Top 5 Software Skills to Aid your Interior Design Career
As much as hand-sketching is a must for this industry, everyday computer software is used throughout architecture practices.
So here are my suggestions for great go to software that will help you throughout your career. Remember there are LOADS of options for similar programmes so… I’ll just show you some of the main ones that I know or feel are most relevant for the industry right now.
Vectorworks (OR AutoCAD/Microstation/etc.)
This is the main software I use daily as an Interior Architect. Vectorworks allows you to create 2D and 3D designs. However I’d say that a lot of people do not actually use it to its potential.
Not only does Vectorworks Architect have standard drawing and modelling features but it also has a rendering system incorporated. This is called Renderworks and is part of the software as standard.
Vectorworks is a great place to start out if you want to download one software for the majority of your needs.
If you are a student you can download the Student Version for free as long as you have a valid Student ID (uni or NUS) and a university email address.
Get info on Vectorworks here:
Revit
Now Revit is part of the Autodesk family (linking closely with AutoCAD). Revit is mainly used in pure Architecture firms. It is very intuitive and works with 3D models of specific walls, doors, M+E, everything that can or is created by manufacturers.
Get info on Revit (and AutoDesk family) here:
Adobe Photoshop (+ the rest of the Adobe cloud products, particularly InDesign + Illustrator)
I’m sure everyone has probably had a crack at Photoshop already! It is so much more than a photo editor… There are so many things you can do in this application alone but by combining it with the use of Illustrator and potentially InDesign they could really help you bring a whole project together.
Going into each of them right now would mean this post is crazy long so let me know in the comments if you would like anymore information on these applications or potential tutorials would help.
The main one to start on is Photoshop. I don’t care what you create or edit but have a play around with all the tools you can see!
Now a main thing to remember that I have to iterate to my students on placement a lot (especially with Photoshop) is that one thing can be done in many ways! So you may try it yourself one way and it works, I might show you another way which has benefits such as it being editable at a later stage, and your tutor may do it a completely different way…So don’t panic!
To get cracking with Photoshop:
Cinema4D (OR Sketchup/3dsMax/etc.)
Creating visuals is one of the main things I get asked about by my Placement Students and Junior Designers… Now, I wouldn’t rely on rendered visuals a lot but I do agree that sometimes for specific clients they are necessary.
I would stick with Renderworks (Vectorworks) as being a great place to start to be introduced to the concept of rendering however moving on from this I personally use Cinema4D. This is because Renderworks and Cinema4D work off of the same rendering system therefore you can export 3D models from Vectorworks into C4D easily.
Take a look at these links:
C4D allows you to create as realistic as possible however add-ons are what make your visuals express super realistic materials. This is where V-Ray comes in…
V-Ray
This is an add on software which can be introduced to multiple modelling/rendering programmes including Sketchup, Revit, 3dsMax and Cinema4D. The main thing about this software is that it gives you more options to add more specific detail.
When you start looking at your software with this add-on installed the interface does become a lot more complicated. To be honest the best way to do this is to decide from the beginning that you will use V-Ray and learn like this from the start.
But sadly this is not free and not particularly cheap even for students:
Remember if you start but mastering the basics and knowing a lot about post-production in Photoshop you can make any design visualisation to your style - If you don’t know what that is quite yet then keep an eye out for a future post aimed to help you figure out your design style!
Guys, I’m not saying that you need to know all of these to be amazing at what you do.. But if you want to dip your toe in the water and have a look at some software that will definitely help you in the long run then go for it!
Hopefully some of the links I’ve added will give you a bit more of direction rather than scrolling through the whole of Google…But if you have a specific question or have found some more tutorials/software let me know in the comments below!