Create families

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in this video, you'll learn how to create a family.

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Starting with the correct template.

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You will then see the correct process of developing a family

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which includes adding reference planes,

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creating dimensions and then labeling the dimensions with parameters

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to create a new family

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under families, click new

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and then open the appropriate folder

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and you can see all of the templates.

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Some categories have a specific family template, whereas some do not.

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If you do not see a template specific to the category of family you want to create,

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you can use one of the generic model templates.

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As you can see there are several options available.

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Generic model, adaptive ceiling based, face based, floor based,

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line based so on and so forth.

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You can always change the category after you create the family.

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For example,

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select the generic model template

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and then click open

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and rev it will create a generic model family

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but then you can change the category

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on the create tab

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in the properties, panel,

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click family category and parameters.

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And then you can change the category

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for this example I'll select furniture

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and then that will change the family to the furniture category.

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And now any visibility controls that are specific to that category or a

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schedule created of the furniture category will then apply to this family.

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I'll click OK to close the dialog and now we can look at creating reference planes

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as you can see there are already two reference planes

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and if you can't select them,

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you want to pay attention to your select pinned elements selection setting.

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So when that is disabled, you won't be able to select any pinned reference planes.

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So you'll need to enable it

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and then you'll be able to select any pinned reference planes.

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When you select a reference plane you can see it's

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instance properties in the properties palette and be aware that

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reference planes can have a name so you can name

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them that way you can keep track of them.

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And then you can also dimension to reference planes when the family is

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loaded into a project and the name will appear in the tool tip.

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Additionally,

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you can control the is reference setting and when I expand that drop

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down you can see there are several options here and most of them

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behave as a strong reference. So strong references one of the options.

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That's also what the left center, right front that it's basically the same setting.

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If you select one of the specific ones then it

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will simply just show you that in the tool tip.

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But those will have the highest priority when

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you are dimension into them in a project,

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the weak reference that will have a not as high

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of a priority when you're dimension into those reference planes.

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And then if it is not a reference then you will not be able to

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dimension to that reference plane when it is the family's loaded into the project.

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I'll leave these settings as they are.

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And then lastly be aware of the defined origin setting.

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You can have that selected for one vertical and one horizontal reference plane.

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And then the intersection of those two will be the origin

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of the family.

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So in this case both of the center,

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the center left,

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right and then the center front back are both set to define the origin.

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So therefore that intersection point will be the

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origin of the family or the insertion point.

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When you are placing that family

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to create new reference planes on the create tab in the datum panel,

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click reference plane.

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And then you can simply click two points to place

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the start and end points of a reference plane.

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So I'm gonna place a left and a right

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and then a front and a back

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and then I'll click modified in the command

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and once again afterwards I can select it and I can add a a name,

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adjust the reference so on and so forth.

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Also

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you can create a new subcategory

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and then you can control the line color or line pattern of those.

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So for example change the name to exterior and click. Ok.

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Then I can change that to let's just say green and click OK. And then I'll click OK.

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And now we can

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change the subcategory for any of the reference planes

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to update the graphics of those

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That way if you have

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several reference planes in a family,

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you can use subcategories to help distinguish them

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in the project.

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Alright, let's go ahead and

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adjust

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the subcategory for those as well.

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And now we'll add dimensions

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on the modify tab in the measure panel.

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You can click aligned dimension

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and then I will place a dimension for the vertical reference planes

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and then click the eq toggle to toggle on an equality constraint

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and then I'll place an overall dimension

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and then I'll do the same thing for the horizontal reference planes

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and then I'll click modified in the command.

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At this point we have equality constraints so that the left and right

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reference planes are always equal distance from the center which is our origin.

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And then same thing with these front and back reference planes.

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Next I will go to the create tab and click family types

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and you'll notice that that is also available on the modify tab.

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That same properties panel is available and family types will open the family

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types dialog and now we can create new parameters at the bottom,

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click new parameter and I will create a parameter called length

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and the discipline will be common

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and the type of parameter is length and I'll group it under dimensions

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and then click OK.

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And I'll create one more and we'll call it with

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and leave it set to the same

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but be aware that the type of parameter that

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is going to control the behavior of that parameter.

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For example

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if we leave it set to length, then we can assign it to a dimension.

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If we select material, then we can assign it to the material parameter of a form,

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a geometric form.

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And that would allow us to control the material of that specific element.

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So you just need to be aware of what you're

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creating that parameter for and how you want it to behave

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once again I'll select length and then click OK.

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And now we have a length, width and height parameter.

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We can move those up and down as needed and I'll

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leave them set to zero for now and click OK.

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And then I'll select the overall length

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dimension here. And then in the label drop down

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in the contextual ribbon tab I'll select length

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and now the length

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parameter updates to that dimension value.

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I'll change this one to width.

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And if I go back to the family types dialog you can see those dimensions are updated

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and I can even change those. So for example if I change them to four ft and click. Ok.

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Now you can see those values update.

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So now what we can do is we can create the geometry

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and then we can constrain the geometry to the reference planes.

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And then when we update those parameter values

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it will update the geometry as well