To) to get updates from an external folder. This can be useful when moving a project file (or setting up a new project file) to a different folder location.