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    • Official Post

    Hi there!


    Since our release of Enscape 2.9 we are officially supporting Vectorworks (as you all probably know).

    In the development of the integration we mainly focus on Vectorworks Architect. But we also know that a lot of you are also using one of the other products like Landmark or Spotlight. Right now, we do not have a very good understanding of the important differences between those products. That's where we would like to have your opinion on it!


    Which Vectorworks product are you using?

    Which important features do not work with Enscape?

    Where could we improve in the integration?


    With your help we are able to identify and implement the blind spots faster and more accurate.


    Thank you so much for your help and happy holidays!

    Joachim

  • Jo

    I use Vectorworks Landmark and Spotlight and have been teaching others to use it for the past 25 years!


    Main features that I would like to see integrated with Vectorworks and Enscape are as follows:


    • Image props are objects that always face the camera. They are often used as plants and trees in Landmark. Can we have them supported such that they face the camera in Enscape too
    • Clip cubes and sectioned models are not supported at the moment - it would be brilliant to have them supported to show cutaways and true internal sectional elevations
    • Visible light beams would be really useful for Spotlight users and those doing exhibition design or show lighting.
    • We use Renderworks backgrounds in Vectorworks which equate to Skyboxes in Enscape - can we have an automatic transfer to Enscape?
    • Your assets don't work when embedded in Vectorworks objects like groups and symbols. If an asset like a tree could be embedded in a plant object or symbol then it would integrate well with normal Vectorworks workflow
    • Can we have 360 videos like Twinmotion and Vectorworks itself can render
    • A quick way of integrating the enscape rendering to a viewport on a Vectorworks sheet that updates when the model is changed.

    I think that is it for the moment!


    You have created a great product which gives almost the same quality as Renderworks but in real-time!

    More integration Vectorworks current workflow is what we are after!


    I did a webinar last Thursday which was well received - here are a couple of images from it:


    [Blocked Image: https://scontent-lhr8-2.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/131901288_10157277607941403_4496526356768615854_o.jpg?_nc_cat=101&ccb=2&_nc_sid=730e14&_nc_ohc=Gb3JgEjnstMAX-Ofq7p&_nc_ht=scontent-lhr8-2.xx&oh=616bb404c6b0b86fb543ac1bb93af152&oe=6006B1F7]


    [Blocked Image: https://scontent-lhr8-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/131908884_10157277608006403_2298493813163349150_o.jpg?_nc_cat=107&ccb=2&_nc_sid=730e14&_nc_ohc=lgHu5mAvFr8AX9S5MU0&_nc_ht=scontent-lhr8-1.xx&oh=401715c836b7091e47d38d359833e8fd&oe=60082B66]

  • VW Architecture here.

    On Mac.


    But I am sure that many VW Landmark users are interested too.


    I am not so sure about VW Spotlight, as they are often using Vision

    for an interactive presentation of their light effects.

    But if Enscape offers all effects like Fog, God Rays, .... in real time,

    why not.

    • Official Post
    • Visible light beams would be really useful for Spotlight users and those doing exhibition design or show lighting.

    We are already having a look at this. But it is quite tricky on our side. As we are trying to render an image with ray tracing, it needs to be very close to physical reality. For light beams that would mean that we either create thousands and thousands particles in space where the light would be reflected and spreaded (which would be veeeeery performance heavy) or we make an exception from our usual approach and create a special object that is treated differently (which could cause followup problems).

    No decision so far which way we will head but we would definitely like to find a solution that suits your purpose but does not affect our performance too much.

    • Your assets don't work when embedded in Vectorworks objects like groups and symbols. If an asset like a tree could be embedded in a plant object or symbol then it would integrate well with normal Vectorworks workflow

    We had a chat about this topic with the Vectorworks developers a few days ago. This behavior will not be implemented on our side as it would be too CAD specific. But there is a way to implement it on the Vectorworks side and they are willing to tackle it. But I am not sure about the timeline.


    Thank you two for the feedback. We will have a look at the other points and come back to you if we need clearification.

  • We had a chat about this topic with the Vectorworks developers a few days ago. This behavior will not be implemented on our side as it would be too CAD specific.

    Wondering whether you would consider a more general solution, for example by writing the category of an asset to a special parameter on the object. You already have 3 parameters for Enscape (enscapeassetid, enscapeassetnativeheight, enscapeassetsource (I could be wrong with the exact names)). Could there perhaps be a fourth parameter/attribute/field that stores the category.


    That would open up a few automation workflows. For example build a Revit filter that hides all enscape assets of the category "accessories".

  • We are already having a look at this. But it is quite tricky on our side. As we are trying to render an image with ray tracing, it needs to be very close to physical reality. For light beams that would mean that we either create thousands and thousands particles in space where the light would be reflected and spreaded (which would be veeeeery performance heavy) or we make an exception from our usual approach and create a special object that is treated differently (which could cause followup problems).

    No decision so far which way we will head but we would definitely like to find a solution that suits your purpose but does not affect our performance too much.

    We had a chat about this topic with the Vectorworks developers a few days ago. This behavior will not be implemented on our side as it would be too CAD specific. But there is a way to implement it on the Vectorworks side and they are willing to tackle it. But I am not sure about the timeline.


    Thank you two for the feedback. We will have a look at the other points and come back to you if we need clearification.

    J0 - what about support of image props - this is. the first request and then we can see whether Vectorworks will solve the problem of embedded image props...

  • For me (garden designer, using Landscape VW instance)


    - Clipped cube/Section models as per thecadman's post above. This is something I'm actively struggling with at the moment as I need to provide some side-on elevations, but can't render them in Enscape. For me personally this is no. 1 missing functionality to be addressed.


    - More plant assets. There are currently a lot of large trees in the asset library, and also house plants, but as a domestic garden designer there is little for me to use. I end up having to bring things in from 3D warehouse into VW (sadly VW's own plants are also quite limited, but also not true 3D models); some of these 3D warehouse models are very high polygon and so it really slows rendering down vs using Enscape's own ones, thus it would be better if there was more choice within the Enscape library. (also I like how Enscape plants move in the wind, but obviously imported ones don't, so again more reason to want more Enscape ones in the library)


    - Weather effects and seasons, as per some of your competitors would also be good.


    Overall I really like Enscape and being able to real-time update in VW which much better than some of the competition, but there are a few more things which would just make it that much better overall.

    • Official Post

    J0 - what about support of image props - this is. the first request and then we can see whether Vectorworks will solve the problem of embedded image props...

    We are considering it but probably not with the highest prio. There are other things about our assets that we want to tackle first.



    - Weather effects and seasons, as per some of your competitors would also be good.

    Quick question for clarification:
    Just as an visual effect? So that it snows/rains in the scene? Or do you mean adding assets (plants) in a specific season? ('both' is not an aswer ;))

  • Quick question for clarification:
    Just as an visual effect? So that it snows/rains in the scene? Or do you mean adding assets (plants) in a specific season? ('both' is not an aswer ;))


    I was thinking more the former, although it wouldn't harm to have some season specific assets. For example in Twinmotion, they have 4 of each tree for each different season (bare winter, autumn colours, spring new growth and full bloom summer). But yes, mostly I was thinking the ability to have snow on the ground, or rain with ground 'wetness' showing.

  • Hi. I'm using Enscape 3 on VW2020. Will try it in VW2021 soon.
    I see the B(BIM information) option but it reports no BIM information for the object though I know I have the object FULL of information.
    Is this a thing also for other platforms? I´d very much like to have this intergrated/achieved.