How to merge two plans together in Garden Planner

I’ve just put up a tutorial in response to a users question. It explains how to merge two plans together in garden planner.

The way you do it is to use the power of Garden Planner’s My Objects category.

Any object in a plan can be added to My Objects, so for example you could create a custom flower with a specific name, size and colors and add that to My Objects so you can easily drag that custom flower onto any new plans as you wish.

But you don’t have to just add one object to My Objects. You can add a section of a garden or a garden bed (with all its plants) or even add an entire garden to My Objects and then drag and drop that onto any other plans you wish.

Three Hidden features in Garden Planner

I thought I would highlight some of the lesser known but rather useful features in Garden Planner.

1. Firstly Title Blocks

In architecture and landscape plans a title block is often added near the bottom of the plan to provide clear details on who created the plan and when. In Garden Planner you can drag and drop a title block onto your plan and place it anywhere on the plan. You will find Title blocks hidden away at the bottom of the general objects category. Add the block to your plan and then select it.

Click on the edit title block button to customize the contents of the title block.

 

2. The second hidden feature is the ability to create a list of all the plants in your plan and paste that into the plan design. Garden Planner already has an easy way to create a list of the contents of your plan in the notebook view, which can be easily included when printing your plan. But what if you want a list within the plan design? Then look under the View menu and you will find the Add a list of plants to the plan menu item.

This isn’t something everyone will use, typically either using auto labels or the plant list from the notebook will be more useful, but one user asked for this functionality so I added it in. Maybe it will be of use to you.

3. And finally we come to my favorite hidden feature. 3d Billboards

What is a 3d billboard?

We’ll say you want to add an image to the 3d view in garden planner but you don’t want it flat on the ground but rather standing up in 3d view.

For example maybe you want to add a picture of  building or a wall behind the garden.

Then scroll down the walls and fences list to the bottom where you will find a 3d billboard. It looks just like a wall and can put anywhere in the plan. When you go in 3d view and select it you will see the settings options shown to the right. Just click on Select Image to add an image from your computer and it will instantly appear in the 3d view.

What’s more you can use jpeg images or PNG images with transparency. This actually gives you a lot of power. Say you really wanted to add a plastic flamingo to your garden and Garden Planner doesn’t have a plastic flamingo. The just find a picture of a plastic flamingo and add that in.

Now a plastic flamingo adorns yours lovely garden.

 

Garden Planner update

The latest update to Garden Planner is version 3.6.31

If you haven’t used Garden Planner since version version 3.6 came out I recommend checking it out. There were a whole bunch of improvements but the most interesting is that you can try out the 3d view of plans within Garden Planner.

To try it out simply choose Turn on 3d view from the help menu. Then all you need to do is click on the 3d view tab to see your 2d plan turned into 3d!

But what is in the very latest update? Version 3.6.31 adds in a button to let you save the current 3d view as an image. What is exciting about this is that you can set the resolution of the saved image. This means you can save  a 4K image even if your computer is a much lower resolution. I tested on an older windows pc that runs at 1600 x 900 and it only took 2 seconds to generate a 4K ultra high def. image (3,840×2,160) of the current 3d view!

 

New Tutorial Video – creating famous gardens in Garden Planner

I’ve just added a new video that shows how I created the Bowling Green Park plan in Garden Planner. The video is interesting for a number of reasons. Firstly it shows working on a large landscape plan with many plants. It also demonstrates using a google satellite image in Garden Planner to start as a basis for a plan.

The video is on you tube and on the Garden Planner site here

This video is the first in a series where I will re-create famous gardens around the world in Garden Planner. Feel free to offer some suggestions via the contact form or in the comments.

 

Garden Planner now on Amazon

You can now purchase Garden Planner as download software on Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk

As the software is new to Amazon, it would be great if some existing users of Garden Planner felt like writing a review. You don’t have to have purchased Garden Planner through amazon to be able to write a review – so why not let everyone else know why you enjoy using Garden Planner.

Also, you can still purchase Garden Planner from the garden planner web site, as well as the Mac app store and the Windows 10 store.

Garden Planner 3d Update

A updated version of the beta Garden Planner 3d viewer is now available. You can find it here.

This update includes a lot of bug fixes and adds in most of the garden furniture. It also starts to add in the option to choose custom shapes and styles for trees. In a 2d plan a simple circle may be used to represent a tree, but what does that look like in 3d? The 3d view will let you choose from a range of shapes to represent the tree, as shown in the image.above.

 

Bowling green park in 3d viewer

Following up from the July 4th post I have now updated the beta 3d viewer, so that Bowling Green Park is one of the default sample plans provided. Get the latest version of the 3d viewer for Garden Planner plans here. Click on the number 2 to open the park. It’s a large plan and may take a moment to display. I think it’s come out quite well, considering it’s being created from a 2d plan, but I welcome any feedback.

Garden Planner Summer / 4th July update

The latest update to Garden Planner is inspired by the northern hemisphere summer and the US 4th July weekend. This update adds in some new objects including Grills, Pizza ovens, fire pits and fountains. As always its a free update, just download and install the latest trial version and it will update (if you have the full version of garden planner the trial version will automatically switch to the full version). If you purchased through the Mac or Windows store just update through the store app.

Also, inspired by the 4th of July I’ve created a new plan of Bowling Green Park in lower

Manhattan, in New York.

So, what has this to do with the fourth of July? Well it’s the oldest park in NY, and in 1770 the British government erected a statue of King George III in the park. But on July 9th 1776 after  the Declaration of Independence was read to Washington’s troops at the current site of City Hall, troops rushed down Broadway to Bowling Green and the statue was toppled. According to folklore, the statue was chopped up made into patriot ammunition. The center of the park now has a large pond and fountain. If you wish you can download the plan here.

Minor updates to Garden Planner and 3d viewer

Garden Planner has now been updated to version 3.5.14 The main changes are bug fixes and this update is recommended if you have any problems with changing scale in your plans.

More interestingly, the beta 3d viewer has also been updated. This updates fixes a bunch of bugs, so if previously you had an issue getting your plan to load into the 3d viewer then try it again with this update. This update doesnt include any changes or additions to plants (that will be in the next update). It does include more buildings, better walls and fences, some rocks, arches, pergolas etc. It also includes a properties button (bottom right of the screen) that will show the properties for the currently selected object. At the moment not everything can be selected and not everything has properties that can change. But you can change the style of most buildings, and change the height and elevation of lots of objects. This can be interesting because most of the basic shapes in garden planner (found in Basic shapes in Special collections category) have 3d versions. So with a few basic shapes : squares that become cubes in 3d, rectangles that become cuboids, and circles that become cylinders; along with the ability to change elevations and heights you can create whole new objects in GP3d.

This Torri (Japanese gate) was created by placing a few rectangles and two circles in garden planner, which became 3d shapes in gp3d. Then by just adjusting the height and elevation I was able to create this.

Garden Planner 3.5

Garden Planner version 3.5 (3.5.8) is now available. This update adds a number of useful features.

Group Objects: you can now group and ungroup a selection of objects. It’s a small improvement but can be very useful especially when managing large plans.

Height: you can now store a height value for trees, plants, walls, buildings etc. This can be useful for planning purposes. The options for the Plant and Object list have also been improved and it is from here that you can choose to show height values in your plant list if you wish.

Other smaller additions:
By default the note books automatically links a garden note for a plant with all other identical plants (so you are not typing the same note over and over again) However some people want each plant to have its own notes, so there is now an option for this in the advanced settings menu.
You can also choose from a couple of display style options in the Preview window.

Bug Fixes: lots of bug fixes, especially pertaining to the vegetable bed planner.

ALSO: GP3d has been updated. The beta tool that lets you view garden planner plans in 3D has been updated. The strange purple shadows on walls are gone and they look more normal now. Also if you enter a height value in Garden Planner for a wall or fence it will be reflected in the 3d view. Some buildings also will show the appropriate height in 3d. Not yet trees, but its coming soon.