Hi Eric, this looks like a great project, I would be interested in that book.!
Hope you keep us posted on it's progress.

Marc

Eric,

not that MOI isn´t a great piece of software, and I personally haven´t done any architectural designing with MOI, but from just a quick glimpse at your visualization I can tell you that you definitely want to look into the free version of Sketchup. Combine that free version of Sketchup with the free version of Doublecad XT, and you have a pretty much very useful package for simple modeling. Sketchup models are imported very quickly into DCad, and you can then very quickly generate layouts and dimensioned views and sections.

MOI is way more versatile for creating mechanical things, and I love the more organic approach you can take with it, but it´s something completely different to what I as an architect would actually use for day to day work.

Hi Mike ..
Thanks. I have tried Sketchup many times and even bought an early version of it after being a beta tester. I know it is a good program but have never felt very comfortable with it. I will check out Doublecad XT.
Thanks again,
eric

Hi ..
Here is the type of illustration I was wanting to do when I started this discussion.

This is done with MoI .. a high res screen capture and then on to Inkscape ... finally to PhotoShop to convert to a .jpg file.

All I did with Inkscape was to erase a few lines I could not hide adequately with MoI and then the hex keys and the text,

It turned out to not be a difficult job and it gets the information across.

cheers,
eric

Here is another illustration of a foundation detail variation.
The model is completely MoI using the high resolution screen capture Michael developed the script for.
The symbols, pointers and text were added using OpenOffice Draw ... a free program. It turned out to be the simplest to use illustration program I have found for free.
For me the days of 2d architectural details are about gone .. MoI makes it so simple.
cheers,
eric

Eric, that illustration looks really good!

And I can immediately see the difference between the u.s. and Europe ;) The corner where the vertical and horizontal part of the foundation meet is at 90 degrees, allowing potential water to sit there, whereas over here in Europe that corner usually needs to have the isolation lead water away from the foundation at with two 135 degree angles http://www.tektorum.de/attachments/hochbau-konstruktion-planung/175d1107940878-bauko-2-schaliges-mw-fundament-bla.gif

But I digress :lol

I must admit, now I am tempted to start sketching up details in MOI ...

Yes, Mike..
Yours is a better detail for getting water away.
Yes, MoI is a great tool for this.
thanks,
eric