Three tools for reading your site
Each gives you a first draft, drawn in your own style, and a register: one row for every fact, each with its source and an empty column for your verdict. Checking those rows is the assignment. The first two read the site; the third reads an existing room. Pick the door that fits what you have.
Site Layers-overlay
You have archiMap, or just a pin
Adds what archiMap leaves out: the NSW planning rules, the sun and the wind. They go into your archiMap drawing, lined up with it. It runs in this browser with nothing to install.
- In: a pin (latitude, longitude), plus your archiMap DXF if you have one
- Out: a DXF with new
AI_layers, three diagrams and the register - Study radius: 200 m
Or run it elsewhere: Colab notebook · script · style card · read me
Site Layers-open
You have an address and nothing else
Builds the whole site from open data: buildings, roads, rail, water, trees, contours, lots and, in NSW, the planning controls. It runs in Google Colab or on your own computer.
- In: an address, or a pin
- Out: a layered DXF, four diagrams, the layers as GeoJSON and the register
- Study radius: 300 m
The zip has everything. Single files: Colab notebook · script · style card · read me
Room Reading
You have photographs of an existing room
Your AI reads your photos into a sketch plan and a list of every wall, opening, fixed element and finish. You decide keep, strip or alter for each one, and this draws the diagram. It runs in this browser.
- In:
room.jsonfrom your AI, plus your decisions when you have them - Out: a keep / strip / alter plan, the register, and an Existing Space file for Revit
- Draft: first shown in Class 5
Start with the instructions for your AI · interior style card · read me
Why two radii
The overlay tool sits inside archiMap's drawing, which already frames the block, so 200 m is enough. The open tool has to draw the neighbourhood itself, so it reaches a little further, to 300 m. You can change either one.
Run both on your site
archiMap costs US$4.99 a month. Run the open tool on the same site and compare the two drawings. What does the paid base give you that open data doesn't? That's the question for Class 6.
Step-by-step sheets
Your AI as a helper
Claude, ChatGPT or Gemini can help you write your style card and work through the register, but they don't run the tools. Paste the instructions for your tool into a project or Gem: overlay instructions · open instructions · Room Reading instructions (this one does read your photos).
Your style card
Each site tool has its own style card template, and you fill it in once. Keep it: the Existing Space tool in Class 7 reads either one, so your drawings keep the same look from the site to the building. Room Reading has its own interior card, with your colours for keep, strip and alter.