19 December 2017

Tip of the month! December: Material properties

Materials are an important tool that help bring your plan to life.


In Palette CAD, materials can be adapted for many applications.



On the right side of your plan are your lists. In addition to the Object list, you will also find the Material list. With a right-click on a material you will be offered several practical options to manage the material.

Double-clicking on the material opens the material properties:



Here colour, light and surface behavior, transparency and more can be set. For more information about materials, use the F1 key and search the following terms in the help guide: #Materials #Assign Material #Create Material.

There you have it! Now go ahead and add a little shine!

Greetings from Stuttgart
Your Palette CAD Blog Team

28 November 2017

Tip of the month! November: Units of measurement

This month we’ll cover a topic that we get a fair amount of questions about;

Can I change the units of measurement and if so, how?

The answer being; Of course!
Here is how:



We begin as with most program settings at the File tab.
File » Program settings » Program settings » Sceneries » Units

And there we have it. Select your desired unit – you can even choose the number of decimal places – click OK and away we go!


You even get a handy little reminder in the bottom right of the program window.


Now you can plan with pin-point accuracy!
Enjoy!

Greetings from Stuttgart
Your Palette CAD Blog Team

30 October 2017

Tip of the month! October: Set up and restore the Object and Material lists

By default, the Object and Material lists are docked on the right and permanently open. Right clicking on the title bar will open a context menu for you to set up the selected list.


Here you can decide whether you want to have your lists docked, or as floating windows. This is especially useful if you use a second screen.

Floating windows can be grouped together. You can then switch between each list using the tabs at the bottom of the window.

If you have lost a list, you can find it again in the Design tab. Here you will also find the catalogues that can be docked, undocked and grouped.


If you have lost one of your catalogues, or they are not behaving as you would like, you can return them to the default setting from the Program Settings:


Greetings from Stuttgart
Your Palette CAD Blog Team

22 September 2017

Tip of the month! September: Auto backup

You’re deep in to a project when suddenly…Power cut!


Your PC shuts off, you can’t remember the last time you hit the save button and the work is due tomorrow.

Do not fret! Palette CAD has an automatic backup save function. By default, the software creates a backup save every 20 steps. The file is saved to the same folder as your normal save, but instead of being a .p3d extension, it is .p3b.

To open the file, click “Open existing project”, then select the “Display auto save files” check box.


It is important to note that the Backup file is only a “light” save file to ensure top performance from the program, and therefore it is occasionally possible for materials or objects to be missing when it is loaded. So, while this can save you in a pinch, you should be hitting the standard save button regularly to keep your work safe.

To change the settings of the Automatic backup, go to File --> Program --> settings --> Input/output --> Object Browser:


Here you can change the Automatic backup frequency or turn it off (we recommend against this!).

So, the moral of the story, Save, Save, Save!


Greetings from Stuttgart
Your Palette CAD Blog Team





29 August 2017

Tip of the month! August: Customise object list

To help you work more effectively with the object list, you can customise the information that you want it to show you.

To customise the object list, click on the symbol for Fields:



By default, the name of an object or group is listed, followed by whether an object is active or inactive. And finally, whether an object is draggable.

Number of faces is recommended as it will allow you to monitor the complexity of the objects. Type of an object is also very useful (e.g. Wall, Profile, Window, Wood technology board, etc.) among others.



The Fields dialog box shows the pre-built fields available to add to your object list.
These can simply be drag and dropped into the object list, or removed in the same way. The fields in the object list can be sorted in the same way, so long as the Field dialogue box is open.


Greetings from Stuttgart
Your Palette CAD Blog Team



28 July 2017

Tip of the month! July: Linear light


Hold onto your sunbrellas people, the summer is in full flow. Here another cool little gem to try out. A new feature in the latest update, linear light is a cool litle addition to lighting objects. It can be used as a great back lighting mood setter, or a freeform to fuel your design imagination.

It can be found in "Insert" tab under "Light" menu.


With the entire colour spectrum at your disposal, there are no limits to what you can create. Putting little touches like this into your designs really brings out the fun side of work. I had a go myself, and touched up one of my first plans.


For those with a keen eye, it is the same plan from the March TOTM, rendered from another viewpoint. Give it a go and see what you can come up with.



Greetings from Stuttgart
Your Palette CAD Blog Team




22 June 2017

Tip of the month! June: Status bar


What is hotter than the weather in Germany at the moment? The new TOTM for June, of course. It is a ridiculously simple one this month, but extremely useful at times, especially for some of the newer users.

The status bar guides you step by step through each operation in Palette CAD. Once you have started an operation, the bar at the bottom left of the screen displays the name of the current operation and the program's expected input.


Using the example above, after the operation "Move" (v) is started, the status bar displays the following:

 "L:" and "R:" refer to the left and right mouse buttons. This information is displayed for all editing and insertion operations.

You are looking for a reference point from which to move the selected object. If this is selected by a left mouse button click, the target point at which the object is to be moved is expected and the bar changes as follows: 

If the target point is also selected, the object is moved and the operation is terminated.

Piece of cake, right! Now try out some of the other operations and see what fun there is to be had.


Greetings from tropical Stuttgart
Your Palette CAD Blog Team





27 May 2017

Tip of the month! May: v9.11-13 release notes



The summer holidays are almost upon us, the trade fair season is in full flow at the moment, so what better time to have a look at the latest updates in Palette CAD. As you can see from the sizeable list below, we are in for another reading feast. Take a look and make sure to take some time and try a few out for yourselves.

Palette CAD 9.13

  • Faster saving of scenes and objects
  • With the Replace operation, you can now replace an object with other objects in the scene (until now, objects in the scene could only be replaced with objects from the catalogues)
  • In the Exposé, you can now set the background colour outside the sheet (Settings / Colour)
  • This means that drawing elements outside the sheet can now be made clearer
  • In the Exposé, the selected sheet size (e.g. A4) can be displayed next to the sheet
  • Views in the Exposé can be switched to preview mode more quickly via the context menu so that, for example, changing the size does not automatically lead to a re-rendering
  • In the Exposé, with “Calculating all views” you have the option to only re-render the views in preview mode
  • In the Exposé you can now set whether guide lines should be printed or exported to a PDF
  • In the 2D drawing menu the “Circle on 2 tangents” and “Circle on 3 tangents” design methods have been enhanced
  • In cases with multiple options, the possible tangent points are displayed in the preview for selection
  • It is now also possible to create a circle on 3 tangents which is tangential to other circles
  • When hatching non-closed contours, the missing sections are highlighted so that they can be located and filled in more easily
  • In 2D drawing, when a drawing derivation with background is created, the background bitmap is now restricted to the size of the objects
  • You can now arrange multiple derived 2D objects with a coloured bitmap on a drawing area (similar to views in the Exposé)
  • Importing Häfele catalogues has been changed from VRML to DWG format, which increases the quality of the objects
  • There is a new Wood technology tab in which important functions for joiners and cabinet makers are shown more quickly and more clearly
  • In Wood technology, boards can automatically be cut together to create a compound mitre cut
  • With CNC export for a contour from a wood technology board, the starting point for the feature can now be automatically set to the middle of the longest section
  • In the wood technology board there is now the option to store forms with values for calculations
  • In the Wood technology menu there is now the option to create and start macros to create and carry out defined processes automatically
  • In tiling technology, the display of cut tiles has been extended to bases and rounded faces
  • The export for Palette Play / Palette VR and for the virtual showroom has been revised and optimised  


Palette CAD 9.12

  • Interior walls can now automatically create a T-connection with neighbouring walls and connect to each other
  • This automatically creates an isle in the wall covering or a division into two partial coverings
  • Until now, the connection could only be restored manually in Wall Settings
  • Individual walls and interior walls can be inserted in the scene like an object as a wall with a fixed length
  • A wall covering can be quickly reset to its original state with a button on the left of the input area
  • This enables undesired “holes” in the covering, which can arise when moving dividing walls, to be fixed more easily
  • The position and properties of cameras automatically created with standard rooms or walls can now be adjusted in the dialog box
  • Objects from the CADENAS online database can be imported
  • Guide lines in 2D drawing can now be laid on their own layer to better differentiate between them and other drawing elements
  • Rectangles and hatches parallel to the axes in 2D drawings can be quickly created by inputting the diagonals
  • Tools and objects can be freely reshaped, extended and improved in the Editor
  • For reshaping objects you have the option to extrude faces and edit individual points
  • For laid tiles, the cutting is calculated and cut tiles can be shown in the scene
  • A button for cut tiles has been added to the “Lay” menu, which has been made clearer so that the tiling methods are more prominent
  • In the wood technology board, recognition of horizontal and vertical holes produced by adjacent connectors has been improved
  • In the wood technology board you have the option to transfer a pocket created by a connector to adjacent boards
  • The size of adopted connectors in the wood technology board can now be set separately
  • The thickness is now shown in the labels of edges in the wood technology board
  • The wood technology board shows the current coordinates of the mouse on the board
  • With DXF/DWG export from the wood technology board, connected lines are no longer exported as individual lines but as a polyline
  • With DXF/DWG export from the wood technology board, the part number is integrated into the name of the exported file

 

 

Palette CAD 9.11

  • In the Exposé you can set the sheet size individually for each sheet, independent of the currently active printer
  • The display of lines, text and dimensions in the Exposé has been fundamentally reworked so that these elements are now displayed as vectors rather than pixels
  • This means that, whereas the pixels were blurred, these elements will always look sharp when enlarged and when printed out
  • Line graphics now require significantly less memory when saving and printing
  • When an Exposé is exported as a PDF, lines and dimensions are transferred as vectors
  • The lines in the PDF can be edited in CAD programs, and the PDF also becomes considerably smaller
  • However, for technical reasons vector-optimized display cannot show any transparency in bitmaps when printed out
  • In Exposé print settings you can switch between the new vector-optimized display and the previous output as pixels
  • A “Calibrate size” button has been added to the “Change size” operation
  • This enables, for example, a PDF imported in sheet size to be adjusted to the actual size of a drawing by using Pick in the scene
  • With Rotate copy an offset can be entered along the axis of rotation and, for example, a coiled rotation can be created
  • In the Exposé the “Sketching” option has been reworked to give better results with round objects in particular
  • In the Exposé, the edges of overlapping objects can be rendered automatically at the point of overlap
  • Automatic backup is considerably faster, as textures and views in the Exposé are no longer saved
  • In the axonometric view, when you rotate a zoomed-in view the zoom remains the same
  • You can set the size and thereby display the background further away for a 360° Panorama used as a background image in the perspective
  • If an image type object is saved, the bitmap contained is saved directly with the object
  • This means it is no longer necessary to save a material when the image is to be transferred
  • Editing the form of floors and ceilings has been reworked and now behaves like editing the control points of a line
  • In the editor there is a new feature to deform objects and areas
  • If the connection to the software protection dongle is lost, the project can now still be saved before switching to demo mode
  • In the Drawing tab, the button for switching to the “2D project” drawing area has been moved from the Extras area to the Start so that this important feature is easier to find
  • Interior walls and installation walls adapt better to wall coverings (tiles) when they are connected to a wall
  • When laying tiles a patchwork can be created as a laying style
  • A patchwork is a way of laying tiles whereby the various tiles are automatically jumbled up without any two identical tiles being next to each other
  • The input process for creating tiling areas has been reworked
  • In the wood technology board, the inside and outside can be given a colour to make errors easier to recognize
  • In the wood technology board settings, a directory can be specified for the board database in order to select a unified database in multi-user operation
  • When importing tools in the wood technology board there is the option to clear the table before import
  • When wood technology boards are numbered, the part number is displayed in the title bar of a wood technology board


Well there you have it. We hope you made it all the way to the bottom of our Palette CAD update marathon. Something for everyone in there, of that we are sure. Enjoy!


Greetings from sunny Stuttgart
Your Palette CAD Blog Team





21 April 2017

Tip of the month! April: Tile cutting efficiency


Every 6 weeks Palette CAD releases an update, meaning tons of cool new features to try out. Sometimes you might not even have enough time to check them all out. This time for our TOTM feature we picked out a little gem that might have gone under the radar. It's perfect for tilers when it comes to tile ordering and cost calculations.

First part of the design is as usual. Make a room, add doors/windows and then lay the tiles as desired. Once the layout is complete, simply select "Cut tiles" from the Lay tab.


This will bring up a new window as seen below. It also allows for an overview of the entire project, as well as other useful information.


There is also the option to highlight the tiles that are cut, which can make it even easier with bigger or more complicated projects. To see the cut tiles just select "Mark cut tiles".


That's it, piece of cake. Give it a go and have some fun while you're at it!


Greetings from Stuttgart
Your Palette CAD Blog Team





24 March 2017

Tip of the month! March: Facebook 360° photos



There is no denying the growing role and impact of social media on marketing. This is exactly why we have added this cool feature to our existing panorama creator in Palette CAD. Now you can show off those awesome projects even easier, or use them to get a little extra exposure for your products and services on Facebook.

The groundwork is almost identical to creating the Palette Move panoramas. Start by positioning the active camera, in order to determine the viewing settings of your panorama. For best results, place the camera near the center of your plan, have the tilt angle at zero, and view height around 150-180cm. This will give the viewer a more immersive feeling, as if they are standing in the room. In perspective window you can see the starting point for your 360° image.


Once you are happy with the camara settings and positioning (don't forget about the ceiling in case it was hidden) , go to the file menu, and choose create panorama from the export features.


A new window will open with a number of options for your panorama. Decide on the quality and the visualisation style, and select save. More detailed explation of these options can be found in the Palette CAD help index (F1). The below window will pop up next. Choose a location to save, a name for your file and then make sure to change the save as type to panorama files for Facebook before clicking on save.


The image will now be rendered, which may take up to a few minutes depending on the quality options selected. The rest is very straight forward, just upload a photo in Facebook as usual, and select it from your computer when prompted.


The photo on your computer will appear as a normal image, as seen from the pic below, but once uploaded to Facebook should give you the option to look around freely.


That's all there is to it. You can find the 360° example from the plan above at our Facebook page, as well as, upload your own for our viewing pleasure. Funtastic!


Greetings from Stuttgart
Your Palette CAD Blog Team






17 February 2017

Tip of the month! February: Creating a virtual tour




This month we bring you a more detailed explanation of the new virtual tour feature from the last program update. Simply put, it allows you to load a number of panorama files, combine them and create a composite panorama file, a virtual tour. Really useful when presenting multiple rooms, or wishing to show a specific space from more angles. To get started, select virtual tour from the export options, found in the file menu.
 
 
What is a virtual tour?
  • A virtual tour is a panorama file that can consist of multiple panoramas

  • The file has the extension .ppan3 and can be viewed in Palette Move and in the Palette Cloud

  • The viewer can switch between panoramas

  • You can insert jump labels

  • When the viewer clicks on a jump label in a panorama, the program automatically loads a linked panorama

  • This allows you to create a virtual tour of a project, for example

What panoramas can be used?
  • All panoramas created in Palette CAD can be imported

  • This can be the current .ppan3 format and the older .ppan2 and .ppan formats

  • You can also import panorama photos in .jpg format

  • In addition, you can use a virtual tour to convert existing panoramas into the .ppan3 format





Importing panoramas into the virtual tour
  • Press the “Open” button to import a virtual tour in .ppan3 format

  • The “New” button starts a new, empty virtual tour

  • The “Add” button adds a panorama in .ppan, .ppan2, .ppan3 or .jpg format to the virtual tour



Editing individual panoramas
  • The “Panoramas” list shows the panoramas currently loaded along with a preview bitmap

  • When a panorama is selected in the list, the preview window on the right displays the panorama as in Palette Move

  • You can move around in the panorama and jump to other panoramas

  • You can rename a panorama

  • You can define the direction of viewing for a panorama

  • The direction of viewing is the orientation of the panorama when it is launched (e.g. by clicking on a jump label)

Saving the virtual tour
  • The virtual tour is saved as a file with the extension .ppan3

  • Basically, a virtual tour behaves the same way as a “simple” panorama

  • For example, a virtual tour can contain a single panorama, in which case it is identical to a “simple” panorama

  • You can use the “Create preview” to define which image to show when displaying the file

  • This preview bitmap for the virtual tour is displayed, for example, in Palette Move in the selection of loaded panoramas or in the Palette Cloud

  • Select a panorama

  • When you create a preview, the current setting of this panorama is saved as a preview for the virtual tour

What are jump labels?
  • A jump label is a marker (icon) in a panorama

  • When the viewer clicks on this jump label, the program loads another panorama

  • In Palette Move VR, all you need to do is look at the jump label

  • Before loading the panorama, the program performs an animated zoom to the jump label to simulate a movement

  • Placing jump labels at appropriate positions in the panoramas creates the impression of a tour

Setting and editing a jump label
  • You can set and edit jump labels in the currently active panorama on the “Jump labels” tab

  • On the left is list of jump labels in the panorama

  • When a jump label is selected, it is displayed blue in the panorama

  • New jump label: This button sets a new jump label in the active panorama

  • The program displays a list box containing the panoramas available in the virtual tour

  • Click on the position in the panorama

  • Delete: This button removes the selected jump label

  • Link: This button links the selected jump label to another panorama

  • The name of the panorama is automatically applied to the jump label 



There you have it, now time to give it a go yourselves, and don't forget to show off on our Facebook page to get some kudos. You can also check out the virtual tour from the pictures above, just visit www.palettecloud.net and enter the pin 83898354. Have fun!


Greetings from Stuttgart
Your Palette CAD Blog Team