Architectural Rendering - HELP!

Question

Can someone please direct me to a source of info for rendering Autocad drawings? I have years of Autocad exp. but only 16 hours of AI coursework.
My Boss expects architectural renderings now(!) and I need the basic info to get going. Nothing at learning center covered setting up a building to be rendered. I can figure out the rest (hopefully) once I have something on screen to draw.
Any info is greatly appreciated!!!
Thank you,
Scott

Answer 1

Much better. Some specifics to go on.
> I have a 2d Autocad (R14) elevation and a floor plan. I can create a side elevation if necessary.
What is the elevation you already have, if not a side elevation? Are you just saying it's a front elevation?
> I need to import this into AI and create a perspective to render.
I assume you want a 2D converging perspective (vanishing point perspective), not a parallel perspective (axonometric), not a true conic perspective generated by 3D construction.
> Question 1: Can I model this in 3d in AI, or do I need to create the perspective in Autocad (2009) prior to importing?
Illustrator is a 2D vector drawing program that uses Bezier curves to define its paths. It has a very limited 3D tool (3D Effect) that is mostly intended for simple extrusion and lathing of standalone objects, like "superman" headlines, the occasional blocky graphic object, etc., not for multi-object constructions in the same 3D space.
For example, AI's 3D Effect can't even take two extruded objects in the same coordinate system and rotate one of them 90 degrees relative to the other. In fact, 3D Effect can't even apply a different extrusion depth to one of the objects in the same orientation. Very very lame for any serious 3D construction. Mere kid stuff comared to any decent 3D modeller.
3D Effect
can be put to use in constructing axonometric models, because axonometric effectively puts the "vanishing point" at infinity; so the individual objects can effectively share the same "vanishing point" despite 3D Effect's inability to actually do that in the same 3D space. So you can build an elaborate assembly as individual pieces and just deal with the z-stacking order manually.
But "arcitectural rendering" usually means an "artists conception" in some kind of vanishing point perspective.
Other than its 3D Effect feature, then, AI is stricly a 2D drawing program. As such, you can
construct a traditional 2D vanishing point perspective, just as you would have on-the-board before CAD software was commonplace. But Illustrator doesn't even have any significant dedicated feature to facilitate proper 2D perspective construction. (Adobe FreeHand does.)
You
could "cleverly" use 3D Effect to help facilitate that construction. For example, in the case of a house, you could draw the walls of floorplan as closed paths, extrude the whole floorplan vertically to form the walls, and even give that resulting object a converging perspective. But you could not then extrude the roofline in the perpendicular direction in the same overall coordinate system. So you'd have to tediously "eyeball" that.
But you could use a few such 3D Effect objects as a "starting sketch" to then set up your perspective scheme by effectively tracing the 3D blocks, and then fleshing out the rendering by drawing 2D.
Probably not the kind of quick turn-around your boss is looking for.
> Question 2: Once imported, how do I convert the lines into something friendly I can work with?
The chronic problem with importing CAD drawings into Bezier programs like Illustrator is the nature of most common CAD program export formats. AI can import 2D DXF. But the
export of the 2D DXF from the CAD program usually converts everything to plotter-language-like pen-up, pen-down straight line segments that are
visually connected, but
actually a kazillion individual disconnected paths. Some CAD programs have improved this situation over the years. Depends upon your version of AutoCad. You may be able to flatten your 3D model to a 2D view and then export as EPS, which might result in more properly useful Bezier curves. (I'm not up on all the AutoCAD version specifics; where I work, Engineering uses CATIA.)
Someone will jump in in a minute and sing the praises of the kid stuff "LivePaint" feature, which essentially can serve as a flood-fill tool to create closed paths within the visually-closed regions of your disjointed imported DXF linework. But from a practical, business-expedient workflow standpoint, you're still going to have alot of hand-drawing and cleanup to do.
So bottom line points:
* You're barking up the wrong tree with Illustrator if your boss is expecting a quick rendering solution for 3D models you have constructed a CAD modeller.
* If you do insist on using Illustrator for this, you would be much better off if you can generate a 3D model perspective in the CAD program, flatten it to a 2D perspective view, and then import that 2D drawing into AI for "colorization" and adding other aesthetic elements.
* Other mainsteram 2D programs in Illustrator's category are better at this. Corel Designer, for example, expressly embraces technical drawing (AI often actually seems downright contrary to it), and can do the 2D flattening of major CAD file formats on import. I suspect you would be vastly more ahead-of-the-game if you used Designer instead of Illustrator.
* If your goal is to have most of the actual rendering generated for you, you would be still better off using a 3D modeling program that can import your 3D model
as a 3D model, and that has its own rendering engine(s), and that lets you then flesh out the model with trees, landscape, sky, etc.
> Sorry if this is simplistic sounding, but that's where I'm at.
Sorry if this is disappointing, but that's where Illustrator is at. AI is arguably more a
graphic design program than (even a 2D)
illustration program. It has precious few features dedicated to facilitate (even traditional 2D) perspective construction.
That's certainly not to say you can't use AI for architectural renderings. Many AI users do. But it's mostly a process of drawing a new piece of 2D artwork from scratch, with the imported CAD elevations serving as mostly proportional guides. Overall, it's the electronic equivalent of drawing a 2D rendering on a drafting board with a T-square and triangles. The end result is stylistically 2D (nothing wrong with that). But it's not the kind of quick-turnaround, automated, CAD-model-to-shaded-rendering process it sounds like your boss is anticipating. And doing it will involve a significant learning curve for you, embracing all the object-specific path drawing, coloring, and manipulation tools in the program.
JET