Marion Mukolwe

I still have not found an intuitive terrain modelling platform for us landscape architects.
Rhino can produce nice surfaces, which can be pulled and pushed to get the aethetics right, but its contours are inaccurate and, unlike Civil 3D, very static. Civil 3D on the other hand is very dynamic and great in live sections and contours, but falls…[Read more]

Thanks RFox. I’m going to download a trial copy of Rhino and play around with it. I did that a few months ago with AutoCAD Civil and found the new interface pretty intuitive. I still need something that’ll be a simple interface with a landscape design focus. Right now, I don’t need super high-quality rendering capabilities, but I would like to…[Read more]

Personally, I would recommend Rhino 4.0. It is an extremely easy to learn platform and combines 2D and 3D design quite well. Plus there are really good render engine plugins like Vray.

Rhino is also very good at importing and exporting a wide variety of different file types from Autocad to Digital Projects to Maya. I don’t know the exact pricing…[Read more]

im going to put up a new “discussion” called image of the week, ill post it on mondays because its everyone’s favorite day.

Thanks guys. I’ve seen many of the previous discussions on this topic. Reviewing my last post, I realized I had mentioned I had been running LandCAD. That part was true. However, I have not been using LandCAD. In fact, I haven’t used it for a single project. I couldn’t get out of the tutorial phase. The LandCAD folks have offered me extremely…[Read more]

John – this question keeps popping up and is a testament of the range of aspirations, skill sets and experiences out there in the industry.
I have seen them all and to date, I have not seen THE tool for landscape architects. We have to use various platforms to deliver the wide range of services we provide.

There are quite a few parameters to this…[Read more]

I personally would go with Autocad over Vectorworks for a couple reasons. To start, Autocad is the industry standard as far as drafting goes so alot more people know the program. Also, as more schools push digital rendering, more and more students are using software like 3ds Max and Revit which don’t play well with Vectorworks linework. On the…[Read more]

I’ve just started a one-person design firm specializing in residential. I’m trying to decide between the various cad programs and think Vectorworks would be the best fit for me. I have owned EaglePoint LandCADD (2000) but was running with its stand-alone cad engine (not AutoCAD). Now, years later, I’m really thinking it’s time to try again with…[Read more]

Thanks for that book, that is great.

This is also a really good tutorial (in four steps) pretty complicated when it gets to the post processing stuff though.
http://en.9jcg.com/comm_pages/blog_content-art-129.htm

I’ve got a very straight forward manual for 3ds Max called “3ds Max Architectural Visualization.” I use it all the time for reference and unlike most program manuals its very easy to follow. Pretty much covers all the basics. Just follow this link and the password is “dallas”.

https://filestogeaux.lsu.edu/public/download.php?FILE=lattin1/313674GOBf0

David Fano is really good, he worked (works?) at SHoP architects in NY and has started a consulting company that show firms how to implement digital technology.

Plus he is very active on the site so you can ask him questions or request he do a tutorial on something.

checked out designreform. havent taken a look at any tutorials yet but looks promising. quite a few tutorials, thanks for the link… ill check it out when i have time to breathe

David Fano at http://www.designreform.net has some excellent 3DS tutorials. His are focused on 3DS as a design tool and not visualisation.

He also has good grasshopper, rhino, and revit tutorials.

a comment to JJ comment (?)
“The greatest designer is normal people—the best cities in the world were not designed” – my frien i think we may include that in the design category. not in the academic kind, but in the category of the design made by specific needs of people, but is design.
if t. Church said that the gardens are made for people (and…[Read more]

I’m Curious if anyone else out there is interested in design focused on including all people and not segregating th popluation into can and can nots. See the following link it has some great information.

http://www.beyondaccess.org/tutorials/design%20tutorials.htm

Hello everyone !!

I wanted to share something that I found which I believe might be of interest for some of us. It is a conference that will be held in Harvard University called “Ecological Urbanism”.

Right now there is not so much information about it but It will be interesting to see what will result from it. I believe the concept of landscape…[Read more]

See today’s blog post for a conference on therapeutic environments in the UK in May, and also scroll down for info on a campaign by the American Cancer Society, early-spring bloomers to brighten the healing garden, and a review of an excellent movie, The Garden: http://tldb.blogspot.com/.

Welcome new members – feel free to post comments or start…[Read more]

Steve,
I just so happen to be installing a RainMaster Oasis, with 15 controllers and a Weather Center II, and will be completing installation of the controls this week. All seems to be going well with installation and configuration.

Let me know if you need any additional information. I can update you when system is up and running.

Regards,
Paul

Hello,
Has anyone spec’d or installed the Rainmaster Weather Center II on-site weather station? It looks like this is a weather station with some commercial qualities. I’m looking to spec. it in a urban community center project.

thanks,

steve