When starting Enscape, some users might see the Access Denied prompt with the following message:

“Enscape cannot write to the Documents folder. You can continue, but some Enscape features will not work…“

The complete message is reflected in the image below.

If Enscape can’t write to the Documents folder, you’ll experience limitations in functionality, specifically:

• You cannot save or modify your custom user settings.
• You cannot create or export panoramas.
• Window positions and layout preferences won’t persist between sessions.

Recommended Actions:

Option 1: Contact your organization’s IT Administrator and request permissions to read/write to your Documents folder.

Option 2: Continue using Enscape with the limitations. You will be informed about these limitations each time Enscape starts unless you choose “Don’t show again.”

To fully resolve this issue and provide users with optimal Enscape functionality, ensure that the user account running Enscape has full read/write permissions to the My Documents folder.

For further assistance, please contact our customer support team.

Enscape Impact is a building performance analysis component integrated into Enscape. It allows architects and designers to conduct real-time energy performance assessments during early stages of design, assisting in making informed decisions that enhance sustainability and efficiency. Enscape Impact integrates seamlessly with existing Enscape workflows, allowing users to conduct real-time energy performance assessments directly within the design environment. This integration ensures that sustainability considerations are embedded into the design process from the outset, enhancing both efficiency and environmental performance without disrupting established workflows.

Enscape Impact can be accessed from within the Enscape Viewport User Interface (UI) toolbar.

In case you don’t have a license available for Impact, you will be prompted to visit your Chaos Account and purchase a license.

Please make sure you have an active license before proceeding to use the feature.

The first time you click on the Impact button, the sidebar will open in order to start the analysis. You will have to fill in the necessary information there before the analysis starts.

The first field is Location. This is a mandatory field. If your CAD project is geolocated, that location will show up here automatically. However, if there is no information, you can simply type in the location in the search bar and select your desired location.

The second mandatory field is the Building Type. There are a few standard options to choose from depending on the category your building stands in.

The third mandatory field is the Build Year of the building. Here, you have to choose a date when the building was constructed.

The fourth field asks you for the last Renovation Year of the building. This field is optional.

The Impact Analysis Dashboard gives you the analysis based on your project design and input. It is important to make sure the project is set to its True North. The solar impact will be calculated based on the true orientation of the building and not the sun settings saved in Enscape. The following two images compare varying results of the same model where one is located in Boston and the other in Los Angeles.

Peak Loads refer to the highest levels of energy consumption in a building. Typically occurring during periods of maximum demand. It is essentially a sum of heating energy, cooling energy, internal gains and solar gains. It helps determine the capacity needed for systems like HVAC (Heating, Ventilation, and Air Conditioning) to ensure they can handle these peak demands efficiently.

Total Carbon Emission reflects the carbon dioxide emission resulting from various building activities, particularly related to energy consumption. High CO2 levels contribute to climate change and are a key focus in sustainability efforts. 

Energy Use Intensity quantifies a building’s energy consumption per unit area (e.g. per square meter). It helps assess a building’s efficiency and compare it to industry benchmarks. A lower EUI indicates better energy efficiency.

Energy End Use refers to the specific purposes or applications for which energy is consumed within a building. This information helps identify opportunities for energy savings through more efficient technologies or behaviors.

Impact also provides you with the option to visualize your building analysis in your project model. To enable this, you simply have to go the Performance Map options at the bottom of the sidebar.  Under each map type, you can click on the map you want to apply on the visualization. This will transform your Enscape view mode to white and will apply colors to your model reflecting these performance maps. 

Heating Energy, Cooling Energy for Peak Loads and Annual Energy, as well as Solar Energy under Thermal Gains. The quick comparison represents these visual modes with their color scales. All closed spaces are calculated and complete rooms are visualized through use of transparency applied on your complete project model.

Impact runs on the IES Apache technology. The weather data used for building location is extracted from Ashrae Weather Data Center. If you want to learn more, check out the Enscape Impact Video Tutorial.

In the Visual Enscape Settings window, located under the Main Tab, a section named Style provides options to allow  you to change the way that Enscape renders your projects. You will notice that the Style section contains, by default, a slider named Outlines and a drop-down menu that is named Mode. These ‘Modes’ allow a user to apply unique styles to their projects and produce a Maquette or Sciographic, Hatched Sketch, Watercolor rendered image style and lots more.

To access these options, make sure Enscape is running and then open the Visual Settings window using the associated button in the Enscape Viewport user interface, as shown highlighted to the right in the following screenshot.

These options can be found at the top of the Visual Settings window.

These options can be combined to create some interesting effects in your projects, as the modes change the way that your project is rendered in the Enscape window, and the outlines can help emphasize the geometric forms in a project. There are five Modes that can be chosen and be combined with the Outlines option.

When White Mode is enabled all materials, apart from transparent ones, are then displayed in white color. It is a great way to emphasize forms and volumes in a project. This style of representation is commonly used for conceptual and schematic design and gives a great overview on the interaction of spatial elements.

A more illustrative look can be achieved using outlines to highlight individual forms. Thickness of the outlines can be controlled using the outline slider. Here is a quick comparison of outlines varying from 0 to 75 percent:

You can choose to exclude all instances of an asset at once using the search bar.

Or you can manually pick assets to be excluded from the White Mode by using the Select in scene option.

Additionally, an Invert Appearance option allows selected assets to appear inverted, i.e. in white, while everything else retains its original colors and materials.

The Selective White Mode functionality applies only to Enscape assets and Custom assets under Enscape Asset Library.

Renders all surfaces like a real polystyrol material, whereby the sunlight is scattered through the thinned geometry.
When this mode is selected, an additional setting appears named Transmission that determines how much light is transmitted through geometry.

You can see the effect of  0% Transmission in the following screenshots with 25% and 75% outlines applied.

It’s also worth noting that bump maps will continue to be displayed when using White/Polystyrol Mode.

This mode informs you as to how much light is hitting a surface and this is displayed as a heat map. It is worth noting that the Enscape Light View is not a professional or fully accurate light analysis tool, and is provided as an estimation only.

There is also the Automatic Scale option which can be disabled. When disabled the minimum and maximum Lux scale can be set manually.

In the Enscape Viewport, when Light View Mode is activated, there will always be a temp range indicator located to refer to which is located at the top of the Enscape viewport window:

This gauge will only be viewable in the Enscape window, and is not included in rendered images.

You can also combine Light View mode with Outlines:

This artistic visual mode recreates the rendering as pen or pencil sketches. This mode can be adjusted as black and white outlines, grayscale or as colored rendering.

Outlines – adjust thickness of lines.

Jitter – modulate the distortion of lines within you sketch composition.

Extended Lines – control the length and prominence of extended lines in your drawing.

Transparent Glass – enable to render objects behind glass with lighter colors.

Hatched Shadows – enhance the drawing by creating depth and form through hatched shadows

Pen – default sketch style in black and white pen.

Pencil – transform your sketch style to grayscale pencil.

Colored Pencil – customize the style of the sketch by applying colors.

It is recommended to use this style for still renders to achieve best results.

The Watercolor mode transforms your viewport into a real-time watercolor painting, simulating watercolor effects to create soft, blended look for your visualization.

This mode comes with its own options to adjust the various color settings.

Color Gradient – affects the number of colors and hues.

Surface Detail – adjusts the level of texture detail on surfaces.

Bleeding Effect – controls color overlap between surfaces.

Transparent Glass – enable to render objects behind glass with lighter colors.

It is recommended to use this artistic visual mode for still renders to achieve best results.

Understanding Room Detection

Enscape Impact automatically detects and analyzes room data from your project’s geometry to provide energy performance insights. Here’s how the room detection process works and how you can ensure more accurate results:

1. What is Room Detection?

Room detection in Enscape Impact identifies enclosed spaces (rooms) from the geometry visible in your CAD model. It creates simplified room shells (essentially boxes) for each detected room and runs energy performance analysis based on that model. Different project views can yield different results because the analysis is performed on the visible geometry in the selected view.

2. Room Detection Limitations

Not all spaces in your project will be detected as rooms. For example, small spaces below 35 cm in any dimension (height, width, or depth) are ignored and merged with neighboring rooms. Additionally, shading elements are not detected as part of the analysis.

3. Voxel Accuracy and its Effect on Analysis

Enscape Impact uses voxels—3D “pixels”—to fill detected rooms and perform analysis. Each voxel is 35 cm in size. While this ensures efficient processing, it introduces a margin of error (up to 35 cm). This means that rooms might be slightly simplified, and the analysis may not reflect every small detail.

4. Improving Room Detection Accuracy

To improve the accuracy of your analysis:

• Ground Modeling: Ensure that floors and ground planes are modeled correctly.
• Simplify Geometry: Hide unnecessary objects like furniture, decorative elements, or assets that do not affect the analysis (Enscape assets are filtered by the algorithm, but hiding them can improve the performance).
• Transparent Materials: Ensure windows have transparent materials since the algorithm detects windows based on material transparency.
• Clean Geometry: Check that there are no large openings (>35-70 cm) in your rooms that might prevent them from being detected as enclosed spaces.

You can also analyze different buildings separately to improve performance, as each building will be treated independently in the analysis.

5. What is Considered a Room?

A room is any enclosed space that is fully surrounded by geometry. Rooms must have dimensions greater than 35 cm in height, width, and depth to be considered. Large openings (over 35-70 cm) in a room will prevent it from being detected as enclosed.

6. Room Detection and Simulation Errors

Room detection is triggered every time Enscape Impact runs an analysis. It is triggered if you make changes to the geometry in your CAD model or if you change the project settings in Enscape Impact. Simulation errors can occur if the geometry is too complex, incomplete, or if there are large gaps between room boundaries. If you suspect there is an issue with room detection, such as missing rooms or inaccurate results, check if the geometry fits the room definition criteria. If you notice any issues, review your geometry and/or send us the logs so we can assist you with analyzing the issues.

7. Detecting Windows and Roofs

• Roofs: Roofs are automatically detected based on the upper boundaries of rooms with no geometry above them.
• Windows: The algorithm identifies windows based on their transparency. Transparent materials will be detected as windows.

8. Tips for Faster and More Accurate Analysis

• Use Separate Views: Set up different views in your CAD software for different buildings. Analyzing them individually improves performance and accuracy.
• Hide Non-Essential Elements: Hide elements that don’t affect energy performance, such as decorative objects or Enscape assets, to reduce calculation time.

Data inputs effect on analysis

Location

If the project has a location set, Enscape Impact will use this location as default. Longitude, latitude and elevation are taken into consideration. Users can change the location in the Settings tab at any time. The selected location assigns the relevant Climate zone automatically and an appropriate weather file (more about the weather files: https://www.iesve.com/support/weatherfiles). The climate zones are defined using the ASHRAE Standard 169-2009. IES follows the standard utilizing the following climate zones. Similar zoning maps are defined for the whole world, so your project can have any location.

Building types

Building types in Enscape Impact are based on ASHRAE building types. The selected building type defines the relevant operational schedules, internal loads and space conditions assigned to the model.
The first version of Enscape Impact offers the following building types:

• Single family
• Multiple family
• Office
• School or University
• Hospital
• Dining

As only one type can be selected, select the main building type. This may change in future versions of Enscape Impact. Additional building types will also be included.
In case the model includes several independent buildings with different main building types, they can be analyzed one by one using different views with the rest of the model being hidden and the building type changed according to the main building function.
Analyzing parts of one building independently based on function (example first floor is dining, second floor is office) is not advisable as the building envelope will have different performance and you will receive inaccurate results.

Building and renovation years

The Building age ranges are defined based on the available ASHRAE Standards editions. The following are used:

The appropriate standard is applied based on the building type and standard revisions, as the standard is applicable to buildings built after its issue date. ASHRAE 90.1 applies to all buildings except low-rise residential buildings. ASHRAE 90.2 applies only to low-rise residential buildings.

Default Datasets

Based on the inputs described above, default datasets developed by IES are assigned. The model is layered up with thermal properties and systems information suitable for the location, age, and building type. This includes relevant building fabric details, operational schedules, internal space conditions, typical internal loads, heating, ventilation, and air conditioning system types. IES derives the datasets to configure the buildings from the following ASHRAE Standards & User Manuals:

• Energy Standard for Buildings Except Low-Rise Residential Buildings, Versions: ASHRAE 90.1:2019, ASHRAE 90.1:2016, ASHRAE 90.1:2013, ASHRAE 90.1:2010, ASHRAE 90.1:2007, ASHRAE 90.1:2004
• Energy Standard for Buildings Low-Rise Residential Buildings, ASHRAE 90.2:2018
• Ventilation for Acceptable Indoor Air Quality, ASHRAE 62.1:2016
• Climatic Data for Building Design Standards, ASHRAE Standard 169-2013

Default Datasets content

In upcoming Enscape Impact versions there will be advanced options to change the default datasets.

Model calculations

Based on all inputs for the energy model, calculations are performed with IES’s APACHE engine. Widely regarded as the best whole-building energy simulation engine in the world, the powerful APACHE engine is used in this integration. The engine benefits from the dynamic thermal simulation with a time step output, that sits at the heart of any simulation that considers the energy efficiency or sustainability of a building from an energy or carbon usage viewpoint. Fully adherent with international standards APACHE helps designers worldwide effectively decarbonize their buildings. APACHE engine considers a complete virtual representation of the real building using first-principles models of heat transfer processes and are driven by recorded or future prediction weather data. Calculations consider the exact location of solar penetration and the associated solar gain throughout the building, and pressure network calculations assess both natural ventilation and forced air movement. Calculating size and select air- and waterside HVAC systems, APACHE provides a complete understanding of energy and carbon usage prediction for both the building and its equipment.

* More information on the used methodologies can be found here.

Benchmarking data

Benchmarking data is added so calculation results can be presented in a more user friendly way. Benchmarks for each building type have been generated based on the CBECS & RECS databases for North America as defined and shared by the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), relevant for the building type and its location.
Benchmarking source for the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland based buildings has been derived by IES to provide location specific benchmark assessment.
IES utilized the following databases:

• DECC measured data 2017
• CIBSE magazine measured data case studies 2017
• UK Public Authority published measured data 2017

IES created quartile ranges for the benchmarking. Quartiles are cut points that divide the range of a probability distribution into continuous intervals with four equal probabilities (as in one-fourth) of the
spectrum, as shown in the picture.

Benchmarking quartiles are climate reactive and aligning ASHRAE building types with CBECS & RECS databases for North America, and DECC, CIBSE and UK Public Authority data for United Kingdom and Ireland. The mapping of building types for each set is specified below:

• Single family – RECS Single Families Detached
• Multiple family – RECS Multi Family Large
• Office – CBECS Office
• School or University – CBECS Education
• Hospital – CBECS Inpatient Healthcare
• Dining – CBECS Food Service

Enscape Impact does not gather data from user projects for benchmarking.

Results

The accuracy of the results is based on how closely the default datasets match the actual design (see 1.4). Below are the key insights provided by Enscape Impact:

1. Peak Loads

Definition: Peak load refers to the energy consumption of the building during the most severe weather conditions, whether extreme heat or cold. This load is used to determine the size and capacity required for the HVAC systems.

• What’s Included: Peak load calculations consist of the highest demand for heating or cooling throughout the year. It does not include energy consumption for electricity, hot water, or internal gains like lighting and appliances.
• How Calculated: Peak loads are determined based on weather conditions from the selected location’s weather file and standards specified by ASHRAE. Only extreme or “design conditions” are considered, so it doesn’t simulate the entire year.
• Purpose: Peak loads help establish the size of systems like HVAC to ensure that they can meet the building’s maximum energy demands.
• Exclusions: The peak loads do not include internal gains, solar gains, electricity, or hot water energy.

2. Carbon Emissions

Definition: Carbon emissions represent the total annual carbon output from building operations. This includes emissions from gas, oil, and electricity used to operate the building.

• What’s Included: The sum of emissions generated from the building’s operational needs, specifically heating, cooling, lighting, and electricity.
• How Calculated: Based on the energy end-use data, the results reflect the annual emissions caused by operational energy demand. This includes emissions from fossil fuel sources and electricity, depending on the energy source mix.

3. Energy Use Intensity (EUI)

Definition: EUI is a measure of the building’s total energy consumption per year divided by its floor area, representing its overall energy efficiency.

• What’s Included: EUI includes all forms of energy used during the building’s operation (gas, oil, electricity).
• How Calculated: The total energy consumed for heating, cooling, lighting, and other operational needs is divided by the building’s total floor area. This is then expressed as energy per square meter or square foot.

4. Energy End Use

Definition: Energy end use breaks down the total energy consumption by category, helping users understand how much energy is used for cooling, heating, hot water, lighting, and other electricity needs.

• What’s Included: Energy distribution is shown between key categories, including heating, cooling, hot water, lighting, and other electrical demands.
• How Calculated: The energy end use results are derived based on default datasets and the selected building and weather conditions, allowing users to see how energy is allocated among different systems.

Peak loads

Reducing the peak load of a building during the early design stage can significantly enhance its energy efficiency, reduce operational costs, and improve occupant comfort. The lower the value, the better. Here are some strategies and design considerations to help achieve this in early design stages:

Optimize Building Orientation and Layout

• Orientation: Orient the building to maximize natural daylight and reduce solar heat gain, especially in hot climates. South-facing windows (in the Northern Hemisphere) can provide beneficial winter solar gain.
• Zoning: Design internal spaces to create thermal zones based on their usage patterns, allowing for more efficient heating and cooling control.

Enhance Daylighting and Shading

• Daylighting: Use skylights, light shelves, and clerestory windows to enhance natural light distribution, reducing the need for artificial lighting.
• Shading Devices: Incorporate external shading devices (e.g., overhangs, louvers) and internal shading (e.g., blinds, curtains) to control solar heat gain and glare.

Renewable Energy Integration (not included in this version of Enscape Impact)

• Solar Panels: Incorporate solar photovoltaic (PV) panels to generate on-site renewable energy, reducing dependency on external power sources.
• Solar Thermal: Use solar thermal systems for water heating to reduce the load on conventional water heaters.

Landscaping and Site Design

• Vegetation: Use landscaping to provide natural shading and windbreaks, which can reduce heating and cooling loads.
• Green Roofs: Install green roofs to provide additional insulation and reduce the urban heat island effect.

Carbon emissions

Reducing operational carbon emissions is a key goal in sustainable building design, and one of the most effective ways to achieve this is by targeting areas where energy consumption is highest.

Reducing Carbon Emissions through Peak Load and Energy End Use Improvements:

• Peak Loads: Reducing the building’s peak heating and cooling loads can significantly cut down the overall energy consumption during periods of maximum demand. By minimizing these peaks, the systems in place, like HVAC, can operate more efficiently, leading to lower carbon emissions.
  • See the Peak Loads section to explore ways to manage heating and cooling requirements during extreme weather conditions.
• Energy End Use: Understanding the breakdown of energy usage (heating, cooling, lighting, hot water, etc.) enables targeted efficiency measures, helping reduce energy demand in specific areas. Lowering overall energy consumption directly correlates with a reduction in carbon emissions.
  • Refer to the Energy End Use section to discover how analyzing energy distribution can help you identify areas for improvement.

By reducing both peak loads and energy end use, designers can take strategic actions to lower the building’s operational carbon emissions, leading to a more sustainable and efficient design.

Energy Use Intensity

The Energy Use Intensity (EUI) is benchmarked against data from similar buildings in terms of building type, size, age, and climate zone (see Benchmarking data). The EUI measures the total energy consumption per square meter or foot of building space, and the result is displayed on a color-coded dial for easy interpretation.

Red Dial: The building’s EUI is among the 71-100% of the benchmarked buildings, indicating a high energy use compared to similar buildings.

Yellow Dial: The building’s EUI is among the 31-70% of the benchmarked buildings, reflecting average energy use.

Green Dial: The building’s EUI is among the 0-30% of the benchmarked buildings, showcasing high energy efficiency.

Strategies to Improve EUI:

1. Optimize Building Orientation and Massing

• Orientation: Position the building to maximize natural daylight and passive solar heating, while minimizing excessive solar gain to reduce cooling demands.
• Shape and Massing: Design compact building shapes to minimize the surface area exposed to external temperature variations, helping to reduce heat transfer.

2. Improve Daylighting Efficiency

• Daylighting: Incorporate large windows, skylights, and light wells to maximize natural light penetration, thereby reducing the need for artificial lighting and lowering overall energy consumption.

Improving the EUI during the early design stages can significantly enhance a building’s energy performance, reduce operational costs, and increase sustainability.

Energy end use

The Energy End Use breakdown helps users understand how energy is distributed among various systems such as cooling, heating, hot water, lighting, and electricity annually. Knowing the breakdown early in the design stage offers valuable insights, allowing you to target specific areas for improvement and optimize overall energy performance.

By analyzing the energy end-use data, users can identify which systems are the major energy consumers and prioritize efficiency measures where they will have the most impact. For example, if cooling is a significant energy user, you might consider adjusting the building’s orientation, shape, or glazing to reduce the cooling demand.

Benefits:

• Identify Major Energy Consumers: Determine which systems consume the most energy, helping you focus on efficiency improvements for HVAC, lighting, or other energy-intensive systems.
• Targeted Design Adjustments: For example, lowering cooling energy requirements can be achieved by rethinking building orientation, window placement, and glazing to minimize heat gain.

This information helps you optimize the design to reduce energy use, increase sustainability, and potentially lower operational costs.

Performance Map Visualizations

The Performance Map visualization feature allows users to visually analyze the performance of each room in terms of peak loads, heating, cooling, and solar gains. Performance is calculated individually for every room, and the rooms with the lowest and highest values form the scale. This means that rooms with very close performance values can still appear dramatically different in color (e.g., blue vs. red), as they set the boundaries for the color range. It’s important to check the scale values for precise interpretation.

This feature helps designers easily spot rooms that may require design improvements by highlighting performance disparities across the building. By identifying problematic rooms, users can implement targeted measures to improve the building’s overall performance.

Examples of solar gains:

• Which rooms receive the most solar gains? These rooms might benefit from less glazing or the addition of shading elements to prevent overheating.
• Which rooms receive the least solar gains? These may need more glazing or other design changes to ensure they meet lighting and energy needs effectively.

The Performance Map visualization tool is a quick and intuitive way to analyze and optimize the building’s design for better performance.

The Chaos AI Enhancer allows you to elevate the quality of your visualizations, specifically Enscape people and vegetation assets. The AI Enhancer tool can be accessed from within the Enscape Viewport User Interface (UI) toolbar. To access the AI Enhancer, you must be logged in to your Chaos account with a non-trial license.

Note: If the button is grayed out, you simply need to log into your account. A tooltip will remind you of this step.

To start using the AI Enhancer, simply go to a named view or navigate inside your Enscape viewport to set up a view you want to export. The AI Enhancer works similar to the Screenshot button. However, the screenshot is exported to your Chaos Cloud account for enhancement. Simply click on the AI Enhancer button and a status window will pop up confirming that your screenshot is being rendered.

Once the image is rendered, the Chaos Cloud window will open up, asking you to define the name and location of the image in your Cloud account. You can either choose an existing project folder location, or create a new folder.

When you click Upload and enhance, you will be able to view the status bar for your upload. When the image has been successfully uploaded, you will be notified in that window, and a button ‘View in Cloud‘ will show up. When you click this button, it will open the exported screenshot in your Chaos Cloud account.

By opening up the exported screenshot in your Cloud Account, you will be able to view the Enhancing… status at the bottom.

Once your image is enhanced, the enhanced version of the image will automatically open up, and a notification will pop up, confirming that your image was enhanced successfully.

You can use the compare versions feature in your Chaos Cloud account to compare the original and the enhanced version of your image as shown below.

You can keep on uploading additional renders through the AI Enhancer button in Enscape. This will not stop you from using Enscape. The enhancement takes place directly in your Chaos Cloud account.

To learn more about the AI Enhancer, check out the video tutorial.

To further understand the accuracy of results generated with Enscape Impact, IES conducted a test, comparing project results from Impact 4.1 and IES VE. This article will give us a quick overview of those results. A seven storey office building in London, UK was used as a base model for the comparison.

The Variations with respect to glazing changes of 10% and 25% show a very similar improvement between both software applications.

Further testing is currently being carried out, across more model archetypes and locations and also design changes.  These test results will be turned into a white paper and published with the release.

Overall, there is a variance of 12% between Enscape Impact & IES VE results. 

Baseline is within a good tolerance between Impact and the IES VE; this is attributed to known factors such as how the geometry is modeled in Impact and differences in the default datasets applied to the model, both of which will be improved over time.

While there are discrepancies in the results, the results clearly show that the impact of the change is in the right direction. As such, the user will have enough information to know if the change they are making has a positive or negative impact and by approximately how much of an impact, e.g. 10%, 15%, 20% etc. 

Impact 4.1 and 4.2 Comparisons

Impact runs on the IES Apache technology. If you want to learn more, check out the Enscape Impact Video Tutorial.

Enscape 4.1 comes with licensing changes in an effort to provide a unified experience for all Chaos customers across its different products and integrations. For those wishing to upgrade to Enscape 4.1 and the new Chaos licensing now, here are the steps to get you started depending on the type of user you are and the license you are using:

Everyone who owns an Enscape license now has a unified Chaos account. You can log in using your existing Enscape account credentials.

A fixed license can be used by one person on one device. 

Single user: Install the new Enscape 4.1 using the default installation options. Sign in with your account and start using the product. 

Small teams with multiple users: Small teams who used to assign fixed licenses to their users can continue to use the licenses in the same way. This setup is straightforward and offers great flexibility. You can refer to the documentation on adding users to an organization and assigning license seats in the Enscape Knowledge Base.

Cloud-based Floating Licensing allows you and your team to use a shared pool of Floating licenses entirely through the Cloud. This allows users to use licenses from any location without the need to be on the same local network or connect to an office network through a VPN.

To use this setup, both the Administrator (who owns the Floating licenses) and users (who use the licenses) need to complete a short list of steps.

Administrators need to:

• Add users to their Organization
• Enable Floating License Sharing for their Organization
  

Users need to:

• Be part of an Organization
• Perform a default installation of the Chaos product(s) and sign in to the product with their Chaos Account

Users can follow the steps in the email they receive for being added to an Organization by the Administrator. If the user does not have an account, the email will lead them through the steps of creating one. For more detailed instructions, visit this page.

Unifying the licensing experience will ensure our customers have a unified way to manage and use products across the Chaos portfolio and allow them to smoothly move through the Chaos ecosystem.

• The Chaos Self-Service Portal, which has been the go-to portal for all other Chaos products, now replaces my.enscape3d.com, allowing Enscape users to use the same Chaos sign-in and licensing system.

• New portal for subscription and license management: When visiting my.enscape3d.com, you will be redirected to my.chaos.com, where you can manage your Enscape licenses and more. My Chaos serves as the self-service portal for all Chaos products. You can now use My Chaos for subscription, license, and user management. The Administrator Guide will help you get started.

• Upload Management (Panoramas and web standalones) remains in My Enscape.

You decided to switch to 4.1 but are still unable to set up things correctly?

Please contact us for further support.

FAQ on Enscape Licensing Changes

FAQ on Chaos Licensing

Chaos Licensing Setup

Enscape License Activation

Cloud-based Floating Licensing

User Account Management

Self-Service Portal Guide

What’s New in Enscape 4.1

Enscape version 4.1 uses a new licensing system that requires authentication with a Chaos account. If you are a single license holder, you will be prompted to login during installation, or you can log in directly from within Enscape. If you are sharing licenses, you can enable the Cloud-based Floating License feature in your Chaos Account Portal.

Click here to learn more about managing your user account.

All Enscape versions from 4.1 onwards need to be connected to a Chaos License to function on your machine. Chaos License Server provides licensing without the need for any physical devices. The Chaos License Server’s interface is accessible in a web browser. There are a few convenient ways to open the interface. When the Chaos License Server is installed and running on the same machine, from which you’re trying to access the interface, you can do one of the following:

When the Chaos License Server is installed and running on another machine in your local network, open a browser and type the IP address of the machine where it’s running, followed by the 30304 port number. For example: http://10.0.0.100:30304/

Within the Chaos License Server, you can browse and sort through all of your Chaos licenses and check their availability. To do so, click on the product you have a license for, and expand the menu to see more details.

You can filter through Online and Offline licenses that are Available or In Use for the selected product, using the dedicated buttons at the top of the expandable menu.

The licensing system allows you to use seats associated with your Chaos account easily from anywhere you can log into over the Internet, and the filters will distinguish the status as online or offline. However, offline licenses also reflect borrowed licenses that are available or in use offline. 

The Unified Login Application (ULA) is integrated into the License Server installation. The ULA allows Single Sign On for all ULA-integrated Chaos desktop apps. Signing in to any of the Chaos applications will automatically log the user in all other Chaos applications installed on the machine.

• Local – Single license holders of fixed licenses can use the default installation option, which installs a local License Server on their device. For the Local installation type, an installation and activation is required.

• Cloud-based Floating License – Enabling the Cloud-based Floating Licensing allows you and your team to use a shared pool of Floating licenses entirely through the Cloud. This allows users to use licenses from any location without the need to be on the same local network or connect to an office network through a VPN.

Enscape versions prior to 4.1 will continue being used for as long as your subscription is active. Existing versions of Enscape do not require a login. Your Enscape Account window may show limited information in the licensing tab though. 

Once you have purchased a subscription, you will then receive a License Key that you will need to input to activate Enscape. There are no License Keys required to run Enscape in Trial Mode. To activate an Enscape License Key, whether Fixed Seat or Floating, open the Enscape Account window via the Enscape ribbon in the CAD you’ve installed Enscape for. Then, click the Licenses button.

This will then open the window which shows the License Details. The following shows the details available in the license window and the button to enter a license key.

Click on the Enter License Key button which will open the window where your License Key can be entered. When copying your License Key, make sure to copy the full License Key and make sure that there are no additional spaces or letters copied. We recommend you paste using the Paste from Clipboard option.

Then click on Apply License to activate the license.

If the activation is successful, the notification will state: Thank you for using Enscape! You can then click on the OK button to close that window.

The User Account (Sign in) button, as highlighted in the following screenshot, is only for use with the User Management feature that you will find documented here.

If you are using a Floating License and receive a message stating you have exceeded the number of seats, this can be caused either by there being no seat available (Enscape is open on another machine on your network) or because you are unable to connect to our Licensing server to confirm the License Key. If you have problems connecting to the Enscape Licensing server, then you may need to add proxy server information or add exceptions to your Firewall. To do that, please refer to this article.

Please note that when there is no seat available on a Floating License, all core features of Enscape are blocked and a notification is displayed, as is also the case when a License Key or a Trial License expires. Core features of Enscape include: the rendering engine itself (Enscape Viewport), Material Library, Material Editor, Asset Library (including the Custom Asset Library), and lastly, Enscape Objects (SketchUp only). In such a case, you will need to wait for a seat to become free, or contact your license administrator if the seat count on a License Key requires increasing.

To remove or deactivate an Enscape License Key, for example when you need to move the license to another machine, open the Enscape Account window via the Enscape ribbon in CAD and click the Licenses button. Then, click the Remove License Key button, which will unbind the license key from that machine whereby, if the license key is a Floating License Key, activation of the license / seat on another machine will then be possible. If it’s a Fixed Seat License Key, there will be two buttons available: clicking the Remove License Key button will simply remove the license key on that machine, as is with the Floating License Key. The other button that will be available is a toggle displaying your license state as License Active. You can click the toggle to change the state to License Inactive and it will simply deactivate the license key but will not remove it. This means you’ll be able to reactivate the license key on the same machine at a later date by clicking this toggle and you won’t have to paste the license key in again.

If you have reinstalled the operating system without removing the License Key beforehand, or if you have uninstalled the CAD and therefore can no longer access the Enscape Account  button to deactivate the license, even though Enscape is still installed on the machine, or if you have problems with activating / deactivating your Enscape License Key in general, even after checking your proxy settings and firewall exceptions, then please contact support through the Help Center.

Enscape and its rendering engine strongly relies on the performance of the graphics processing unit (GPU) of the Apple Silicon chipset and Unified Memory of the Mac. To optimize this, your computer must at least meet the minimum recommended system requirements set out below.

Furthermore, we do recommend that you use Enscape in a multi-monitor setup to be able to fully facilitate the workflow between the CAD application and Enscape.

The Enscape for Mac plug-in is provided for the following host applications:

• SketchUp 2022, 2023, 2024 and 2025*
• Archicad 26, 27 and 28
• Vectorworks 2023 (Service Pack 6), 2024 and 2025
• Rhino 7.0 and 8.3 (or later)

On macOS, the Enscape plugin will be installed for all of the above listed host applications by default unless otherwise specified by the user during the installation process. This means you do not require a dedicated installer specific to each individual host application, and you can specify which CAD or CADs you want to install Enscape for during the installation procedure.

We recommend updating your CAD application listed above to the latest software release/update version available from the manufacturer to have all fixes and improvements available.

* Be advised that SketchUp versions prior to 2024 do not officially support macOS 14 Sonoma at this time. Technical issues might ensue from using SketchUp and Enscape. Please use at your own discretion.

Enscape performs its renders using your graphics card (GPU).
A good CPU can speed up Enscape’s loading times.

It is also recommended that your internet connection is fast and stable, and that you should use a direct cable connection and avoid using a Wi-Fi connection where possible, as this can slow down the Asset Library loading times.

Note: Real-time rendering performance is affected by the project size, and therefore the following table provides the minimum GPU specifications that we recommend where large CAD/BIM projects are regularly being worked on.

Driver updates are supplied by Apple exclusively via updates to the operating system macOS itself. We therefore encourage you to update macOS to the latest version your software situation allows.

If you run into trouble, let us know by using Enscape’s Feedback function or contact us here. There are plenty of different system configurations and we are working every day to support more of them.

Enscape uses ray tracing for its real-time rendering, and almost all the calculations that Enscape performs are being handled on the graphics card (GPU). For this reason, your computer must at least meet the minimum recommended system requirements set out below.

Furthermore, although not a requirement, we do recommend that you use Enscape with dual monitors, as Enscape is optimized to work on a dual monitor setup.

The Enscape for Windows plug-in is provided for the following host applications:

• Revit 2022, 2023, 2024, and 2025
• SketchUp 2022, 2023, 2024 and 2025
• Rhino 7.0 and 8.3 (or later)
  
• Archicad 26, 27 and 28
• Vectorworks 2023 (Service Pack 1 or later), 2024 and 2025

Enscape is not provided as a plugin for Revit LT  because Revit only allows the addition of third-party plugins in the the full version of the software. This is a limitation set by Autodesk.

On Windows, the Enscape plugin will be installed for all of the above listed host applications by default unless otherwise specified by the user during the installation process. This means you do not require a dedicated installer specific to each individual host application, and you can specify which CAD or CAD’s you want to install Enscape for during the installation procedure.

We recommend updating your CAD application listed above to the latest software release/update version available from the manufacturer to have all fixes and improvements available.

Note: There are conflicts with two other Revit plugins: Colorizer and Techviz. To avoid incompatibilities, please uninstall them before using Enscape.

Enscape performs its renders using your graphics card (GPU), but the GPU has to have dedicated VRAM, and not shared VRAM as found with Intel Integrated Graphics chips. If your systems CPU and RAM are capable of handling Revit, for instance, and you have a capable GPU, Enscape should work. A good CPU can speed up Enscape’s loading times. The system requirements to run Enscape, as well as the Standalone Executable files that can be exported from Enscape, are identical.

It is also recommended that your internet connection is fast and stable, and that you should use a direct cable connection and avoid using a Wi-fi connection where possible, as this can slow down the Asset Library loading times.

Note: Real-time rendering performance is affected by the project size, and therefore the following table provides the minimum GPU specifications that we recommend where large CAD/BIM projects are regularly being worked on. Where VR is listed, the GPU’s clock speed (processor) has more relevance than the amount of VRAM, although you should always try to use a GPU with as much VRAM as possible.

Enscape should work if your GPU is capable of running the minimum recommended drivers listed below. Although we always advise that you should be running the latest available drivers for your GPU, sometimes the latest available GPU drivers can cause unforeseen issues and in such a case we strongly advise that you roll back to the drivers listed here:

If you run into trouble, let us know by using Enscape’s Feedback function or contact us here. There are plenty of different system configurations and we are working every day to support more of them.

There are several reasons why your frame rate (fps) might be low, resulting in single frames being strongly noticeable when moving in Enscape.

Your computer’s system specifications are too low

• Enscape renders use only a dedicated GPU. A GPU such as an AMD Radeon Pro 5300m with 4GB or a M1 with dedicated GPU cores is recommended and the more VRAM/RAM there is on the GPU, the better Enscape will generally perform. It’s worth checking our System Requirements from time to time and on each release as these are subject to change.

Your project is too large

• Project size can be, but is not always, an issue. Projects containing a lot of fine tessellated geometry, such as pipes, cables, and furniture, or lots of high-res textures might overwhelm your computer. Hiding small but detailed elements in your project can help.

Under the General Settings – Rendering tab, Enscape provides further options to enhance performance:

Although Enscape does not offer a way to natively monitor your GPU performance, it is possible via other methods to get some idea about the GPU performance whilst Enscape is running. The following suggestions may not give you totally accurate statistics but do go some way to monitor GPU performance in the first instance.

The first option is to open the Activity Monitor application which is included by default in all macOS installations. Just search for ‘Activity Monitor’ in your Launchpad.

For some projects, Enscape’s initial loading time can take a few minutes whilst it loads all the information required.

Loading time is also determined by how quickly the CAD software can communicate the content of the project. The more complex your project is in the CAD software, the longer it may take for Enscape to load. To shorten loading times, try the following:

1. 
   Download the newest version of Enscape as we’re continuously working on improving the loading time.
2. 
   Hide small yet detailed objects, such as cables, triggers, pipes, etc.
3. 
   Use a dedicated SSD for your CAD installation and project files.
4. 
   Upgrade your computer. Exporting time is limited by your CPU, RAM and hard disk speed.

There are several reasons why your frame rate (fps) might be low, resulting in single frames being strongly noticeable when moving in Enscape.

Your computer’s system specifications are too low

• Enscape renders using only a dedicated GPU. A GPU such as an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 900 series card or higher is recommended and the more VRAM there is on the GPU, the better Enscape will generally perform (although when using VR, the clock speed of the GPU processor is the more limiting factor on the higher end GPU’s required for VR). It’s worth checking our System Requirements from time to time and on each release as these are subject to change.

Your project is too large

• Project size can be, but is not always, an issue. Projects containing a lot of fine tessellated geometry, such as pipes, cables, and furniture, or lots of high-res textures might overwhelm your computer. Hiding small but detailed elements in your project can help.

Under the General Settings – Rendering tab, Enscape provides further options to enhance performance:

Although Enscape does not offer a way to natively monitor your GPU performance, it is possible via other methods to get some idea about the GPU performance whilst Enscape is running. The following suggestions may not give you totally accurate statistics but do go some way to monitor GPU performance in the first instance.

The first option is to open the Windows Task Manager application which is included by default in all Windows installations. Just search for ‘Task Manager’ in the Windows search function.

For some projects, Enscape’s initial loading time can take a few minutes whilst it loads all the information required.

Loading time is also determined by how quickly the CAD software can communicate the content of the project. The more complex your project is in the CAD software, the longer it may take for Enscape to load. To shorten loading times, try the following:

1. 
   In Revit use the Section Box function which will reduce the amount of information being communicated.
2. 
   Hide small yet detailed objects, such as cables, triggers, pipes, etc.
3. 
   Use a dedicated SSD for your CAD installation and project files.
4. 
   Upgrade your computer. Exporting time is limited by your CPU, RAM and hard disk speed.
5. 
   Download the newest version of Enscape as we’re continuously working on improving the loading time.

To open the Enscape material editor, click the Enscape Material Editor button in the Enscape toolbar.

NOTE: If the Material Editor opens but is blocked with a notification informing the user that the license key has expired, or that there are no seats available on a floating license, then please refer to this article.

Two other functions that are available in the Enscape Material Editor are the menu button at the top which allows you to either Batch Import *.mattpkg files, or import materials from the Enscape Material Library.

You can also set the location where materials will be stored (such as a network drive)  via the ‘gear / cog’ symbol at the extreme bottom left of the Material Editor dialog and this is also covered in the Material Library article.

The following shows how to import a PBR material from the Enscape Material Library into Rhino.

• The Enscape Material Editor can set each material to be set to a certain Type. Each Type has a set of pre-built qualities.These following Type of materials are available to choose from:
  • Generic – Suited for any materials that aren’t supposed to be rendered as grass blades, water surface, or have translucency applied.
  • Carpet – Contains pre-built sprites that act like carpet fibers which can be adjusted.
  • Clearcoat – Imitates the type of paint that you find on car bodies.
  • Foliage – If the Sun (not artificial lighting) is located behind said surface, it will be illuminated on both sides, common in nature.
  • Glass – Transparent material with reflective properties, simulating the appearance of real glass surfaces.
  • Grass– Contains sprites that represent grass material which animate when not at rest.
  • Self-illuminated – Makes a material appear as if glowing, and emitting actual light.
  • Water – Acts as a liquid and animates when not at rest.

It is also possible to add a video texture to the Albedo texture slot. The following formats are currently supported: .mp4, .mpg, .m2v, .3gp, .avi, .mov, and .mkv.

When selecting a video file as the Albedo texture, transparency-related material settings are limited to Cutout-Transparency only where you can apply a mask texture. The adjustment or inversion of the brightness of the video texture in the Enscape Texture Editor becomes unavailable in this scenario.

This value summarizes the texture coordinate systems currently in use by the textures of this material. Changing this value will update all textures at the same time.

Object (default) – Rhino’s standard UV texture mapping.

World Plane – Textures are projected downwards onto each object from a horizontal plane.

World Box – Textures are projected into each object from a six-sided box surrounding the scene.

• Roughness
  The smoother the material (Roughness -> 0%), the more it will reflect it’s environment. The rougher the material is, the more it will diffuse incoming light.
• Texture
  Again, you can also use 2D Images as a ‘Roughness Map’ to control the roughness value per location on your surface.
• Metallic
  The Metallic-slider tells Enscape to treat the surface either as a non-metallic (e.g. plastic, ceramic..) reflective surface, or as a metallic one.
  Let’s say metallic surfaces behave more like a mirror, reflecting a clear image of their surrounding, while non-metallic surfaces show more of their actual surface, reflecting the environment rather vaguely.
• Specular
  This value controls the amount by which light is being reflected when hitting a non-metallic surface at a steep angle, as opposed to light that’s hitting it rather from the side.
  If you’re not too familiar with this setting, it’s best to leave it around 50% for realistic results.

The Carpet material acts in the same way as the Grass Material, in that it can be applied to a horizontal surface only, and the Height and Height Variation are controlled in the Enscape Material Editor.

NOTE: The minimum surface area for the sprites of the Grass material to show in Enscape is 10cm x 12.5cm. Any surface that has this Material Type applied and is smaller than these dimensions will result in the sprites not being visible in Enscape.

The Height and Height Variation Settings title is amended with Carpet when Carpet is selected as the Type in the Material Editor.

• Height
  The Height slider will stretch the sprites being used as grass blades, making them appear larger, making for higher grass.

• Height Variation
  The Height Variation slider adds a random factor to the grass height. This makes for a wilder looking, ragged grass.

• Wind Settings
  The Grass material is now also affected by the global Wind setting found in the in the Visual Settings -> Atmosphere tab. You can adjust both the wind Intensity and Direction Angle, and this affect can be seen working when adjusting the Intensity slider, as well as when moving around in the Enscape Viewport and will be included in Video exports.

Here are the available settings for Water in the Enscape Material Editor.

• Water Color
  Choose a color your water should be tinted in. No textures to be used this time – water color is set globally.

You can use up to four textures at a time per Enscape material. Textures are being used to control Color, Visibility, Surface Detail and Roughness of a material.

By clicking any of the texture symbols at the top of the material editor, or any of the blue and underlined image file names next to “Texture”, you’ll enter the actual texture editor interface.

Here you can

• Choose the image file for your texture
• Change the brightness
• Invert the colors of your image
• Apply explicit texture transformations

The Texture Editor interface is the same for any texture type. It’s meant to allow for simple image editing operations without having to leave the material editor.

In order to be able to utilize existent materials, you can import multiple materials simultaneously via the Batch Import feature, or by importing a single material. You can also export single materials as a *.matpkg file.

To import a single material hover the mouse over any material listed on the left hand side of the Material Editor dialog and the material Type symbol will change to 3 dots.

Clicking on the 3 dots will reveal the menu options Export Material Package and Import Material Package. In order to import an existing material, click on Import Material Package which will allow you to navigate to the location of the *.matpkg file you wish to import.

To export a material package file (*.matpkg), click Export Material Package and this will allow you to choose the location you would like to save the file to.

Finally, to Batch Import .matpkg files you need to click on the three horizontal lines menu next to the Materials title at the top left of the Material Editor dialog and choose the Batch Import *.matpkg… option. This will open a dialog window to allow you to navigate to the  “.matpkg” files you would like to import. When Batch Importing the *.matpkg files you want to import must be in the same location.

Replacing current materials in the current project with materials from the Enscape Material Library is now possible from within the Enscape Material Editor.

To replace a material hover the mouse over any material listed on the left hand side of the Material Editor dialog and the material Type symbol will change to a meatball menu (3 horizontal dots).

Clicking on the meatball menu will reveal 3 menu options, one being Replace with Enscape Material.

Once you click on Replace with Enscape Material the Enscape Material Library will open. The selected material will be previewed on the surface that has material to be replaced. With a material selected the Replace button will be available.
To confirm and replace the existing material with the newly selected material, click the Replace button and the material will be imported and updated.

The process is illustrated in the video below.

Those keywords change the material parameters without changing their color. The color is still defined by the SketchUp texture. The SketchUp default roughness is 1.0.

To open the Enscape material editor, click the Enscape Material Editor button in the Enscape toolbar.

NOTE: If the Material Editor opens but is blocked with a notification informing the user that the license key has expired, or that there are no seats available on a floating license, then please refer to this article.

Two other functions that are available in the Enscape Material Editor are the menu button at the top which allows you to either Batch Import *.mattpkg files, or import materials from the Enscape Material Library.

You can also set the location where materials will be stored (such as a network drive)  via the ‘gear / cog’ symbol at the extreme bottom left of the Material Editor dialog and this is also covered in the Material Library article.

The following shows how to import a PBR material from the Enscape Material Library into Rhino.

• The Enscape Material Editor can set each material to be set to a certain Type. Each Type has a set of pre-built qualities.These following Type of materials are available to choose from:
  • Generic – Suited for any materials that aren’t supposed to be rendered as grass blades, water surface, or have translucency applied.
  • Carpet – Contains pre-built sprites that act like carpet fibers which can be adjusted.
  • Clearcoat – Imitates the type of paint that you find on car bodies.
  • Foliage – If the Sun (not artificial lighting) is located behind said surface, it will be illuminated on both sides, common in nature.
  • Glass – Transparent material with reflective properties, simulating the appearance of real glass surfaces.
  • Grass– Contains sprites that represent grass material which animate when not at rest.
  • Self-illuminated – Makes a material appear as if glowing, and emitting actual light.
  • Water – Acts as a liquid and animates when not at rest.

It is also possible to add a video texture to the Albedo texture slot. The following formats are currently supported: .mp4, .mpg, .m2v, .3gp, .avi, .mov, and .mkv.

When selecting a video file as the Albedo texture, transparency-related material settings are limited to Cutout-Transparency only where you can apply a mask texture. The adjustment or inversion of the brightness of the video texture in the Enscape Texture Editor becomes unavailable in this scenario.

This value summarizes the texture coordinate systems currently in use by the textures of this material. Changing this value will update all textures at the same time.

Object (default) – Rhino’s standard UV texture mapping.

World Plane – Textures are projected downwards onto each object from a horizontal plane.

World Box – Textures are projected into each object from a six-sided box surrounding the scene.

• Roughness
  The smoother the material (Roughness -> 0%), the more it will reflect it’s environment. The rougher the material is, the more it will diffuse incoming light.
• Texture
  Again, you can also use 2D Images as a ‘Roughness Map’ to control the roughness value per location on your surface.
• Metallic
  The Metallic-slider tells Enscape to treat the surface either as a non-metallic (e.g. plastic, ceramic..) reflective surface, or as a metallic one.
  Let’s say metallic surfaces behave more like a mirror, reflecting a clear image of their surrounding, while non-metallic surfaces show more of their actual surface, reflecting the environment rather vaguely.
• Specular
  This value controls the amount by which light is being reflected when hitting a non-metallic surface at a steep angle, as opposed to light that’s hitting it rather from the side.
  If you’re not too familiar with this setting, it’s best to leave it around 50% for realistic results.

The Carpet material acts in the same way as the Grass Material, in that it can be applied to a horizontal surface only, and the Height and Height Variation are controlled in the Enscape Material Editor.

NOTE: The minimum surface area for the sprites of the Grass material to show in Enscape is 10cm x 12.5cm. Any surface that has this Material Type applied and is smaller than these dimensions will result in the sprites not being visible in Enscape.

The Height and Height Variation Settings title is amended with Carpet when Carpet is selected as the Type in the Material Editor.

• Height
  The Height slider will stretch the sprites being used as grass blades, making them appear larger, making for higher grass.

• Height Variation
  The Height Variation slider adds a random factor to the grass height. This makes for a wilder looking, ragged grass.

• Wind Settings
  The Grass material is now also affected by the global Wind setting found in the in the Visual Settings -> Atmosphere tab. You can adjust both the wind Intensity and Direction Angle, and this affect can be seen working when adjusting the Intensity slider, as well as when moving around in the Enscape Viewport and will be included in Video exports.

Here are the available settings for Water in the Enscape Material Editor.

• Water Color
  Choose a color your water should be tinted in. No textures to be used this time – water color is set globally.

You can use up to four textures at a time per Enscape material. Textures are being used to control Color, Visibility, Surface Detail and Roughness of a material.

By clicking any of the texture symbols at the top of the material editor, or any of the blue and underlined image file names next to “Texture”, you’ll enter the actual texture editor interface.

Here you can

• Choose the image file for your texture
• Change the brightness
• Invert the colors of your image
• Apply explicit texture transformations

The Texture Editor interface is the same for any texture type. It’s meant to allow for simple image editing operations without having to leave the material editor.

In order to be able to utilize existent materials, you can import multiple materials simultaneously via the Batch Import feature, or by importing a single material. You can also export single materials as a *.matpkg file.

To import a single material hover the mouse over any material listed on the left hand side of the Material Editor dialog and the material Type symbol will change to 3 dots.

Clicking on the 3 dots will reveal the menu options Export Material Package and Import Material Package. In order to import an existing material, click on Import Material Package which will allow you to navigate to the location of the *.matpkg file you wish to import.

To export a material package file (*.matpkg), click Export Material Package and this will allow you to choose the location you would like to save the file to.

Finally, to Batch Import .matpkg files you need to click on the three horizontal lines menu next to the Materials title at the top left of the Material Editor dialog and choose the Batch Import *.matpkg… option. This will open a dialog window to allow you to navigate to the  “.matpkg” files you would like to import. When Batch Importing the *.matpkg files you want to import must be in the same location.

Replacing current materials in the current project with materials from the Enscape Material Library is now possible from within the Enscape Material Editor.

To replace a material hover the mouse over any material listed on the left hand side of the Material Editor dialog and the material Type symbol will change to a meatball menu (3 horizontal dots).

Clicking on the meatball menu will reveal 3 menu options, one being Replace with Enscape Material.

Once you click on Replace with Enscape Material the Enscape Material Library will open. The selected material will be previewed on the surface that has material to be replaced. With a material selected the Replace button will be available.

To confirm and replace the existing material with the newly selected material, click the Replace button and the material will be imported and updated.

The process is illustrated in the video below.

Those keywords change the material parameters without changing their color. The color is still defined by the texture. The default roughness is 1.0.

To open the Enscape material editor, go to the Enscape menu on top and click on the Enscape Material Editor button.

NOTE: If the Material Editor opens but is blocked with a notification informing the user that the license key has expired, or that there are no seats available on a floating license, then please refer to this article.

Two other functions that are available in the Enscape Material Editor are the menu button at the top which allows you to either Batch Import *.mattpkg files, or import materials from the Enscape Material Library.

You can also set the location where materials will be stored (such as a network drive)  via the ‘gear / cog’ symbol at the extreme bottom left of the Material Editor dialog and this is also covered in the Material Library article.

Additional Render Appearance Paths

Additionally, and specific to Revit, please make sure that you add your textures folder as a path in the “Additional render appearance paths” in Revit itself. Open the Revit File tab and select Options > Rendering . Under Additional render appearance paths , use the green plus button to add a path.

If you are not able to see the expected appearance of materials inside Enscape, it can be the case that your material selection is set to Graphics. This can be changed easily. Go to Enscape General Settings window in the Enscape menu inside Revit. Click on the Revit tab, and choose Appearance under the Material Selection dropdown menu.

Display Revit Graphics Overrides in Enscape

Graphics Overrides in Revit, allow you to apply filters and define how objects should display visually. For example, you would like to display all North facing walls in green and South facing walls in Red. Or you might want to display MEP drawings where drainage lines should be displayed in different colors, or HVAC drawings where entry and exit systems are represented in specific colors or display styles. The display properties of different objects can be controlled in such a way that overrides are set to display custom settings. There are multiple ways to set these override rules. Refer to the documentation on the official Autodesk Website to go into more detail on setting this up inside Revit. 

With Enscape 4.2 onwards, it is now possible to view these overrides in the Enscape visualization as well. Let’s go through the steps to enable the display of these overrides inside Enscape. 

Go to the General Settings window in the Enscape menu inside Revit.

Click on the Revit tab, and select Display Revit Objects, Filters and Elements.

Once you check this box, you will be able to see your overrides in the Enscape visualization as shown below

When you change the graphic display of layers in a linked file, you can specify whether Revit preserves or discards the graphic overrides.

Import a PBR material from the Enscape into Revit

The following shows how to import a PBR material from the Enscape Material Library into Revit.

• The Enscape Material Editor can set each material to be set to a certain Type. Each Type has a set of pre-built qualities.These following Type of materials are available to choose from:
  • Generic – Suited for any materials that aren’t supposed to be rendered as grass blades, water surface, or have translucency applied.
  • Carpet – Contains pre-built sprites that act like carpet fibers which can be adjusted.
  • Clearcoat – Imitates the type of paint that you find on car bodies.
  • Foliage – If the Sun (not artificial lighting) is located behind said surface, it will be illuminated on both sides, common in nature.
  • Glass – Transparent material with reflective properties, simulating the appearance of real glass surfaces.
  • Grass – Contains sprites that represent grass material which animate when not at rest.
  • Self-illuminated – Makes a material appear as if glowing, and emitting actual light.
  • Water – Acts as a liquid and animates when not at rest.

It is also possible to add a video texture to the Albedo texture slot. The following formats are currently supported: .mp4, .mpg, .m2v, .3gp, .avi, .mov, and .mkv.

When selecting a video file as the Albedo texture, transparency-related material settings are limited to Cutout-Transparency only where you can apply a mask texture. The adjustment or inversion of the brightness of the video texture in the Enscape Texture Editor becomes unavailable in this scenario.

• Roughness
  The smoother the material (Roughness -> 0%), the more it will reflect it’s environment. The rougher the material is, the more it will diffuse incoming light.
• Texture
  Again, you can also use 2D Images as a ‘Roughness Map’ to control the roughness value per location on your surface.
• Metallic
  The Metallic-slider tells Enscape to treat the surface either as a non-metallic (e.g. plastic, ceramic..) reflective surface, or as a metallic one.
  Let’s say metallic surfaces behave more like a mirror, reflecting a clear image of their surrounding, while non-metallic surfaces show more of their actual surface, reflecting the environment rather vaguely.
• Specular
  This value controls the amount by which light is being reflected when hitting a non-metallic surface at a steep angle, as opposed to light that’s hitting it rather from the side.
  If you’re not too familiar with this setting, it’s best to leave it around 50% for realistic results.

The Carpet material acts in the same way as the Grass Material, in that it can be applied to a horizontal surface only, and the Height and Height Variation are controlled in the Enscape Material Editor.

NOTE: The minimum surface area for the sprites of the Grass material to show in Enscape is 10cm x 12.5cm. Any surface that has this Material Type applied and is smaller than these dimensions will result in the sprites not being visible in Enscape.

The Height and Height Variation Settings title is amended with Carpet when Carpet is selected as the Type in the Material Editor.

• Height
  The Height slider will stretch the sprites being used as grass blades, making them appear larger, making for higher grass.

• Height Variation
  The Height Variation slider adds a random factor to the grass height. This makes for a wilder looking, ragged grass.

• Wind Settings
  The Grass material is now also affected by the global Wind setting found in the in the Visual Settings -> Atmosphere tab. You can adjust both the wind Intensity and Direction Angle, and this affect can be seen working when adjusting the Intensity slider, as well as when moving around in the Enscape Viewport and will be included in Video exports.

Here are the available settings for Water in the Enscape Material Editor.

• Water Color
  Choose a color your water should be tinted in. No textures to be used this time – water color is set globally.

You can use up to four textures at a time per Enscape material. Textures are being used to control Color, Visibility, Surface Detail and Roughness of a material.

By clicking any of the texture symbols at the top of the material editor, or any of the blue and underlined image file names next to “Texture”, you’ll enter the actual texture editor interface.

Here you can

• Choose the image file for your texture
• Change the brightness
• Invert the colors of your image
• Apply explicit texture transformations

The Texture Editor interface is the same for any texture type. It’s meant to allow for simple image editing operations without having to leave the material editor.

In order to be able to utilize existent materials, you can import multiple materials simultaneously via the Batch Import feature, or by importing a single material. You can also export single materials as a *.matpkg file.

To import a single material hover the mouse over any material listed on the left hand side of the Material Editor dialog and the material Type symbol will change to 3 dots.

Clicking on the 3 dots will reveal the menu options Export Material Package and Import Material Package. In order to import an existing material, click on Import Material Package which will allow you to navigate to the location of the *.matpkg file you wish to import.

To export a material package file (*.matpkg), click Export Material Package and this will allow you to choose the location you would like to save the file to.

Finally, to Batch Import .matpkg files you need to click on the three horizontal lines menu next to the Materials title at the top left of the Material Editor dialog and choose the Batch Import *.matpkg… option. This will open a dialog window to allow you to navigate to the  “.matpkg” files you would like to import. When Batch Importing the *.matpkg files you want to import must be in the same location.

Replacing current materials in the current project with materials from the Enscape Material Library is now possible from within the Enscape Material Editor.

To replace a material hover the mouse over any material listed on the left hand side of the Material Editor dialog and the material Type symbol will change to a meatball menu (3 horizontal dots).

Clicking on the meatball menu will reveal 3 menu options, one being Replace with Enscape Material.

Once you click on Replace with Enscape Material the Enscape Material Library will open. The selected material will be previewed on the surface that has material to be replaced. With a material selected the Replace button will be available.

To confirm and replace the existing material with the newly selected material, click the Replace button and the material will be imported and updated.

The process is illustrated in the video below.

Those keywords change the material parameters without changing their color. The color is still defined by the texture. The default roughness is 1.0.

With the release of Enscape 4.1.1, we are introducing a new Web User Interface. This article covers how to use this new interface to manage Panoramas and Web Standalones.

Panorama and Web Standalone files created in Enscape can be managed via Upload Management within Enscape itself (accessed via the Enscape toolbar in the CAD ). They can also be further managed within Chaos Cloud, accessed via your web browser. For clarity, there are two elements to managing Panoramas and Web Standalone files; the Upload Management dialog in Enscape itself and the Uploaded projects accessed via your Cloud Account.

Individual license holders can access their Enscape uploads by simply signing in to their Chaos Cloud account via the Go to Uploads link on the bottom right of the Chaos Account Upload Management tab.

Users working in an organization can gain access to the Enscape Uploads once they have been invited by their account administrator.

The functions that are available within the Chaos Cloud allow the possibility to upload, share, move, rename, and delete Panoramas and Web Standalone files, as well as create Virtual tours where multiple Panoramas from the same project can be linked together.