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Interactively draw lighting beams. The beam size and shape adjust as you drag and nudge the beam. |
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Adjustable properties include: Position Height, Distance to C-Clamp, Field Angle, Beam Angle, Peak Candela, Face Plane Height, Show/Hide Beam on Floor. |
| Completely stand-alone. Beam Draw lets you concentrate on worksheeting your rough plot — save drafting for later. You can use Beam Draw to easily determine ideal instrument placement in AutoPlot, SpotLight, or any blank document. | |
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Easily convert beam objects into SpotLight lighting devices. |
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Use Beam Draw PAR to visualize elliptical beams with any bottle rotation, in both 2D and 3D. |
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View the beam’s ellipse in plan view and cone in 3D. |
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Focus from any position height to any focus height, even if the light focus up or hits the face plane in an open parabola. |
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Visualize shutter cuts. You can drag the shutters right in the drawing! |
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View valuable data on how your light focuses. |
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Beam Draw Section lets you visualize beam sections in a 2D view. This is also a fully interactive tool. Beam Draw Section will even draw a figure for you, and show you what portion of the section includes the full width of your focus area. |
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Beam Draw will let you read photometric data from your symbols, letting you easily try different unit types. |
| Beam Draw will detect the Z height of a lighting position below it, but only when you ask! | |
| Static mode to easily duplicate beams into a system of lights. | |
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Command to reverse and repeat beams. It even will R&R shutter cuts and bottle rotations. |
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If you are working with one system of beams at a time, you can easily channel them, and the data will be transferred when you convert the beams to Spotlight lighting devices. |
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Quickly file away beams in a system to their own, hidden layer. |
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Includes properties to let you view the beams in a rough plot mode. |
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Beam Draw Magic pulls position and channel data from your beams for use on a sheet layer magic sheet. You can even adjust your channel numbers to accommodate similarly focused or reverse-and-repeated systems. |
Beam Draw 4
The ultimate tool for visualizing lighting angles and coverage
A lighting designer’s complete solution to previsualize how your light plot will focus. Use Beam Draw to help determine the position, field angle, and focus point for your lighting instruments, and walk into focus knowing you have the angles and coverage you need.
“I can’t ever go back to doing plots without Beam Draw!”
“Beam Draw rocks the house. It’s by far the best $89 I’ve spent in a long time. Thank you so much for writing it!”
“I have been using your Beam Draw plug-in and it changed my life.”
“Thank you for providing this software!!! It’s so great, and it has completely changed the way that I work as an LD!”
For Vectorworks 2018–2020
Version 4.1.11 - October 30, 2018 for Vectorworks 2018–2020
Includes a 61-day free trial
Use this installer format with the Vectorworks Plug-In Manager
Full instructions
Professional: $89.00Student: $14.99Upgrades from $45.00
BuyNew Features
In addition to 2015 support, Beam Draw 4 includes the following improvements:
Improvements to performance, accuracy, and usability: |
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Beam Object improvements: |
Discrete Class Control
Discrete class control for each component of the object, including an option to automatically set classes |
New Settings for Defaults
New settings preferences for default class and default Move to Layer prefix |
Mirror Tool Support
All Beam objects now properly flip when using with the mirror tool and a horizontal or vertical line of reflection |
Better ButtonsGet Light Info Data, Pickup Z Height, and Reset Shutters buttons now function on all selected Beam Draw objects |
Beam Draw and Beam Draw PAR improvements: |
Improved Redraw Modes
“Fixed Focus” for nudging or dragging the instrument location New Cycle BD Redraw Mode command, which allows you to change redraw modes with a keyboard shortcut |
Additional Cut Plane
New Additional Cut Plane parameter, to check coverage at any height. Perfect for checking shots through scenery or under masking |
Coverage Map
New Coverage Map feature shows full body or other user-specified coverage in plan view |
Cone Edges and Focus Vectors
New Cone Edge Lines option to display lines defining the beam cone in plan view. The cone edge accurately adjusts to shutter cuts and bottle rotations New Show Focus Vector option to show a line representing the light’s focus
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Spotlight Focus Point IntegrationNew parameter to focus a Beam to an existing Spotlight Focus Point |
Adjust Shutters Dialog
New interactive Adjust Shutters dialog uses sliders to control shutter depth and angle, displaying changes right in the drawing, in both 2D and 3D views |
Z Height Improvements
Now use the z height to visualize beams above or below the ground plane without adjusting the beam’s position height |
Simple 3D Mode
New Simple 3D mode shows only cut planes and cone bounds |
NURBS Geometry
3D components drawn with NURBS, resulting in faster and more elegant rendering |
Better Visualization of Low Angles
Improved calculations now show accurate shutter cuts and bottle rotations for low angles that create parabolic coverage areas |
Improved Render Light
Numerous improvements to the Add Light feature. Adding a rendering light now hides the beam in rendered views Render lights now appear in the Visualization palette |
Overhung Units
New indicator when a light is overhung (negative clamp distance) When converted to Lighting Devices, overhung units now also affect the 3D component |
Improved Rotation BehaviorBeams logically respond to rotate commands, depending on the mode:
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Beam Draw Section improvements: |
Improved Utility
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New Options
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Mirror Tool SupportCan now unflip itself if used with mirror tool, including vertical and rotated plan |
Menu command improvements: |
Move Beams to Layer
Now includes options to select an existing layer, change the layer prefix, and set the visibility for new layers New option to deselect the Show Beam parameter, converting objects to “rough plot” mode |
Convert Beam to Instrument
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New Section Beam to Pan
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New Update Beams from Focus PtUpdates beams set to a focus point, when the focus point changes position or height |
New Cycle BD Redraw ModeNew command to cycle the Redraw Mode among Fixed, Dynamic, and Fixed Focus |
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Who is eligible to use a student license?
In order to use the plug-in at the student rate, you must use the free, watermarked, educational Vectorworks license.
Educators with a standard Vectorworks license must purchase a standard license as well. Please contact us if you would like a time-sensitive demo code for demonstrating a plug-in to your class.
If you have a CAD lab of five or more seats, please contact us to see if you are eligible for a free license.
What happens if I upgrade or switch platforms?
All JBLD plug-ins are platform as well as version independent. You may use your license with any version of Vectorworks from the minimal supported version up.
They are, however, linked to a specific seat of Vectorworks, meaning you may use them with a specific Vectorworks serial number and its subsequent upgrades.
Savvy Series licenses are linked to a specific version of Vectorworks. For example, if you have the 2020 Savvy Subscription Series, it will work in perpetuity with Vectorworks 2020.
When I enter my registration key, the OK button remains grayed out....
If you enter a registration code but the “OK” button remains grayed, please double check the following:
- Make sure you have installed the latest version of the plug-in. You can download the current release any time from the Downloads page.
- Make sure you are matching the correct registration code to the correct product.
- If you purchased a student version (registration begins with “A”), it will only work with an E series, free educational license of VectorWorks. You can purchase an upgrade to a full version of the plug-in.
- If copying and pasting in your registration code, make sure there are no spaces or carriage returns at the beginning or end of the field. If you use the arrow key to move to the ends of the field, you may catch the extra characters.
- The code is case sensitive.
- All “0” are zeros. (Except for the Savvy Section product code, SO.)
- Make sure your Vectorworks seat registration is correct. In your plug-in registration, nnnn-nnnn-XXXXXX-nnnn, XXXXXX should match the last six characters of your Vectorworks serial number.
If you have tried all these steps, and your registration code still produces an error, there will be a 5 digit code next to the registration field. Please follow this link and enter it into the troubleshooting formfollow this link and enter it into the troubleshooting form.
If you do not see the error code, make sure you have updated to the latest version, and have entered your user name.
If there is still no error code, you have entered a registration with too many or too few characters.
Where are the plug-ins and help installed?
By default, the plug-ins, libraries, and workspaces all get installed in your Vectorworks user data folder.
On the Mac this is: ~/Library/Application Support/Vectorworks/{version number}
On Windows, this is: /users/{user_name}/Application Data/Nemetschek/Vectorworks/{version number}
You can confirm the location that Vectorworks looks for user data. Open Vectorworks preferences (Tools>Options>Vectorworks Preferences…). Switch to the User Folders tab. You will see the setting for your user data folder.
Note, if you are confirming installation via the Plug-in Manager, compiled plug-ins appear in the Built-in tab, not the Third-party tab
Purchase Beam Draw 4
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