Product Reviews
Vectorworks 2010
Lighting & Sound America
A review of Vectorworks Spotlight 2010 was published in Lighting & Sound America magazine's July issue. Written by Patrick Immel, assistant professor of theatre, lighting and scenic design at Northwest Missouri State University, the review lists the top 10 features of the software, and ends with this conclusion:
"Nemetschek NA's Vectorworks Spotlight is a 'soup-to-nuts' CAD solution that will allow you to conceive, design and present your work at the highest levels. I highly recommend giving it a try!"
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Posted July 2010
John Black
John Black, principal of Verdance Fine Garden Design, reviewed Vectorworks Landmark 2010 on his blog. This is the first installment of a multi-part review. Here's an excerpt:
"One of my favorite new features is the 'Select Similar tool, which allows me to select objects of like size, shape, color, line weight, opacity…any combination of 27 different criteria in all. This is a massive time-saver when I want to, say, delete all the boulders in a design, or increase the line weights of all my trees, or make all the guidelines on one particular design layer visible."
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Posted July 2010
Lucas Krech
Vectorworks 2010 Product Review Part 2 – April 2010
Lighting designer Lucas Krech published Part 2 of his review of Vectorworks Spotlight 2010 on his blog. In this review, he focuses on 3D drafting and basic rendering as he completes an exercise from the manual. Here's an excerpt:
"The manual is written clearly. Thus it should be no problem for a novice, or someone upgrading from a much older version like I was, to dive right into the program and begin to do some fun and interesting work."
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Posted April 2010
Techie Talk
One of the best new features in Vectorworks 2010 is the improved 3D environment, a new Unified View allows you to select and modify objects in 3D on any layer, it also has some excellent 3D snapping. This is probably the area of Vectorworks that impresses the most, being able to switch to a 3D view and continue to work on the drawing is fantastic. You'll need a powerful computer to do this in anything other than wire-frame, but if you do the benefits are immense.
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Posted April 2010
Landezine
Landezine, an online magazine written and published by Zaš Brezar of Slovenia, featured a review of Vectorworks 2010 Landmark on February 27: "Vectorworks Landmark is definitely 'The' software for Landscape Architects – it will be what you want it to be, at any stage of the project."
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Posted February 2010
Lucas Krech
New York-based lighting designer Lucas Krech published a review of Vectorworks 2010 on his blog. Here's an excerpt: "As a drafting program to make a lightplot Vectorworks has maintained its edge as the industry standard setting the bar for what Computer Aided Design can do for the lighting and design community. I hope you'll join me in future posts as I continue to explore this fantastic piece of software."
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Posted February 2010
MacCompanion Magazine
Robert L Pritchett at MacCompanion Magazine reviewed Vectorworks 2010 and wrote "… the latest release is even more easier to use than the previous version. Now THAT is change I can believe in! We've given Vectorworks another solid 5 rating and Nemetschek deserves it."
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Posted February 2010
CAD User AEC Magazine
CAD User editor David Chadwick reviewed Vectorworks 2010 in the November/December 2009 issue of CAD User AEC Magazine. Here's an excerpt from the review: "So hats off then to the companies providing the wherewithal to make the change to 3D, and in particular to Nemetschek's Vectorworks, which has made "Making Change Easy" the theme for the release of Vectorworks 2010."
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Posted February 2010
Novedge:
Choosing a CAD Program
"My first thought on writing a review of an update to an existing CAD program is that the readers of the review won't just be those already dedicated to the program and wanting to know if the upgrade is worth the expense and time to learn new features, but they might also be those looking to change programs or even those architects and others just starting out in their use of CAD."
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Posted December 2009
BD Online:
"Vectorworks 2010 feels like a significant upgrade on its predecessor in many areas. Now that the Parasolid 3D modelling core, introduced in version 2009, has been fully integrated, Vectorworks 2010 offers an extremely flexible and easy-to-use 2D environment, combined with a true 3D BIM solution. Initially, it does not look too different, with the 2010 interface appearing almost identical to the previous version apart from a few new tools and modes."
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Posted December 2009
Webnash:
"I recently received my copy of Vectorworks Designer 2010. It contains Vectorworks: Fundamentals, Architect, Renderworks, Landmark, Spotlight, and Machine Design. I've been using this software since it was MiniCAD, sometime around 1997 or so. Before VW, I used AutoCAD, Sketchup, and Chief Architect. In general I've found VW to be the most practical, full-featured, and easy to use design software available. The price is also the most competitive in its class."
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Posted October 2009
Vectorworks 2009
Architosh:
"The most significant change for Vectorworks 2009 is a new 3-D modeling engine from Siemens PLM. Suffice to say that this industrial strength modeler significantly boosts the power and performance of Vectorworks 2009. Nemetschek has stated that the new engine operates roughly four to five times faster than the previous version for most 3-D operations and up to twelve times faster for Boolean operations."
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Posted Sept 2009
Live Design:
"There are heaps of CAD packages out there that do amazing things, but I've not yet had such a streamlined experience as I've had with Vectorworks. It offers layers upon layers of different ways to do things, which stimulates inventiveness and enhances design. It makes it fun to design."
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Posted May 2009
Macworld:
Vectorworks has evolved over the years from a lean and mean drafting application with a quick learning curve and inexpensive price to a very powerful high-end CAD application with more features to compete with the top CAD programs on any platform.
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Posted May 2009
Lighting&Sound America:
With Nemetschek NA's latest release of Vectorworks Spotlight version 2009, users are offered a program that is powerful, flexible, and intuitive. Powerful enough to be able to present my designs in 2-D and 3-D. Flexible enough to let me work my way and intuitive enough to help me make decisions so I can concentrate on my designs.
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Posted May 2009
Live Design:
Vectorworks 2009, Nemetschek's most recent upgrade of its design, visualization, and rendering program might look a lot like last year's version, but under the hood are some substantial upgrades as well as helpful additions and bug fixes. While many of those additions work in all the Vectorworks' products, tools have been added to Spotlight that will significantly impact the lighting design process.
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Posted March 2009
LANDSCAPE PAYSAGES:
The Vectorworks Landmark package is designed for landscape architects. The main intent of Landmark is to have one vehicle that can carry a project through its entire lifespan, from concept to design to presentation to construction drawings.
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Posted March 2009
"LANDSCAPE PAYSAGES" is a publication of the Canadian Society of Landscape Architects.
Architosh:
As for the product today, Vectorworks Architect 2009 is easily the most robust version ever shipped. The improvements to the walls, new methods of placing openings in them, and substantial new improvements to file import/export and latest AutoCAD 2009 file support make this a worthwhile update.
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Posted February 2009
MacCompanion:
"Are you kidding me? If you are in the AEC industry, run, don't walk to get this version of Vectorworks. It puts the competition to shame!"
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Posted December 2008
BD Online:
"By incorporating Parasolid, the best 3D modelling technology available, Vectorworks 2009 is racing ahead of the pack."
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Posted October 2008
Ed's Independent Voice:
"Although I am known as a proponent (and a user) of Autodesk's Revit software, I am always open to other solutions. From what I observed, Vectorworks Architect 2009 seems to stand up well in relation to Revit (which I think is the industry standard in this genre of the AEC market)."
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Posted October 2008
PLSN – Projection, Lights, and Staging News:
"I'm coming at this as an AutoCAD user and a new user of Vectorworks, but I was able to get up the learning curve fairly quickly. I'm by no means a power user, but I like what I've seen in the new Vectorworks 2009. It is very powerful, it has a lot of features to help streamline your workflow, and it is capable of producing some fabulous documentation."
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Posted October 2008