Chief Architect User Stories

[Emily Black]

Chief Architect Inc began selling software in 1992. We have come a long way since that first release and would like you to join us in our 20 year celebration. Please share your Chief story with our user community. New or old, let us know how you are using the software or how the software has impacted your business!

[dshall]

Share your Chief Architect story with our user community. New or old, let us know how you are using the software or how the software has impacted your business!

Oh my gosh. Great question. CA has changed my business in more ways than I want to spend time detailing. Bottom line, it has increased my hourly rate by 33%. But the real question is.... is it costing my clients more? No!. My clients are getting a more accurate and more detailed set of plans for the same price they were paying 25 years ago...................... with the added benefit of 3D renderings. And................ and.................... my clients can come into my office, make some relatively radically changes, and before they get back into there office, I have emailed them a set of PDF's and plans WITH colored 3D renderings................. maybe I am exagerrating a little, but not very much.

CA is a godsend................ I could not imagine going back to the old days.

PS: Do I get paid for this glowing review? Heck fire, maybe I should pay you guys..........

[perryh]

Chief has allowed me to stay way ahead of my competition. I can blow any 2d company out of the water. In fact I encourage any perspective client to shop around and come back to me. This has happened many times. Thanks Chief.

EDIT: Woops Just got another one away from a 2d company.

Perry

[dshall]

Chief has allowed me to stay way ahead of my competition. I can blow any 2d company out of the water. In fact I encourage any perspective client to shop around and come back to me. This has happened many times. Thanks Chief.

Perry

P and I thinking alike. I love it when my clients try somebody else. They come back and don't hate me as much. Yeah, thanks CA.

[sutcac]

Not sure of the exact date, but I started using 3D Home Architect Deluxe (or something to that effect) around 1995, when Broderbund was still on the box. I would print my drawings out on 8-1/2x11, tape them together, and then get a vellum scan of that to do additional notes & such back when I was a design-build contractor. Even this was an amazing improvement in production over pencil drafting.

My first full version of Chief Architect was 6.0. I might have skipped Version 7 (was there one?) but pretty sure I have had every other version.

Even in this depressed building environment, I still raised my hourly rate because Chief has made my process increasingly efficient, and my clients don't get charged any more, often less.

Chief is an amazing product for its target market. It is an essential tool for my architectural practice.

[pintodesign]

Like Bryce, I too started with 3D Home architect in 1995. I quickly upgraded to Chief version 3.1. Sometimes back then, I would call it "chump architect", but I think that was mostly user error
Been using Chief ever since, and I get nothing but glowing reviews about how fast I get changes made and the great 3d tools. For me, it's mostly about construction documents, so the more advanced raytracing capabilities are less important.
It has made my business more productive in ways too numerous to list. Yes - we can blow the 2d people out of the water.
Thank you Chief, and all the folks on the forum for the help and insight over the years!
Barb

ps. I think CA should send a t-shirt to those of us that are longtime users...just a thought

[DON SHUMAN]

I got on board with CA with version-2. It didn't have many bells or whistles back then to do a really good set of working plans for example; on the electrical plan it was better to just use a dashed curved line to connect the fixtures to the switches. and place a 2 or a 3 beside the switch to show it was a 2-way or a 3-way switch Just as one of the few examples I could remember; But now we have the electrical connect button. As time went on I played with it more and more as each version came out and now I'm on X4 things are much better for us Southerners in the Great State of Texas due to the brick/stone exteriors we work with on walls and the way the garage foundation works in X4. With my health & eye issues I have had over the last 3-4yrs I'm to a point I feel can get back into using CA to draw house plans again. It has been good to Grow up with Chief and all their hard working staff through the years. Keep it up & God Bless All !!!! Thanks for the memories and I pray we have many more GOOD & HAPPY memories through many more years with lots of friendly & helpful Chief Architect Users and Staff.

[David J. Potter]

I started out in this business with onion paper, graph paper and a set of stencils, oh and lots of erasers.
I was working for the largest remodeling firm in Central Texas and the boss decided we would modernize using old Apple PC's that had a 9" diagonal screen.
None of the programs we tried really cut the mustard and one day an Architect that helped us with permit drawings suggested we try 3-D Home Architect by Advanced Relational Technologies and distributed by Broderbund.
After a couple of weeks I complained of barriers and short-falls of this program and asked our Architect friend if they had something better. He of course recommended Chief Architect, then Version 4.
There is nothing so joyous as helping others bring their Dreams to reality, being an important part of that creative process. The looks of wonder and appreciation I get working with people, helping, has given me profound joy and satisfaction, knowing I have contributed to the comfort, satisfaction and quality of Lives, doing the work, I have chosen and that I love.
A man is alive as he helps others; Chief Architect Inc has given me the tools I need to keep doing that and made me very glad to be alive.

DJP

[Allen Brown]

OK, that might be a little bit of a stretch, but maybe not.

I started drafting by hand on paper while doing custom woodworking projects, then got into whole house remodeling, then into new home building. I then purchased Chief Version 8, and started drawing just my own plans for projects I was building.

In 2004, I fell 12' off a roof, & ended up in a wheel chair for 3 months, and off work for a total of 6 months. During my time off, I decided that I didn't want that to ever happen again, so I spent that time off pouring through the training videos, and practicing, practicing, practicing. Once I was able to walk on crutches, I went out knocking on the doors of builders & others I knew in the business, and started pushing my design services. I got a couple of shots from some builders I knew, & it worked out just right.

I was pretty sure that the next time I fell off a roof, it would probably kill me, so Chief Architect allowed me to change careers, therefore keeping me off roofs for good!

[David J. Potter]

Allen, that is a great story (except the falling off the roof part), it is a great story because you "saved your own Life" by taking positive action when presented with adversity; that is COOL!

DJP

[Barton Brown]

This is a story of a non-professional’s use of Chief Architect (CA).

As an engineer (EE) by training and profession, I am fascinated with modeling software. In 1998 I purchased 3D Home Design as a way to help my wife and I conceptualize our retirement home. By 2000 I had upgraded to CA V7 and have subsequently upgraded to each new version as it was available. Between 2000 and 2006 we “tried on for size” many house designs which, with CA, was very easy to do. For us, the rendering and ray trace features were essential in making our concepts “real enough” for us to make critical design decisions.

In late 2006 we started the build process by working with an architect on the island of Bonaire, Netherlands Antilles (now Dutch Caribbean) where our house would be built. The Bonairian architect took our plan, redrew it using AutoCAD and made some dimension modifications based on load spans since I was unfamiliar with the concrete construction methods used on the island. He then submitted the plan to the local building department. As one might expect, many errors occurred in the redrawing of the plans but the (error laden) plans were approved. I retired on May 31, 2007 and on June 1 I arrived on Bonaire to initiate construction. The chosen contractor spoke only Spanish, I spoke only English, and the approved plans were annotated in Dutch! Before construction started I asked the architect if we were required to use the approved plans (which meant he had to correct all the errors), he said “No” because the building department would never inspect the house or review based on the original construction documents! I said “Great” since I had kept my plans current and correct. From then on the contractor used my construction documents, complete with English/Spanish annotation (thanks to Google Translate) and a plethora of render and ray trace images to ensure the contractor understood exactly what we expected. The contractor’s foreman was great and very meticulous – the house was built as designed with very little “what do you want?” discussion required during the build process. The goal was to build the house so it appeared finished from the street but I would do some of the finish work (install tile flooring, build the cabinetry, etc.) because I was retired and needed an activity to keep me occupied.

But having a great house, built to our design is only part of the story. The architect saw my house CDs, especially the ray trace images and was amazed. Next thing I knew, in addition to overseeing the construction of our house, I was also using Chief Architect version X1 to do 3D modeling and ray trace imaging of the two 16 unit apartment buildings he had under design. The architect’s AutoCAD was too cumbersome and slow for this. Additionally, the 3D models highlighted some roof clearance issues that would probably have gone unnoticed until construction. The results of my moonlight activity were ray trace images that the apartment builders used in brochures and on LARGE onsite advertising billboards for the apartments. For me, this was a very satisfying demonstration of the power, speed, and capabilities of Chief Architect.

I continue to use CA for designing floor and bathroom tile layouts, cabinetry, window shutters, landscaping, etc. For the cabinetry I design in CA and in Sketchup. For the Sketchup models I import them into CA in order to produce the ray trace images we use to decide if we like the design. Using CA (and Sketchup) has been incredibly productive for us, as well as significantly less expensive than the build/change approach.

Thank you Chief Architect!

[Asie Mahone]

Ditto on all of the above! Man feel that Chief love!

[Asie Mahone]

I remember my first time with Chief. It started with the 3d Home Design program. I was an AutoCad jockey, and I salivated on the 3d possibilities. I joined with a kitchen designer that bought my first version of Chief which was 6.0. I remember using both ACAD and Chief until I understood how to use the layout portion of the program. Once I figured this out along with a little help from Mike Newiss and DJ Potter, I have NEVER looked back. I looked at Revit, and all of the other progs, and test drove them all, and they all led me back to my beloved Chief. No program is perfect, but this one is perfect for me, and 12 years and about 300+ projects later, it is like holding a pencil and sketchpad for me!

[lgc30642]

I began Chief at Version 4.0. At the time, the only sales rep in the Southeast was some dude in Florida. Once I had the software delivered, he fell off the earth in terms of any support whatsoever. Eventually, I was contacted by Steve and Kaye Blake of Berryvale Software with info that they were now my sales reps and support avenue. Where the **** is Cornish, Maine, I thought? As all who knew and loved those two, you quickly found out that it did not matter where Cornish, Maine was.........you had a reliable and dependable source of getting answers to your many questions and support for your software!!

My use of Chief is spotty year to year. I'm certainly not an expert with the program, but it has consistently allowed me to "WOW" potential customers when up against the competition of other builders. I do not use Chief for full sets of drawings to the degree that others might, but I can get enough on paper to get the job done......

ChiefTalk has been an instrumental support network over the years because of all the sharing that the Users on here contribute.......so much so, I've only had to use Customer Support on very rare occassions, and those were technical issues more than solving design problems with the software.

ChiefArchitect has allowed me to be a very successful Custom Home Builder over an extended period of time. Customers marvel at seeing their dream design come to life in 3D with a photo backdrop of their construction site. I have beat out my competition numerous times because the customer developed greater confidence in my company by seeing how my previous projects had both "as designed" and "as built" photo comparisons as the means to understand that we do, in fact, provide the finished project exactly to their expectations. ChiefArchitect allows us to do that!

I skipped X4 and SSA for the past year, but now I am back with the Upgrade sale and looking forward to what X5 will bring.

[DMDz]

I started my designing career for Home Desperate (As I Like to call it) on their 3D program 20/20 Design. After 3 years and about 1,000 kitchens later, I got an offer to work for a local Contractor, so off I went, sold on the idea that the 3D software was the ticket I needed to make his company better.

That’s when I learned 20/20 can’t do anything but kitchens, and I needed Something stronger. So off to AutoCAD I went… Then I must have test drove every known software out there – DataSoft, VisaCAD, PlanSoft, Punch, Revit, AutoDesk, and on and on.

Then, one day, a friend of mine sat me down and turned on CA 9.0 – After 5 minutes of him drawing an entire house, framing it, roofing it, and putting in the foundation – I flew off my chair and began the journey. The very next day, I talked my boss into buying the latest Chief Architect 9.5. All those wasted hours @ the OTHER type programs, taught me what a gift CA was. With Chief Architect 9.5 it help me find a home as a LEAD Designer / Drafter for a major contracting firm, with Chief 10 I was able to out bid and out produce all Drafters & Architects in my area, we had become the go to design build firm for Orange County.

Then Chief X1 ushered in my solo career with David Michael Designs - And now with the latest CA version, I have had over 1,000 jobs completed in almost every State in the US as well as Canada and Mexico, not to mention, England, Scotland, Finland, Australia, Fiji, Brazil, and on and on. From residential to commercial, non profit to great profit - All from the comfort of my office, not more then 10 feet away from my Master. The traffic time I have saved in my life alone, do to CA – its worth a second lifetime. I can not say thank you enough to Chief Architect, but here I will try - Thank You Chief Architect, Thank You Chief Architect, Thank You Chief Architect..!

Giving Back I started the free website: www.ChiefTutor.com as a way to say I really do appreciate all that you have offered all of us users.