Perspective puts that roof on, letting you see how the house is shaping up from the outside. Doll House for instance removes the roof and allows you see inside each room and corridor. You have access to various 2D and 3D views, including this interesting ‘glass house’ effect (Image credit: Chief Architect)īut you can also see everything from a 3D perspective, and you’re not limited to just one view. The interface is clever enough to notice when you add another wall, and if you click close enough to an existing one, it will assume the new wall starts from there, and won’t leave you with frustrating little gaps that would be a pain to fix later on. As you drag them you’ll immediately start seeing how long it will be (you get to choose your preferred measuring system: antiquated feet and inches, or the more modern and precise metric system). Perhaps the most obvious start is adding walls. It might look a little intimidating at first, but you get the gist of it very quickly. The largest part of the interface is dedicated to your design, with all the tools you need crammed in a sidebar to the left, rows of icons at the top, and a library on the right. For the sake of this review, we’ve taken a look at the Suite package on a Mac. If you’re not sure which one to choose, Chief Architect offers you a trial version which you can check out and decide which features suit you best. There are also upgrade prices for those who already own a previous version. Further, if you’ve paid for 12 consecutive months, you can own the software outright (sort of a rent to buy option). Finally, Pro costs a hefty $595 (or $495 with the current price reduction), and you also have the option of renting that software for $59 a month. Architectural would set you back $249 (or $199 if the current offer is still valid by the time you read this). You can get it for $129, although it is currently on offer at $99. If you’ve tried some other home design apps you’ll know that some apps just leave you with a bunch of tiny icons that you have to try and decode without any help, so this is a very welcome feature.Don’t be put off though: Suite is still incredibly capable, and most likely would suit most people’s needs. That tells you what each tool does as you move the mouse over it. We’re glad to see that the little tutorial window has been retained. We particularly like the tracing option, which you can use to mimic existing blueprints which you can then edit to suit your own requirements and which enables you to combine elements from different floorplans.Īs before, you can also add your own digital photos to the design: you can even include pictures of your family to help you visualize how the finished project will look - or perhaps to persuade your partner that they’ll love what you’re designing. Tools such as automatic wall snapping and one-click window placement take a lot of the effort out of creating even complex plans, and if you’re already used to home planning software you can import your previous plans. That’s really helpful if you don’t have an architectural background. Although your plans will be created in 2D, the actual design takes place in a 3D environment. The latest version of Virtual Architect Ultimate retains the strengths of its previous version. Although the minimum specification here is a 2GHz or faster processor with 4GB of RAM and 1GB of graphics memory, that spec is not going to deliver the optimal experience: on a 2.5GHz Core i5-4200M processor with 8GB of memory and 1GB integrated graphics, the app ran very slowly in 3D mode. There’s another similarity between version ten and version nine: it may run very slowly on low-powered laptops.
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