Vectorworks Question

[Plupo]

How do you guys go about showing "yoked out" fixtures on your plots? In the same vein (and probably slightly more common) how do you show lights hung on different areas of the truss? I'm working on a plot where I have fixtures hung from the top, bottom, and vertical rungs of a 2' box truss and I can't seem to concoct a clean way to show them on a 2D plot.


Thanks!

PL

 

[theatricalmatt]

First, I would treat each "location" on the truss as its own lighting position -- top chord, bottom chord, verticals. Make certain they show up this way in your instrument schedule in Lightwright.

You can draft units as being yoked out. You may want to edit the 3D symbol to create a fixture whose yoke is orientated the way you want it to be and use that rather than a standard symbol.

Depending on how complex the plot is -- and yours sounds reasonably complex -- I might draw a detail for a specific area, perhaps isolating all the units on the top chord on one detail, all the units on the bottom on a second, all the units on the verticals on a third, etc. A simpler way is just to put in a note (in the generous font size) pointing either to specific units or the lighting position in general describing which units are to be yoked out.

 

[fbrault]

Hi Plupo,

At the bottom of the Object Info palette with a lighting device object selected, you will see a checkbox called "3D orientation".

Ticking this check box will reveal 2 fields for X and Y adjustments. For yoking out, you can type in 90° in the Y Field. For overhanging you can type 180° in the same field.

There is no way to show the lighting position with all those different configurations in the top/plan view. The conventions of drafting don't provide for that without either a detail, a note or another view such as front and/or section.

Actually, this is the same problem when you're drafting with paper and a pencil.

However, if you use shipping content and/or the built-in objects such as the Straight Truss object in the Spotlight toolset, these objects are hybrid and so have the 3D geometry built in, and can easily be shown with a Viewport on a Sheet Layer in front or side view.

The labels can even be shown in these views with the 3D label legend improvements that were introduced recently in Vectorworks Spotlight.

If you convert your truss to lighting positions, you can "hang" the lighting device automatically on the bottom chord. Adjust the elevation for the top chord by entering the trim height plus the 2 feet vertical height of the truss in the Z field near the top of the Object Info palette with the lighting device selected.

Hope this helps!