Design software incorporating efficient 3-D rendering

In a computerized architectural design environment in which a computer system receives input from a user regarding design choices for an interior or exterior design space, a computer-implemented method of prerendering one or more visual effects for one or more selectable design elements, such that the user's selections for the given design elements can be rendered with the one or more visual effects in a representation for display in real-time, comprising the acts of:

• identifying a plurality of different possible positions of the design element in an interior or exterior design space;
• rendering a visual effect for each of the plurality of positions of the design element, wherein a plurality of visual effect blanks corresponding to each of the plurality of visual effects are created for the design element in each of the plurality of different possible positions;
• passing the created one or more visual effect blanks to a data store, such that the plurality of visual effect blanks are accessible to a graphical processing unit prior to receiving a first user design input for the design element;
• receiving a first user design input indicating a preference for a first three-dimensional view of the element;
• and
• passing a first of the plurality of visual effect blanks to a graphical processing engine, the first of the plurality of visual effect blanks corresponding to at least one position for the design element in the interior or exterior space.

In a computerized architectural design environment in which a computer system receives input from a user regarding design choices related to positioning design elements in an interior or exterior space, a computerized design system configured to render design elements in a design space in a believable and efficient manner so that an end-user using the computer system can navigate through a three-dimensional view of the interior or exterior design space in real-time, comprising:

• a first processor configured to create all physically possible visual effect blanks corresponding to a visual effect for all physically possible positions of a design element, wherein the total number of physically possible positions are determined via correlation with a reference library;
• wherein the first processor is further configured to pass the visual effect blanks for all physically possible positions of the design element into a visual effect data store prior to receiving any user design input into the interior or exterior design space;
• and
• a second processor configured to, in response to a user's positioning of a design element in a design space, receive the visual effect blanks corresponding to the design element positions selected by the user, the second processor further being configured to generate pixel information for each received visual effect blank, and for any of color, size, or material information for the design element in the interior or exterior design space.

At a computerized system in a computerized architectural design environment in which a design program is loaded in memory and processed at a central processing unit, a computer program storage product having computer-executable instructions stored thereon that, when executed, cause one or more processors of the computerized system to perform a computer-implemented method of rendering three-dimensional views of a user's design choices during run-time at least in part using previously-rendered blanks for one or more of the user's design inputs, wherein the rendering allows a user to navigate a real-world depiction of the user's design inputs in a three-dimensional space, the method comprising:

• an act of creating a plurality of visual effect blanks for a design element in advance of any user design input, the plurality of visual effect blanks representing a visual effect for the design element at a corresponding plurality of different positions;
• an act of, after creating the plurality of visual effect blanks, receiving user design input regarding the positioning of a design element in a design space, the user input including one or more attributes associated with the design element;
• an act of retrieving the determined one of the plurality of visual effect blanks for the design element from a data store;
• and
• a step for providing an three-dimensional view of the user input at a display device through communication with a graphical processing unit, such that the graphical processing unit processes and provides to the display device visual effect data for the design element based on the received positioning information.