Draw Order in Section Views

[Anonymous]

Does anyone have a workaround for obtaining a draw order for elements in a section view?... perhaps something less cumbersome of creating two views and overlaying them on top of each other.

Is it just me, or does Revit always seem to pick the wrong item to put in front.

Section views should be an obvious place to have draw order.

[barthbradley]

Doesn't look that way from here.  You got a Transparency going on?  

Can you post the source file for this screenshot?

[Anonymous]

Interestingly, it seems to be the opposite of what you're assuming @barthbradley, as things actually improve somewhat in 'wireframe'. See here.

Now the concrete pad comes in front, but the curbing (basic wall element) on the right is still behind.

Re. sending you the file, we have a NDA on this project, but you can replicate it pretty quickly with a ramp, floor (earth), and wall elements in a section.

[barthbradley]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Re. sending you the file, we have a NDA on this project, but you can replicate it pretty quickly with a ramp, floor (earth), and wall elements in a section.

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I cannot replicate what you are showing in your screenshot. Nobody here can. That's what the problem is dude! It's flipping weird.   Strip the state secrets and proprietary content out of your ultra-sensitive "NDA" project and post what's left.  Do it quickly though. You have a lot of experts' attention right now.  They may go way if you bore them too much.  Just saying.  

[Anonymous]

@barthbradley I didn't know this was such a tight community that you can speak for others, their skill set, and what they've attempted in coming up with an alternative solution. 😉  Good to know! I hope to be part of this elite group one day.

Even better, PM your email address and we'll screenshare this for you. You'll be able to play with it directly.

[barthbradley]

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@Anonymous wrote:

@barthbradley I didn't know this was such a tight community that you can speak for others, their skill set, and what they've attempted in coming up with an alternative solution. 😉  Good to know! I hope to be part of this elite group one day.

Even better, PM your email address and we'll screenshare this for you. You'll be able to play with it directly.

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Remember how I said: "Do it quickly though. You have a lot of experts' attention right now. They may go way if you bore them too much."   Well...I'm bored. Goodbye.  

[askywalkerY4FK5]

this is an old issue

https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/forums/searchpage/tab/message?advanced=false&allow_punctuation=false&...

pick vote and wait like the rest of us

in the mean time you have the right idea about using an annotation line

[RobDraw]

Brilliant!

Issue or just the way Revit works? (Please don't even try to answer that.)

[michael.coviello]

Hello @Anonymous   I'm checking in to ask if certain posts have helped you with your problem. Please add a post with how you decide to proceed and your results so other Community members may benefit.

Please hit the Accept as Solution button if a post or posts solves your issue or answers your question.

[Anonymous]

Hello @michael.coviello, and welcome to the discussion.

The issue appears to be a limitation of Revit, so the current solution is to essentially use a 2D drafting technique;

1. use 'Annotate/Detail Line' to draw in the desired information over top of the Elements that are in the wrong display order,
2. 'Hide in View' those elements.

I want to encourage you to consider flagging this to development team to review;

• the fundamental nature of information section drawings communicate,
• the value of BIM in communicating this information,
• how 'Draw Order' should work in an hierarchical sense for section drawings, and
• revising Revit to align with the above.

Please feel free to have someone contact me directly to go through this in person if that would help. Years ago I was on the beta team for Autocad Architectural Desktop, and 3DS Vis (aka 'Kenny' I believe), so this would not be new territory for me.

Thank you.

[michael.coviello]

Hello @Anonymous ,    This may be a known limitation as others have mentioned but I don't think we understand the problem fully at this point.

I've been trying to reproduce this as well like the others here and have some questions:    

• If you place a new section (one without a view template),   do the graphics show correctly?
• Are there any overrides to the ramp (By element, category or filter),  a transparency of some type may be applied as @barthbradley mentioned.
• If it is easily reproducible for you, can you recreate in a small file and post the file?

[mariah.ferranti]

Hello @Anonymous ,

I wanted to follow up and see if you are able to provide the information requested in Michael's last post, in order for us to better understand and reproduce the issue. Please let me know if you have any questions or concerns regarding the requested information.

[Anonymous]

Hello @michael.coviello and welcome @mariah.ferranti ,

Apologies for the delay, we're in a crunch to get these drawings out.

• If a new section is placed, it still does not show correctly.
• Yes, in this particular case there is a graphic override (Cut Pattern/Background) by element, but that isn't affecting the draw order.
• The floor element (ie. earth), has modified sub-elements.

The PIC for the project said we could do a screenshare. Can we do that next week?

[ToanDN]

Your view shows both new and demolished elements so they are overlapping each others. Not sure why you expect to see something different.

[michael.coviello]

Hello @Anonymous ,    I sent you a message yesterday to connect.    Please reply to the message and I'll be glad to review this issue with you to better understand the conditions of the problem.  Thank you.

[Anonymous]

Fantastic @michael.coviello, I've responded and will look forward to illustrating this further in real time.

[Anonymous]

The original earth is in the existing phase, this will make it draw above the current phase. The order is based on a series of phase filters and category types, and can not be manually adjusted. The order of the items you drew in the section will be critical to making it look the way that you want. The existing site should not contain a hatch as it is being drawn over the sidewalk. You will want to make the surface pattern or phase filter transparent for existing topography and then the new topography and pads will cut and display the earth with the pattern as you like.

Sometimes you just have to work within the bounds of what Revit draws...

[Anonymous]

... or you care enough about the program that you provide insight to the developer for making improvements. 😉

Thank you @Anonymous, you're the only other person to get the issue and articulate why it is happening. Now let' hope revising the bounds to a pragmatic condition (explained above) can be easily implemented into a future release. 

[martijn_pater]

@Anonymous wrote:

1. "A section shows the order in which they are seen."

Are you implying this is done in a chronological sense?  If so, then conceptually it's the opposite direction it should be for reality.

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No, view directional... just dropping by but maybe share the file to have a look (as .zip)

Section view direction

edit: somehow I always miss page two... lol

[Anonymous]

@AnonymousNo problem, I would agree with the comments on sharing ideas. Maybe post something in Revit Ideas Forum as a follow up. Something as simple as the 'Send to Back' functions found on the annotations tab for linework could be implemented?

Anyhow, for now, hopefully you can get the drawing to look close to what you need. Here's to hoping it gets easier down the line.

[martijn_pater]

You could just draw a region with the topo hatch using the actual topo as underlay and disable the topo after that...