Architect's site plan
Place by click puts the middle of the drawing where you click, which
gets it close. Move by then shifts it a stated number of metres at a time, which is how
the last few metres get done — drop the step to 0.5 m once the roads nearly line up.
Scale it by typing the real width of the drawing, then rotate until the roads
line up with the photography. On sloping ground raise the lift until it clears the
surface where you are tracing.
Existing buildings
Edit shape puts yellow corners on the boundary to drag, and the
corner buttons under Massing add and remove them. The cut and the pad re-sample when
you let go. Use Plan view to work on the outline from above.
Cuts the existing buildings out of Google's mesh inside the shape you draw,
so a new scheme doesn't grow out of the old roofs — instead of compositing two renders in
Photoshop. It removes the ground as well, so a flat pad goes in at the sampled height. Drape
the site plan over it and that becomes your ground.
Massing
Facade
Select a block, pick what you are marking, then click the two
points on its outline where that stretch starts and ends. It can run round a corner. Escape
gives up.
The dot beside each block in the list hides it. That is a working aid for
seeing past one mass to what is behind it — a hidden block is still in the project and still
goes into the KMZ.
Solidity applies to the selected block. With nothing selected it sets
every block at once, and what the next one will be. Solid is right for judging what a scheme hides from a camera; turn it down to trace a
footprint over the site plan underneath. It carries through to the KMZ.
Base nudge raises or lowers the selected block against the ground
measured under it. The measurement is kept separately, so re-measuring — after clearing an
area, say — does not undo the nudge. Leave it at 0 unless a block plainly sits wrong.
Click a block to select it, then drag the yellow corners to reshape
it. Height and colour apply to the selected block, or set the next one before you draw. The
corner buttons work on the cleared area too, when that is the shape being edited.
Click round the footprint, then double-click or press Enter to close it.
Backspace undoes a point, Escape abandons it. New blocks take the height above.
