Drawing a Gross Area / Hall Boundary
Gross Areas / Hall boundaries are an important part of your floorplan, they dictate the actual floorspace you are using and must be used to calculate Gross to Net figures. They also tell the stands what Hall they are actually in which is particularly important for multi-hall shows.
They are also essential when using the Floorplan Live system because Floorplan Live can only show stands that are within a Gross Area.
Drawing a Gross Area / Hall Boundary
1
Click the 'Hall/Show Boundary' button (top part of button) which is located on the DRAW ribbon.
2
A box will now pop up (see picture below) allowing you to give the Gross Area / Hall boundary a name.
After drawing your area which is described below, you may find that the calculated area differs from the figure supplied by the venue, if this is the case you can tick 'Use Venue Supplied Area' and then type the figure into the box. All of the calculated floorplan figures will now show the venue supplied figure instead of the calculated one. You will however, see on the screenshot below that it shows both areas for you convenience.
At this stage you can also set the colour, this is useful if you have a multi hall show and you need to distinguish the different halls easily.
You can also set whether the stands that are within this boundary are shown on screen, this is useful when working with multi-hall shows but, for now leave this ticked, you can change this later if needed.
TIP: You can also set what stands are shown by Gross Area/Hall Boundary in individual Views.
Click OK
Name:
You can either select a name from the drop down box or type your own name in. If you type a new name in, make sure its descriptive so that when you produce the floorplan figures you know what hall/show it is supposed to be.
Show Stands (tick box) - This option allows you to hide the stands that are in this particular Hall Boundary. This can be useful when multi-hall floorplans are created. You can also set this option per view for even more flexibility e.g. I can create a view called Hall 1 that does not show the stands for Hall 2 and vise-versa.
Area:
Use Venue Supplied Area - This allows you to override the automatically calculated gross area and add in a figure supplied by the venue, this then gives you accurate gross and net figures when running a report. Tick the box and then enter the relevant figure.
Type:
This allows you to choose how the Hall Boundary is shaded. The most common is Solid but you can also use Single, Double or Cross hatch lines.
Options:
Pitch: This is only available when Single, Double or Cross hatch type is selected and specifies how large the gap is in between each hatch line.
Offset: This is only available when the Double hatch line type is selected and specifies the gap between the 2 hatch lines.
Angle: This is available when Solid (with Gradient ticked) or Single, Double or Cross hatch type is selected. For hatch types it lets you specify the angle of the hatch lines. For Solid with the Gradient option ticked it allows you to specify the angle of the gradient.
Line Width: This is only available when Single, Double or Cross hatch type is selected and specifies the thickness of each hatch line.
Colour:
Gradient (tick box): This is only available when Solid type is selected. Tick this to allow you to choose 2 colours.
Colour 1: This is available when Solid, Single, Double or Cross hatch type is selected. Choose a colour from the drop down box or move your mouse over something on your screen and press CTRL+1 to grab the colour.
Colour 2: This is only available when Solid type is selected and the Gradient tick box is ticked. This allows you select the 2nd colour of your gradient fill or move your mouse over something on your screen and press CTRL+2 to grab the colour.
Select Item to Match Colour From (drop down box): If there are colours already used on your floorplan for other Hall Boundaries, Zones or Stands that you want to use on your new Hall Boundary, click this box and select as required.
3
Now all you need to do is start to draw around the edge of the Venue wall. When you have drawn all the way around the venue wall, just before the last point (your starting point - shown as a little circle) press C on your keyboard to close the boundary.
TIP: If you make a mistake at any point, just press U on your keyboard and it will undo your last click, keep pressing U to go back even more steps.
Your finished Gross Area / Hall boundary should look like the below:
