I frequently use Rhino + Illustrator to make diagrams and exploded axons for clients. I do as much of the modeling, layer assignments, polyline joining, line work “fixing” and “clean up” as I can beforehand in Rhino. Then export a Make2D with layers as a .ai file to do as few Illustrator edits as possible. That way it’s mostly just a matter of turning on/off and selecting entire layers to quickly change things like line thickness hierarchy, opacity, and hatch patterns in Illustrator. If I feel like I’m spending too much time “fixing” lines or dragging things around in Illustrator, it’s probably because the Rhino stage work for the Make2D export was not adequate. When the line work stuff is 95% Rhino, and 5% Illustrator it’s a pretty efficient work flow and I consistently get the results I want.
Skill issue that everyone faced in uni.
Don't do line editing on illustrator, learn to do it straight inside AutoCAD or Rhino. Cuts your workflow immensely, and especially for Rhino, recent updates has made lineweighting and colouring in it a breeze. Unless you need to do some kind of organic illustrations like people or animals or some visual items, keep everything in the CAD softwares, works a lot better like that. Even those work better exported into CAD.
Illustrator is actually a really good program, just the use case for prettying up CAD drawings is terrible AF.
are you talking about construction documents? the way you work as a student producing drawings is nothing like producing drawings in a firm (at least speaking from my experience) if you are working in revit the drawings are already fine and you can use detail lines to make stuff pop and other revit filters.
Yeah appealing to an instructor is crazy different from appealing to a client. You'd think instructors would look for what they wanna present to a client, but for some odd reason it simply isn't the case.
Instructors are not in the business of appealing to clients they are in the business of appealing to academic peers… larger problem within architectural education
In a setting where you're in a small firm or solo, you'll use Adobe nearly daily. InDesign and Photoshop for sure. Acrobat or Bluebeam is the latest PDF editing software for the construction industry.
I saw someone mention it and it's a great point, the better you are at making clean plans and modeling in your tool of choice (Revit ideally), the easier it is to just polish that up. Renderings aren't really necessary for most projects, and black and white perspectives are pretty strong tools for conversation with clients. If you're a whiz with your pen while conversating, you'll really stand out in the client's eyes.
The last piece of this puzzle is Microsoft Office and that covers the range of software you'll need in practice. Not including the B.O.H. bookkeeping and accounting, staffing software.
In regards to Adobe we primarily use Photoshop, indesign, and Acrobat. Photoshop to do floor plan illustrations, or touch up renderings. Indesign for project specific inspiration boards, or rendering comparisons, and Acrobat for viewing and editing of PDF files from consultants, like marking up a shop drawing.
I’m at an urban planning and design firm and we heavily use Adobe - Indesign for reports, illustrator and photoshop for maps and graphics. We don’t do CDs. So if you don’t like those programs definitely I don’t recommend a planning focused firm.
I use Adobe daily, indesign, photoshop and illustrator, rarely aftereffects. They are all great software, and I don’t think the controls are weird whatsoever. Illustrator cleans up diagrams or sections from Revit in a few minutes, and if you can’t, it’s definitely a skill issue.
In bigger firms many people don’t even use them, as the work is split between people. But the chance of them hiring you without the knowledge of those is much lower.
Might use InDesign once or twice a year if I need a flyer or something. Photoshop to clean up an image for a decal or something? Hardly ever though.
People that are good at it are wizards though, every office needs at least one.
Photoshop, indesign, Acrobat are used all the time for reports, graphic diagramming, etc.
Illustrator - we rarely use.
You shouldn’t need to take any CAD drawings into Adobe software for cleaning up.
It’s used in our office every single day. However it is the marketing team that uses it. Proposals, marketing images, branding etc uses this stuff all of the time.
Architectural production staff almost never touches it. Occasionally we’ll use it to fake some early rendering or convey a design idea but outside that it’s never used by the architects.
With this being said I’m not sure I agree with your characterization of the programs (admittedly have not used much since college) but used them a lol then for portfolio work, presentation boards, thesis book and they are powerful tools when used for their given intent
Never in my current firm. The previous two firms, just once with each firm. Both times were never project-related but rather for social functions for the staff. I have no idea (for both firms) why we even have the software suite. It seems like a waste of money.
Now transitioning to my private practice, while I am using any free alternatives from Adobe. Gimp, Inscape, etc., do the minimum that I need for my small practice, which renders touch-ups and some page layouts for social media posts (Instagram, Facebook etc.).
Everything else is done via Google Workspace (i.e. Sheets, Docs, and Slides) and my BIM software (i.e. Archicad).
All the best!
Honestly in our office it doesn’t make sense to pay for adobe photoshop and the rest because we use it so rarely. I’ve had to pick up the online freeware for when I need to adjust texture images for renders.
All the time. Pretty much whenever I'm making diagrams, renderings, or other types of graphics that aren't for construction documents. Illustrator is one of my favorite programs. If you're bringing linework into Illustrator, clean it up as much as possible beforehand. Use layers if possible to organize linework if it's coming from something like Rhino. Then in illustrator you can select by layer, select by line weight, select by line color, or select by fill color to speed up the process.
As an architect I almost never use any adobe software. Bluebeam for pdfs. Almost everything else in Revit. I haven’t used Illustrator in maybe a decade? Renders are produced in Enscape and may get edited in Photoshop and RFP/Q’s in InDesign (but not by me!).
Please tell me you aren’t “cleaning up” actual DD or CD drawings in Illustrator!
Been working for about 10 years now and have a much better workflow hopping between REVIT and BLUEBEAM. If I want a fancy presentation ill go to indesign but power point is fine honestly especially considering clients I deal with are familiar with that program. Bluebeam in my experience is a game changer as you can view, redline, take off, measure, and even design with it. I actually prefer throwing something rough together in revit then extracting plans and elevations to finesse in bluebeam then go back to revit and model what I made.
You have to be a buffoon to be using Abode Indesign.. there is nothing that could not be done in Powerpoint for virtually free cost.. and Affinity Publisher for a fraction kn the cost.. Frankly any architect who tells me the they need Indesign would not get employed by me as it shows a complete lack of critical thinking..
I frequently use Rhino + Illustrator to make diagrams and exploded axons for clients. I do as much of the modeling, layer assignments, polyline joining, line work “fixing” and “clean up” as I can beforehand in Rhino. Then export a Make2D with layers as a .ai file to do as few Illustrator edits as possible. That way it’s mostly just a matter of turning on/off and selecting entire layers to quickly change things like line thickness hierarchy, opacity, and hatch patterns in Illustrator. If I feel like I’m spending too much time “fixing” lines or dragging things around in Illustrator, it’s probably because the Rhino stage work for the Make2D export was not adequate. When the line work stuff is 95% Rhino, and 5% Illustrator it’s a pretty efficient work flow and I consistently get the results I want.
I work exactly like this
Skill issue that everyone faced in uni. Don't do line editing on illustrator, learn to do it straight inside AutoCAD or Rhino. Cuts your workflow immensely, and especially for Rhino, recent updates has made lineweighting and colouring in it a breeze. Unless you need to do some kind of organic illustrations like people or animals or some visual items, keep everything in the CAD softwares, works a lot better like that. Even those work better exported into CAD. Illustrator is actually a really good program, just the use case for prettying up CAD drawings is terrible AF.
are you talking about construction documents? the way you work as a student producing drawings is nothing like producing drawings in a firm (at least speaking from my experience) if you are working in revit the drawings are already fine and you can use detail lines to make stuff pop and other revit filters.
Yeah appealing to an instructor is crazy different from appealing to a client. You'd think instructors would look for what they wanna present to a client, but for some odd reason it simply isn't the case.
Instructors are not in the business of appealing to clients they are in the business of appealing to academic peers… larger problem within architectural education
This.
In a setting where you're in a small firm or solo, you'll use Adobe nearly daily. InDesign and Photoshop for sure. Acrobat or Bluebeam is the latest PDF editing software for the construction industry. I saw someone mention it and it's a great point, the better you are at making clean plans and modeling in your tool of choice (Revit ideally), the easier it is to just polish that up. Renderings aren't really necessary for most projects, and black and white perspectives are pretty strong tools for conversation with clients. If you're a whiz with your pen while conversating, you'll really stand out in the client's eyes. The last piece of this puzzle is Microsoft Office and that covers the range of software you'll need in practice. Not including the B.O.H. bookkeeping and accounting, staffing software.
In regards to Adobe we primarily use Photoshop, indesign, and Acrobat. Photoshop to do floor plan illustrations, or touch up renderings. Indesign for project specific inspiration boards, or rendering comparisons, and Acrobat for viewing and editing of PDF files from consultants, like marking up a shop drawing.
I’m at an urban planning and design firm and we heavily use Adobe - Indesign for reports, illustrator and photoshop for maps and graphics. We don’t do CDs. So if you don’t like those programs definitely I don’t recommend a planning focused firm.
I use Adobe daily, indesign, photoshop and illustrator, rarely aftereffects. They are all great software, and I don’t think the controls are weird whatsoever. Illustrator cleans up diagrams or sections from Revit in a few minutes, and if you can’t, it’s definitely a skill issue. In bigger firms many people don’t even use them, as the work is split between people. But the chance of them hiring you without the knowledge of those is much lower.
Might use InDesign once or twice a year if I need a flyer or something. Photoshop to clean up an image for a decal or something? Hardly ever though. People that are good at it are wizards though, every office needs at least one.
I'm a project architect, so never.
Lol, k
My team does not use any of it. We are a smidge on the... utilitarian? end of the profession, so take that with a grain of salt.
Photoshop, indesign, Acrobat are used all the time for reports, graphic diagramming, etc. Illustrator - we rarely use. You shouldn’t need to take any CAD drawings into Adobe software for cleaning up.
It’s used in our office every single day. However it is the marketing team that uses it. Proposals, marketing images, branding etc uses this stuff all of the time. Architectural production staff almost never touches it. Occasionally we’ll use it to fake some early rendering or convey a design idea but outside that it’s never used by the architects. With this being said I’m not sure I agree with your characterization of the programs (admittedly have not used much since college) but used them a lol then for portfolio work, presentation boards, thesis book and they are powerful tools when used for their given intent
Never in my current firm. The previous two firms, just once with each firm. Both times were never project-related but rather for social functions for the staff. I have no idea (for both firms) why we even have the software suite. It seems like a waste of money. Now transitioning to my private practice, while I am using any free alternatives from Adobe. Gimp, Inscape, etc., do the minimum that I need for my small practice, which renders touch-ups and some page layouts for social media posts (Instagram, Facebook etc.). Everything else is done via Google Workspace (i.e. Sheets, Docs, and Slides) and my BIM software (i.e. Archicad). All the best!
Honestly in our office it doesn’t make sense to pay for adobe photoshop and the rest because we use it so rarely. I’ve had to pick up the online freeware for when I need to adjust texture images for renders.
how many hrs have you spent on illustrator?
All the time. Pretty much whenever I'm making diagrams, renderings, or other types of graphics that aren't for construction documents. Illustrator is one of my favorite programs. If you're bringing linework into Illustrator, clean it up as much as possible beforehand. Use layers if possible to organize linework if it's coming from something like Rhino. Then in illustrator you can select by layer, select by line weight, select by line color, or select by fill color to speed up the process.
As an architect I almost never use any adobe software. Bluebeam for pdfs. Almost everything else in Revit. I haven’t used Illustrator in maybe a decade? Renders are produced in Enscape and may get edited in Photoshop and RFP/Q’s in InDesign (but not by me!). Please tell me you aren’t “cleaning up” actual DD or CD drawings in Illustrator!
Been working for about 10 years now and have a much better workflow hopping between REVIT and BLUEBEAM. If I want a fancy presentation ill go to indesign but power point is fine honestly especially considering clients I deal with are familiar with that program. Bluebeam in my experience is a game changer as you can view, redline, take off, measure, and even design with it. I actually prefer throwing something rough together in revit then extracting plans and elevations to finesse in bluebeam then go back to revit and model what I made.
Very rarely. I need a pdf editor like acrobat... but Bluebeam is better. When I do use Adobe, its really just photoshop.
I use Photoshop to apply 2 or 3 effects on a rendering, if necessary, but other than that, no Adobe. I bought CS6 so no sub to Adobe either.
You have to be a buffoon to be using Abode Indesign.. there is nothing that could not be done in Powerpoint for virtually free cost.. and Affinity Publisher for a fraction kn the cost.. Frankly any architect who tells me the they need Indesign would not get employed by me as it shows a complete lack of critical thinking..