Seeing is believing

SUCCESS STORY
Terry Beaubois
& Associates
Seeing is believing
Leading architecture firm wins over clients, city review boards, and others
with compelling project presentations created in Adobe® Photoshop® CS2
Try to imagine a building you’ve never seen,
surrounded by other buildings. Then think
about brick, stone, glass, concrete, tile, wood,
and other materials on the building. And of
course, don’t forget to visualize the building’s
proportion in relation to other buildings
and surrounding landscaping. “It really can
be overwhelming for someone not trained in
architecture,” says Terry Beaubois, architect
and president of Terry Beaubois & Associates
in Palo Alto, California. “People can usually
imagine a few elements, but visualizing the
whole picture is extremely difficult.”
Communicating these details is the exact
challenge architects face daily. Every element
of a design has to be understood and clearly
articulated to clients, engineers, contractors,
review agencies, and others involved in the
designing and building processes. “It’s one
thing to talk about how something will look
and quite another to show it,” says Beaubois.
Architect Terry Beaubois takes a photo of the original site
with no structure and uses Photoshop CS2 to correct colors,
exposures, and contrasts to ensure that the image accurately
reflects the site before any work is done.
“With Adobe Photoshop, we can handle
previously manual processes—layering
images, reworking designs, adding color,
changing perspectives—significantly faster.
The big difference is that I can now do tasks
in minutes, instead of days, and achieve
much better results.”
Terry Beaubois, president, Terry Beaubois & Associates
Taking this concept to heart, Beaubois and his
staff have made high art of presenting clients and
other parties with project displays that highlight
many of a project’s design details. To efficiently
create views of his projects that move clients from
confusion to clarity and ultimately to enthusiasm,
Terry Beaubois & Associates staff make extensive
use of Adobe Creative Suite 2, including Adobe
Photoshop CS2 software.
Wanted: more time for design
Beaubois’ successful architecture firm specializes
in single-family residential design projects for
clients across the United States. The firm’s design
projects range from modern, mid-sized homes on
urban lots to stately mansions on 30 or more acres.
Traditionally, creating the design renderings and
display boards to convey his vision to others was
a time-consuming, labor-intensive process.
Staff could spend hours simply hand drawing color
renderings of proposed buildings on a site—and
even more time if minor design changes were
made during the process. The hours and days spent
developing project presentations could turn into
weeks as staff combined electronic drawings with
pictures and sketches. In the past, composite images
were cut and pasted together and then photographed,
with the film sent out for developing. The entire
process left little time for creativity and made it
difficult to meet clients’ increasingly tight deadlines.
Simple transition from paper to digital
For Beaubois, this all changed when he started using
Adobe Photoshop software. “Photoshop makes the
transition from paper to digital processes extremely
easy,” he explains. “With Adobe Photoshop, we
can handle previously manual processes—layering
images, reworking designs, adding color, changing
perspectives—significantly faster. The big difference
is that I can now do tasks in minutes, instead of days,
and achieve much better results.”
To obtain approval from the client and from regional planning agencies, Beaubois
uses Photoshop CS2 to enable viewers to see how the proposed structure will
visually impact the surrounding environment. To enhance the realism of images,
Photoshop CS2 is used to composite in landscaping, shadows, and all external
building finishes, such as stone for walls and roofing shingles.
For instance, the layering feature in Adobe
Photoshop CS2 is used daily by staff to great effect.
On a recent home remodel project, Beaubois created
a Photoshop CS2 file with multiple layers, each
displaying modifications to the home’s exterior.
By selecting layers, Beaubois could show the client
how added dormers would look, the impact of
new roofing materials, and even the effect of color
variations. The client was thrilled with the results.
Consensus building made easy
By improving the quality of project presentations,
Adobe Photoshop CS2 has been instrumental in
helping Terry Beaubois & Associates gain city
approval on designs that may previously have been
denied. For example, local planning commissioners
were considering denying a home design because it
was located on a scenic corridor. The commissioners
had read the staff project report and reviewed the
plan elevations, concluding that the design would
infringe on the corridor’s natural beauty.
That is, until Beaubois showed them high-quality
Photoshop CS images of the proposed house on the
site in question. The commissioners could see the
proposed house at a variety of angles from the scenic
corridor and how it would look with and without
trees. “It was incredible,” says Beaubois. “In just a
few minutes, the commissioners moved from being
skeptical to unanimously approving the project.”
A new view of design
Many enhanced capabilities in Adobe Creative Suite 2
and Adobe Photoshop CS2 enable Beaubois and his
staff to work faster and smarter. The Vanishing Point
feature in Adobe Photoshop CS2 makes it easier than
ever to add or display architectural images in proper
perspective. For example, brick or stone applied to
a building’s surface appear instantly in perspective,
while a window or door moved from a front wall to
a side wall automatically aligns in perspective.
With the Adobe Bridge functionality in Adobe
Creative Suite 2, managing a variety of images—
common windows, stone surfaces, interior and
exterior wood samples, paint colors, and other
design elements—is greatly streamlined. The images
are easily applied to structure surfaces using the
stamp tool in Adobe Photoshop CS2. “I need to be
able to select from thousands of elements for my
designs,” says Beaubois. “The thumbnail views and
enhanced file identifier features in Adobe Bridge
enable me to find the images I want in seconds.”
Company
Terry Beaubois & Associates
Palo Alto, California
Challenge
• Enable clients, engineers, and
city planners to better visualize
architectural designs
• Improve quality of renderings
while reducing time and resources
needed to create project displays
Solution
Adopt Adobe Create Suite 2,
including Adobe Photoshop CS2,
to enable architects to quickly
and efficiently create high-quality,
multiple views of project designs
Benefits
• Reduced time to produce
compelling project presentations
• Accelerated design approval from
clients and city planners
• Improved design creativity with
flexibility to quickly try out and
see new ideas
• Boosted staff productivity and
reduced administrative costs
Tool Kit
• Adobe Creative Suite.
Products used include:
• Adobe Photoshop CS2
• Adobe Acrobat® 7.0 Professional
• Adobe GoLive® CS
• Adobe InDesign® CS2
• Apple Powerbook G4 running
Mac OSX
The image below, created using Photoshop CS2, shows how Beaubois
superimposes a photo of the completed building over the approved building
exhibit. Showing the progression of the empty site through proposal
and then completed project aids in communicating to future clients and
planning review boards the effectiveness of this visualization process.
More time, fewer headaches
Central to delivering the right plans on time and
on budget is efficient collaboration among clients,
architects, contractors, city planners, engineers,
interior designers, and others involved in the
building process. Integrated Web capabilities in
Adobe Photoshop CS2 simplify posting designs to
secure extranets for fast review and commenting.
Using Adobe Acrobat software, design plans can be
output in a single step to application- and platformindependent Adobe Portable Document Format
(PDF) files that are made available online or emailed
to all participants.
“The flexibility to use Adobe PDF to collaborate
across project teams saves everyone time, money,
and headaches,” explains Beaubois. “Also, digital
sharing and review of materials gives clients the
freedom to assemble a project team best suited to
their goals, knowing that everyone can collaborate
from anywhere at any time.” Once plans are
approved, the firm often lays out final project
documents in Adobe InDesign CS2 software, a page
layout program that can be used to create brochures
and printed literature. Finalized documents are also
incorporated into the company’s Web site using
Adobe GoLive CS.
“With Adobe Photoshop CS2, I can test out
design ideas in seconds and instantly see
what works and what doesn’t. My clients
are amazed by how well I can help them
visualize what their projects will look like
early in the design phase.”
Terry Beaubois, president, Terry Beaubois & Associates
Quality and service redefined
Incorporating Adobe Creative Suite 2 into his
practice has revolutionized Beaubois’ work. Instead
of devoting weeks and good portions of budgets
to manually rendering designs and laying out
composites, Beaubois can now focus more on the
creative process. “With Adobe Photoshop CS2, I
can test out design ideas in seconds and instantly
see what works and what doesn’t,” he says. “The
improved creativity and reduced costs are only two
of the advantages. Most importantly, my clients are
amazed by how well I can help them visualize what
their projects will look like early in the design phase.”
Adobe Systems Incorporated • 345 Park Avenue, San Jose, CA 95110-2704 USA • www.adobe.com
Adobe, the Adobe logo, Acrobat, GoLive, InDesign, and Photoshop are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Adobe Systems Incorporated in the United States
and/or other countries. Apple and Mac OS are trademarks of Apple Computer, Inc., registered in the United States and other countries. All other trademarks are the
property of their respective owners.
© 2005 Adobe Systems Incorporated. All rights reserved. Printed in the USA.
9500533 0505A