Put building grid BEHIND other items

[NigelParsons4560]

Hello,

How do I set the building grid to be underneath columns and other structures instead of on top?

[Viveka_CD]

Hi @payam.rad

Thank you for the feedback.

Please take a moment to review and vote for this idea by @NigelParsons4560 on the Ideas forum.

Feel free to add your comments here.

Regards,

[Anonymous]

Ease of implementation should be another consideration.  This is such a basic feature...just have one person work on it for half a day.  Or, perhaps a more significant overhaul is needed that would allow any item to be moved above or below any other item.

[Anonymous]

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@payam.radwrote:

Nigel, 

I see your frustration here. I have a workaround that I do, not the best solution, but it will help you achieve the graphics and look you are after. I usually create a duplicate of the plans, bring them both on the sheet and overlap them on the sheet. (it's important which view you bring onto the sheet first, since it will always stay at the background). then I create two view template, one with grids only and apply it to the first plan I placed on the sheet. second view template is for everything else except for the grids. apply your two view templates to the two plans and you get what you are hoping to achieve...

Good luck! 

Give a kudos if this works for you!

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Payam,

Your method isn't working for me.  I'm on Revit 2014, but I wouldn't think something like this would change... Any ideas what I could be doing wrong?

Has anyone else gotten this to work?  Nigel?

[payam.rad]

Care to share a screen shot?

Can you tell me what part is not working? Is it possible that you have transparency or your visual style set as "wire frame"?

[NigelParsons4560]

Hi Benlukes,

To tell you the truth, it was just too much stuffing around to try to achieve a decent looking drawing.  The "we're never wrong" attitude of Autodesk just wore us down.  I've been asking for this for 10 years ... as well as fully flexible leader arrows ... a bunch of other stuff.  I've just grown tired of being involved anymore. 

On top of that Perpetual Licence pricing is through the roof.  No doubt it will be phased out in a year or two.  We have 2016 installed.  We'll also install 2018 and that will be our last.  When I'm not here anymore you can expect us to have abandoned the Revit upgrade path, at least for a while.

We've added a couple of ArchiCads to the office as a result.  It has it's own problems, but it's just as good as Revit.  One added advantage is we can now hire ArchiCad proficient staff whereas we were restricting ourselves to people trained on Revit.  As an architect with 32 years experience on AutoCAD and 11 on Revit, I never thought I'd move away from Autodesk ... but I did.

My best advice with Revit is to abandon the fight for great looking architectural drawings and submit to the will of Autodesk and be content with "the digital style" of drawings today.  Yes, they finally broke me.

The above does not reflect my general outlook on life.  Life is good.  Food is on the table.  The world is greener than it was a decade ago.  My children live better than I did.  There are plans to put a man on Mars ... how exciting is that ? !!!

Cheers

N.

[Anonymous]

I just threw this together to show you what I'm talking about: image

The grid was added to the sheet first, and then the floor plan, but the grid still shows up on top of the floor plan (not that I haven't aligned the two view ports).  No wireframe involved, and I'm pretty sure it isn't a transparency issue.

The only thing I did differently is that I applied the view templates to the views before I placed them on the sheet.

[Anonymous]

Unless I am able to get your method to work, I think my only option would be to use grid lines with a gap, adjust the gap to the outermost surface of the exterior walls (unfortunately the grid gap adjustment doesn't snap), then draw in the grid lines with model or detail lines where the building doubles back on itself (where there are openings within the building perimeter).  Any better ideas?

[Anonymous]

Yeah, it's really frustrating coming from AutoCAD, which is incredibly refined and flexible (not saying it's perfect).  I can no longer find a perpetual license on Autodesk's website (look like it isn't available anymore?), but when I last checked I thought it was actually cheaper than ArchiCad.  If I ever buy another BIM-type program there is a good chance it will be ArchiCad.

Anyway, glad your life is good otherwise!

[NigelParsons4560]

Hi Ben,

They're moving everyone across to rental.  You can't buy perpetual licenses anymore.  It works out to be about AUD$3600 per seat per year.  Way too much for a small firm in Australia.  There is also BrisCAD BIM, which is developing fast and is about half the price of Revit.  Haven't looked into it yet though.

[ToanDN]

A quirk with Revit is that halftoned elements tend to take priority over fulltoned counterparts, especially when print. That is the reason I never use halftone for grids and levels.

[Anonymous]

That definitely could be it.  I'll give a try tomorrow.  Thanks!

[Anonymous]

Shoot, turning off halftone for the grids didn't solve the issue either...

[ToanDN]

I think there is a misunderstanding.  Keeping the grids black, does not send it behind other model elements.  The grids, being annotation objects by nature, are still showing "above" model objects, but because they are all black, then when print they all blend together, unlike when the grids are halftoned. 

Apologize for not being clear in the begimning.

[Anonymous]

No worries.  payam.rad said above that he makes a copy of the floor plan and turns off everything but the grid, then puts that onto the sheet first, followed by the actual plan (but with grids turned off).  That is supposed to result in the drawing layering over the grid, but it doesn't work for me.  I thought turning off halftone might work...but unfortunately that isn't the case.

[RobDraw]

@Anonymous

Why is this an issue for you?

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@NigelParsons4560wrote:

To tell you the truth, it was just too much stuffing around to try to achieve a decent looking drawing.

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You must have really high standards for grid lines. IMHO, Revit can produce quality documents. If the need for better graphics for something so trivial, you can get additional software to produce them. It wouldn't be too hard to export a suitable format for fine tuning. Once a workflow is established, it could be done fairly quickly. Revit has always had graphic stumbling blocks.

But if Revit is not in demand in your particular market, alternate BIM software is an acceptable solution. That is if the graphics suit such high standards as established by a design software know for it's graphic capabilities.

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@NigelParsons4560wrote:

The "we're never wrong" attitude of Autodesk just wore us down.  

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?

[Anonymous]

It's not about high standards, this is very basic functionality we are asking for.  I think you are correct that exporting to another program is the best solution, but it's a shame that is the only way to get this done.

[RobDraw]

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@Anonymouswrote:

It's not about high standards, this is very basic functionality we are asking for.

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How do you know that is basic Revit functionality?

[Anonymous]

I didn't say it was basic Revit functionality.  I said is it basic functionality.  The ability to put one line behind another is incredibly basic and is something that can be done in all sorts of programs that are used for graphic output.  Note that I'm not saying it is basic to implement.  I don't know whether or not it is easy to implement, but if it isn't, that reflects a deeper problem with the program.

[RobDraw]

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@Anonymouswrote:

I don't know whether or not it is easy to implement, but if it isn't, that reflects a deeper problem with the program.

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Graphic problems are nothing new to Revit. I knew that going in and still deal with them on a daily basis. The key word is "deal".

[Anonymous]

I think that's a bad attitude.  We are all paying obscene amounts of money for this program and, presumably, Autodesk wants to make a program that is useful to it's customers.  It is up to us to make a fuss about it so they are aware of the issues.  They can't really say they aren't aware of how useful features like this are, because they also make another program, AutoCAD, that handles many things like this very well.