AutoCAD: 3D Architectural Modeling

Take your drawings from 2D to 3D with AutoCAD. Learn how to model a building, complete with doors, windows, staircases, roofs, and surrounding terrain.

Introduction

• Explore 3D architectural modeling in AutoCAD
• What you should know

1. Clean Up 2D Drawings

• Bring the project data together
• Arrange elevations around the plan
• Arrange sections adjacent to elevations
• Delete layers, clean up, and purge

2. Model the Ground Floor

• Set up property filters for 2D and 3D layers
• Create closed polylines with boundaries
• Navigate in 3D
• Rotate objects in 3D
• Realign elevations and sections in 3D
• Extrude closed polyline walls
• Build sills and headers
• Extrude interior partitions
• Extrude, presspull, and union headers
• Model curved headers
• Move the ceiling using a point filter
• Build the slab on grade

3. Model Doors, Windows, and Stairs

• Model doors with glazing
• Copy doors around the model
• Sketch window detail in place
• Model a window
• Copy window groups
• Join and extrude stair profiles
• Subobject manipulation
• Model stairs from plans
• Thicken stair object with Booleans
• Build a handrail that follows a 3D path
• Support the handrail

4. Model Terrain Surfaces

• Shape a courtyard as a NURBS surface
• Sculpt a sloping terrain
• Trim a surface with other surfaces
• Slice topographic contour lines
• Loft a surface between contours

5. Model the Second Floor

• Copy the ceiling to create a new floor
• Extrude a walkway
• Extrude the second floor walls
• Fill in voids in slabs and walls
• Remove unwanted volume from walls
• Sketch roof plans in wireframe
• Duplicate a wireframe for later reuse
• Create door headers
• Perform a Boolean subtraction

6. Complete the Second Floor and Roof

• Build interior partitions
• Cut window openings
• Create custom windows
• Cut standard openings in courtyard walls
• Cut small openings in courtyard walls
• Copy windows around the second floor
• Build roof surfaces
• Subtract the tower volume from the roof
• Sculpt solids from regions and surfaces

7. Model the Tower

• Build the tower walls
• Cut the wraparound walls down
• Construct the first wraparound roof
• Fill in walls under the roof
• Make a wraparound roof with 3D poly objects
• Fill in missing wall volume
• Extend walls to meet the roof
• Cut notches for clerestory windows
• Build clerestory windows
• Model the tower walls
• Shell the tower
• Extrude the roof along a path

Conclusion

• Next steps