OK, we've started our plan out right by first calling HighRise to do the vertical planning We've arranged for four levels, and we have the lower two of those levels )the basement and the main floor) on Punch! Floors 2 and 3, respectively. So we start building our house by switching Punch! to Floor 2 (where our basement will soon be) and starting to build.
In the upper lefthand corner of Floor 1 there is the table of values that we asked HighRise to leave there for us (we could also have printed it out. If we forgot to do that, we can run HighRise again, press the Back to design button, press Next and Print it from there as well.) The table tells us whet we need to set various parameters to as we work on the house. For example, in the basement level (on Floor 2), we can draw the basement (foundation) walls using the Exterior Wall tool, the one that shows a wall with grass growing around it.
We use it all around the perimeter of the proposed house *this one is a simple rectangle, but it is only an example; your might be more complicated.) Once we've done that we need to make sure it adhere's to our design - in particular, it should have all four (or whatever many) walls elevated and sized (height) properly, and that the autofloor is correctly sized. Lasso the four walls, right click on the elevation slider on the left edge of the plan window and select Set Elevation. It will display the elevations of the walls in inches - change that setting to the value on the table under the column header "Wall Elevation". Similarly, check their heights in the wall properties menu on the right (in AS3000, ACHES and version 8 products); for AS18 you will need to right-click on each wall and set the heights in the Wall Segment Properties, and set the correct values from the "Wall Height" column. Finally, check in the properties that autofloor is checked and that the thickness of the autofloor is set to the value in the Floor Thickness column.
I've also added some windows for realism's sake, and textured the basement walls in concrete. I added texture to the insides. Note another thing I added: a note to myself on each floor, telling me what I'm looking at. Even with the reminder box on the top of the window telling which levels are on which floors, these little pieces of text have proven to be the best way to keep from becoming confused about what floor I'm editing.
At this point it becomes possible to worry about the terrain. Remember that we requested a basement depth of 80:. In versions of Punch! before AS4000 this will have been taken care of by HighRise, but in AS4000 we need to do this ourselves. I loaded the Terrain Designer and built a drainage berm around the house that starts at zero elevation on the edges of the drawing and slopes upwards toward the house up to 80". Certainly lots of other designs are possible. Remember to generate the terrain (the button in the upper right, and save the terrain near your plan, as it is now a part of the in concept, if not physically.
The main floor builds in the same way as the basement - draw the walls, adjust their parameters, then add windows and doors, texture and paint. I also added a porch and a deck, using the deck tools. The porch is textured with brick rather than decking, so it looks real and substantial.
Now we've exhausted all the editing we can do from here; we need to call HighRise to make the third floor available to Punch! for editing. All it takes is calling up HighRise, selecting the bedroom level (note that two of the ceiling height parameters need to be adjusted afterwards), and tell it to Swap. Change the required ceiling heights and delete the reminders.
(Tutorial continued on the next page.)
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