TOTAL Sketch Pro update: Introducing Photometrics

A new TOTAL Sketch update is now ready for you. To download it, plus any prior updates you may have missed, make sure you have TOTAL Sketch open. Then just click Help menu, and select Get Instant Customer Updates. (Remember that TOTAL Sketch is a completely standalone program, so make sure you get the updates from within Sketch, not from within TOTAL or WinTOTAL.)

This update introduces a new TOTAL Sketch Pro feature: Photometrics. Pro users will now be able to upload and sketch on top of photos, scanned building plans, aerial maps, and more. It's an especially useful tool for commercial properties and sketching from plans and specs.

Here's how it works:

oad your image and click "Set Scale." This allows you to draw a line where you know the measurement and enter the actual distance.

Click here to view a larger screen.

2. Photometrics sets the scale.

3. Continue drawing over your image. It will automatically calculate the dimensions.

Click here to view a larger screen.

Here's what one of our beta testers had to say about this new feature:

“Wow. I will admit up front that I am a dyed-in-the-wool Apex user. I saw the Photometrics feature [in TOTAL Sketch] and it definitely piqued my curiosity. Over the weekend, I had a subject that was tailor-made for using this feature. I have the overall width from a survey, and I had a scatter of dimensions on the building, but not all. I dropped in the image and it took me no time at all to finish tracing five different areas on my ground-level floor plan. As I traced over the lines that I did have dimensions on, the scaling from that initial scale-check was working perfectly. I went back and tried tracing another sketch in Apex and finally gave up. I had trouble scaling the image to begin tracing accurately.”

— Lawrence G. LaCroix, SRA, The Appraisal Shoppe, Inc.

Photometrics is only available in TOTAL Sketch Pro. If you don't have the Pro level yet, click here to upgrade today — it also includes Trace Mode. TOTAL Sketch Pro is included in the Elite System.

This update also includes fixes and stability improvements for every level of TOTAL Sketch. To get all of the details, take a look at the notes below. And be on the lookout for more features coming to TOTAL Sketch Pro. In the meantime, if you have sketch questions or ideas, be sure to let us know.

TOTAL Sketch — March 11, 2015 Update

General

• Issues that could cause an "Unhandled Exception" message when launching TOTAL Sketch have been resolved.

Sketch

• Dimensions for free-form lines will no longer be displayed if the user's settings are set to not show the dimensions for free-form lines.
• The Undo function will no longer inadvertently interrupt the trace process.
• A rare issue that caused the grid to fail to load when opening a new sketch has been resolved.
• Adding another area will no longer cause the lines to improperly segment.
• A rare issue that could occur cause the program to close when modifying a sketch has been fixed.
• Response time when pasting symbols into larger, more detailed sketches has been improved.
• TOTAL Sketch will now detect and correct damaged setting files that would’ve prevented the sketching grid from displaying correctly.
• Area calculations will now transfer back to WinTOTAL reports correctly after applying the Area Multiplier.

Preferences

• Area Multiplier will no longer round to the nearest whole number.

Symbols

• We added a Small Eraser symbol to the Symbols menu.