Backsplash and walls

Hello,

I just purchased Interior Designer 9.0 today and am in the midst of learning the program. I have watched a few of the tutorials and while they give me the scope of what the program can do, they do not address specifics.

My initial questions are:

1) How do I extend the backsplash along the wall - specifically under a window casing and then above a set of base cabinets. I have tried to modify the counter with the backsplash options however the backsplash does not show up.

2) How do I get the walls from the other rooms to become transparent so that I can see through them and get a better view of my room? When I pan and move, they sometimes get in the way.

3) Any tips or tricks you might want to impart for a new user would be greatly appreciated. I have used many different types of software however they have not seemed as user friendly.

Thanks!

Welcome to the forum, Heather.

I don't have Interior Designer 9 (ID9), so please take my suggestions as theoretical rather than from direct experience with ID9. That said, there are some tricks that extend across the entire line of Home Designer (and Chief Architect) line of software.

You can simulate a backsplash by using a thin soffit with the appropriate material applied. Check your counter backsplash settings and there should be a thickness dimension; make your soffit thickness to match.

You should be able to make walls invisible in the Wall Specification dialog, if you want a diorama type view. Otherwise, the dollhouse camera will give you an overhead view of the current floor, and you can rotate the view to see all walls in a room. You may have other cameras available such as the backclipped elevation view, which will let you see an elevation view (2D) of the objects between where you start to click and to where you extend the camera view arrow.

As for helpful tips, browse through the forum and I'm sure you'll be able to mine a few golden nuggets. Read the manuals and watch the videos, and be sure to practice that which you've read and watched. There is a helpful database of videos, which you can filter for your software title, at: http://video.homedesigner.chiefarchitect.com/videos

And a search-able database of articles (how to do it) can be found at: http://www.homedesignersoftware.com/.../database.html

And if you get stumped, ask here. I invite you to become a part of the community and help answer questions that you may have experience and knowledge as a way to flex your creativity. Sometimes, the act of discussing through other people's issues may prompt ideas on how to solve your own puzzlers (those that you know of, and perhaps those that you're not yet aware). :)

Do you have a back splash to base below option in your version?

Dean