What is Home Builder?
Home Builder is an open-source asset library for Blender that focuses on the process of creating interior architectural spaces.
The library provides a wide variety of parametric assets and features to make designing interior spaces easy for beginners.
How to Install Home Builder
Home Builder is useable with a custom Build of Blender that includes PyClone. You can download the entire package here.
Once you download there are a few steps that should be followed to activate the library. You can find the instructions here.
What assets are available in Home Builder?
Appliances
There are a variety of parametric appliances that can be used to design your scene. In the extended library pack you will find brand specific appliances that can be used.
Cabinets
A library of parametric cabinetry can be used to layout kitchen, bath, and closet spaces.
Doors and Windows
Doors and Windows can be easily placed and automatically cut holes in walls. There are various components that can be changed to create unique styles.
Walls
Walls can easily be placed in the scene. Since walls connect together it is easy to make adjustments to the size of your room at any time.
What Features are Available in Home Builder?
Intuitive Placement
Every Asset can easily be placed in the scene. Cabinets snap together, window and doors snap to walls, and some appliances are automatically placed in cabinets.
Product Prompts
Every asset has a prompt page that can be accessed in the right click menu. Prompts provide various controls to modify options for the assets.
Materials, Door Styles, and Hardware
Materials, Door Styles, and Hardware can easily be changed in the Library Interface. By changing a few properties you can quickly adjust the style of your entire project.
How can I support development?
If you want to support development you can purchase the extended asset library which gives you access to hundreds of additional assets, or you can sign up on my Patreon to get access to tutorials, additional assets, and support.
I am in the process of creating content for my Patreon. It will be available soon.
Email List
If you want to stay up to date on future releases of Home Builder join my email list.
This is awesome, any plans for roofs (gable, flat, etc ie various styles, with and without ceiling ie see the rafters just like you can have a frame-only wall that you showed in your video), and multiple floors? And some easy mechanism to walk through like have a walk speed setting and wherever your mouse points (without clicking any button or such) the camera moves in that direction (kind of a flythrough mode but for walking), you just control the speed (which you set to 0 if you want to “stand still”).
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For the ‘flythrough mode’ Blender already has ‘Fly Navigation’ and ‘Walk Navigation’ under View > Navigation menu. Basically its just like what you said but you move the camera using WASD input keys just like in video games
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Thanks. Yeah I have plans for adding a lot of different assets as well as putting together designs with multiple floors.
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Hi this is a great tool. I have a company the focuses on kitchen manufacturing and we suffer with parametric design when rendering. We make a cabinet then add it to the renderer, its a pain. I’d be happy to help out sharing some modern cabinet designs. I also have the hardware in any 3d format.
thank you!
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Hi Paul. Yeah any help is appreciated. Feel free to jump on the discord to share any designs, or discuss anyway to help. Thanks.
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Great job Andrew!
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Amasing Add on i realy like that. i’m waiting for news about that.
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Hey Andrew awesome tool! have an issue however when i right click i dont get the option to select ‘Prompts’ like you have in your showcase video.
Perhaps i missed something somewhere.
Any ideas? 🙂
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Make sure you have an asset selected, also make sure your key map is not overriding the default right click menu. If you still have trouble try joining the discord server for help.
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That is amazing! Mr. Peel, is it possible to use your tool in real time rendering VR/AR projects? The files are optimized for it? If it is not, there are plans to do it?
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Thanks. I think it would work with VR/AR but I haven’t tried it yet. I will be testing it out soon.
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Andrew this looks good!
Just wondering, are you primarely catering for the US market or will it be international/European as well? Units & typical equipment spring to mind.
Will we need to use a different branch of Blender or can we continue with the standart and/or E-cycles version?
Thanks,
Fran
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It will be international. You can change the units to metric in the scene settings. For now you have to use this custom build but I will eventually make it work for the standard version of Blender.
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Thanks Andrew.
Once its international and works with the standart version it looks like a must have.
Great job!
Will I be able to integrate my existing asset wizard library?
Will it integrate with the new Blender asset library feature?
Just saw a promising preview on the future Blender Asset Library at askNK’s YT channel.
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I haven’t used the asset wizard but I am sure it will work. Let me know if you have issues. Also yeah I will migrate this to work with the default blender asset system.
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The thing is I’ll be using it once its integrated into the “normal” Blender.
But I am keen to give it a go eventually.
Because it would be yet another installation. I already have 2x E-Cycles (RTX and non RTX and 1x Blender “Normal”.
Apparently there is an experimental branch of the new asset library. It features drag and drop for all assets. Did not install and try it, just saw the exciting video.
Feels like heaven, as does yours.
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love it – great idea – any chance to add our own custom libraries – as in Australia we have different products and styles and large suppliers. possibly even add the custom assets to your main library
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could you make it available for c4d?
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I currently only develop for open source packages.
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Which open source license are the parametric assets released under, and how does that effect the derivitive works that are created using this tool?
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The add-on is GPL3 but there are no restrictions on the files you create. They are standard Blend Files.
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Thanks for the quick response. That sounds great! But after looking at the GitHub repo, I don’t see anything that excludes the 3D assets included in the library from GPL3. When using this library, wouldn’t some of these included 3D assets themselves, not just their output, become part of the resulting work? As I understand it, that would mean anything made using the included assets would be a derivative work of GPL3-licensed content, and therefore GPL3 requires those works to be GPL3-licensed as well. But I am not a lawyer and very well could be missing something or misunderstanding how your library works. Please correct me if I’m wrong here.
I don’t know that GPL3-licensing the 3D assets is the best option if you want to allow wide usage of this tool, but I imagine you would want to apply some kind of license to them to prevent them from being flipped and resold on asset stores.
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Hey Andrew! This is absolutely awesome! I look forward to seeing what else you create in terms of building columns, vents, ceiling fixtures such as lights and fans, roof tiles, and any other interior/exterior home features you can think of that would fit in with the asset library. I also wonder how this might be used with game development and if the animations such as door animations with translate over to software like Unity and Unreal Engine. It will be a while before I try this out myself. Amazing stuff!
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Thanks. Yeah I have a lot of assets to create still, but it should work in game engines. I need to create a button that remove all drivers before it would be possible. That will come in the next release.
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Hello Andrew, Am really interested this. At our business we are having success in the outdoor kitchen niche. We make everything stainless. Would really like to know how to get going on this. Can you help? Where do I get started. Probably need the latest Blender? Thank you, Jack Babay
P.s. We currently use SolidWorks extensively.
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Hi Andrew,
I really like the ease of use you addon provides, very intuitive something Blender and Unreal could use a lot more of.
That being said I seem to come to yet another dead end. Your plugin like many other programs of this type is focused mostly upon interior design. I happen to have a different use for it that is lacking on the web or if present is very $$$$ and or has a ridiculous learning curve . My house caught on fire 6 months ago and one of the steps to repair it is to present plans to the building department representing your proposed work. These plans if accepted are filed in the county office so that the inspector can use them as reference and in future showing changes to the original building design.
They can be as simple as a line drawing or as nice as your framing model.
I have tried 20 different options to model this house and been led down the primrose path by ol Justin at
The CG Essentials
at least 6 of those times XD .
For an owner builder repairing damages or a remodel your addon is a great option and would go far in impressing the county building dept. Unfortunately as I just saw on your YouTube video the framing was just a test for the real stuff.
Having just modeled my floorplan in record breaking time using your framing, lol, “side test” XD, the fastest most ridiculously easy to use of its kind in existence. I find it a shame that it wasnt develouped farther.
If it had window and door headers or openings for that matter and the ability to pull wiring that put holes in the framing just to represent the path not the actual plug wiring, with the ability to place plug and switches boxes back to the fuse box it would be very helpful indeed in a barren landscape of choices. It could be drag out the wire it puts a plug every 10 foot with adjustments like the framing is set up or just drop generic light fixtures, plugs and switches where needed like the cabinets are set up
a simple truss system 5″ in 12′ with a 32′ span plug in your numbers.
walls where you want em click here for top plate. IDK you are the expert on sleek easy to use software design.
As you know the framing wont be exactaly the same as the existing house unless some studs are moved around but these not ment to be blue prints they are to represent where and what you are proposing to add like a basement tv room needs a need a bathroom and wall plugs and a light. simple building plan can take to the county and not bring em a napkin with a doodle on it :P\. look around there isnt anything in between architect blueprint software at $$$$$$$$$$ year sub or some jank ass 486 windows 3.1 software ported over to an amiga system.
Its really frustrating.
At least I got the 3D framing up easy as pie thanks to you.
Now I can chunk out some headers and punch some holes in it.
Not a biggy,
I have used blender before.
Most homeowners dont know how to blender.
I am sure any of them could have followed your install instructions and 3D framed their house in an afternoon. With a oh look dear thats our house comment tossed in as well.
On blender thats Unherd of.
I think more devs should take a few notes on how to make blender more accessible by putting some for thought into the interface like you have .
So I leave it to your consideration.
look at the YouTube videos on how to submit building plans to the county. Heads up almost all are lawyers scaring people or architects trying to get money, but there is 1 good one the basement guy mentioned earlier.
well back to sanding soot (real soot not CGI soot XD) ,
Twisted
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Hi John. Sorry to hear about your house. We have had a lot of wild fires in our area which has resulted in many losing their homes in our community. I’m glad you found the functionality I have developed useful. It’s still in early development and I plan to implement a lot more functionality and develop more tools for framing and generating the needed 2D Drawings. I have a ways to go, but it gives me hope when people like yourself are able to use it even with it’s limited functionality. I hope everything goes well for you and thank you again for the feedback.
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Andrew, this is excellent! Is there a capability to display dimension lines with arrows (ex. feet/inches or meters/cm)?
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I am currently working on this feature. I will have it available in the next release.
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