Working with Layers in Ez-Architect, part 3: What if you didn’t?

Oops! There’s your entire Ez-Architect plan sitting on the Base (B) Layer. A big no-no!

What to do. All that work. Don’t want to start over?

Here’s the solution

Depending on the complexity of your plan, you should be able to grab parts of it and move those parts to separate layers. If your plan is terribly detailed, you may have to do a little bit of do-over. But we should be able to separate various parts into layers pretty easily.

Here are the Steps

1. Back up your plan. Use Ez-Architect’s Save As menu item and give your plan a new name so you preserve the original in all its erroneous forms. Call it MyPlan-all-on-the-base-layer or something equally descriptive and revealing.

2. Next, re-open the original plan. Be sure you see “My Plan” in the title bar of the window (not “MyPlan-all-on-the-base-layer”).

3. If you really drew your entire plan on the base layer. Select B just below the menus. If you are uncertain whether you used other layers. Unclick B and sequence through all the layers 1-9, selecting and UnSelecting each one, so you’re only looking at one at a time to see what might be on them. If you haven’t used a Layer, the program will pop a dialog to name it, cancel it and you can go on reviewing the other layers.

4. For this little tutorial we’ll assume you put everything on the Base.

First we’re going to get EVERYTHING off the base layer.

1. Click B.

2. Do a Ctrl+A or use the edit menu and Select All

3. Cut (or Ctrl+X)

4. Click Layer 1

5. Paste (Ctrl+V)

Now everything is on Layer 1. NOTE: you will still see your plan on the base.  Remember, the base layer includes everything from all layers. But now you will also see your floor plan on Layer 1. Layer 1 is where we’ll start separating out the different parts and moving them to new layers.

This really isn’t difficult, only possibly a bit tedious depending on the complexity of your plan. So here’s how to proceed.

1. Start with the easy stuff. If you have landscape elements select all of these at once (Ctrl+click click click click etc.) If you have a ton of them, just click as many as you wish at one time and then —

2. Cut (Ctrl+X)

3. Click Layer 2. (Name it Landscape when the dialog pops up.) You’ll still see layer 1 when you click 2.

4. Paste (Ctrl+v) , and your Landscape elements will plop down onto the new layer in the same positions they were on in the original layer. After you paste you can UnClick 1 so you can see the landscape elements separate from the floor plan.

5. Go back to layer one and select a group of objects for the next layer, Bathroom fixtures, for example.

6. Ctrl+click each one and Cut.

7. Click on Layer 3, name it Bathroom Fixtures, and paste. You’ll still see layer 1 when you click 3. So after you paste UnClick 1 so you can see the separation. Click both together again, or click B to see all of your layers assembled. (You can also click 1, 2, and 3 to see all of the layers.)

8. Continue selecting elements of your house plan or floor plan for each separate layer for easier editing and management as your home design evolves.

9. Save often.

Using layers enables you to create as detailed a home plan as you wish. You can include plumbing, electrical, furniture, carpeting & other flooring, and every imaginable detail that you wish to include in your plan.

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