Productivity is Not Just About Speed

I have just spend several minutes with the designer of the Landru Design tools, Andrew Dunning. These tools are designed for the entertainment industry and they are fantastic. I interviewed Andrew so that he could show me the tools, but during the interview, it struck me that he tools offered a lot of feedback to the designer.

The interview was so long, it had to be broken into two parts.
Part one:

Part two:

What struck me during the interview was the ability to see the results of your choices. For example, when Andrew was showing the projector screen in part one, you can see the viewing area of the projector in plan. this allows you to see the results of your choices. If you had the seating layout on the plan, you would see the area or seating covered. If the projector is too small, not everyone will be able to see the screen, and that will be very easy to see in plan.
So, within seconds of making your choices on the projector tool, you have visual feedback about the results of your choices.
The speaker tool has the same visual feedback in plan, and in 3D, so you can quickly check your design to make sure the audience will get adequate sound.
These tools made me think about productivity, and I think Andrew and I talked about it in the interview. This feedback that Andrew’s tools provide can make it faster and easier to design a good presentation. But is productivity really just about speed. I can see the feedback you get from these tools can make your designs better; in a short time you could try several designs until you have the solution you want. So, you can improve the quality of your work. I think that improving the quality of your work is as important as improving the speed of your work. In the long run, the quality of your work is the most important thing, far more important than the speed.
What about landscape and architects? You may not be needing the tools that Andrew has created, but you have other tools that can help you improve the quality of your work. Building a 3D model of your site, adding simple 3D models of your project and checking the solar study will help you to improve the quality of the project. You can see within a few minutes if the project can be lived in the way you wanted.
I think that the true test of increased productivity when using CAD (like Vectorworks) is an increase in quality as well as an increase in speed. Training is a why to learn the best from your software, and I can help you to get the best from Vectorworks. See my web site: http://www.archoncad.co.nz