
Documentation
How the Plyvel app works, from your first project to the Render Receipt. Each section is short and links to its full article in the app’s Help, which is written for what the app does today.
Get started
Plyvel is a render system for architects. You give it an approved image of your design and one clear change. Ply makes the render. On Verified Renders and Portfolio Renders, Vel reviews the result against your approved image.
- Drop an image of the design. It becomes the project’s first view and its approved source.
- Ask Ply for one change, and choose what to keep.
- Pick the render type and read its price. Then start the render.
- Compare the result with the approved source, and read Vel’s review.
- Approve the result you want, and download it with its receipt.
The beta is by invitation. You sign in with a link sent to your email address; there is no password. Sign-in links and sessions says what to do when a link does not work.
Three guides go further: controlled AI rendering and a material change, from SketchUp or Revit to a reviewed render, and checking an AI render against your design.
Ply’s render engine and Vel’s review are still being finished. Until they land, a render in the beta returns your source image unchanged, and Vel is a stand-in reviewer that answers from a fixed script: its decisions there say nothing about the image. Credits there are test credits.
In the app’s Help: What is Plyvel?
Projects and views
A project holds one building or scheme. A view is one camera angle of it, such as Front Exterior or Courtyard. Each view has its own approved source and its own renders, and the approved source is the baseline for every render of the view.
Upload a source or a reference as PNG, JPEG or WebP, up to 30 MB: drop, paste or choose a file. A rejected upload costs nothing.
Each render is a version of the view: Source, then v1, v2 and on. Continue or branch from a result, or start again from the approved source, which stays the baseline. How branches work.
Views can be added and renamed, but not removed yet.
In the app’s Help: How project Views work
Asking Ply
Every request starts from Ply’s line under the image. A request has four parts: the change, what it applies to, what to make it, and what to keep. A clear request gives Ply less to guess and Vel a clear thing to check.
- Change: one kind, such as Material, Lighting or Landscape.
- Applies to: the element as you would name it on a drawing, such as Main façade.
- Make it: the result, such as Warm limestone.
- Keep exactly: what must not move, such as Camera, Massing and Openings. May vary: what can change freely, such as Sky.
Protection is a request and a check, not a promise: compare the result yourself before you use it. How Ply protects architecture.
In the app’s Help: Writing a clear request
References and regions
A reference is an image that guides a material, the light or a mood. Each has a role and a scope, and none replaces the architecture. The receipt lists the references used. How references work.
A region is an area marked on the view’s approved source: a CHANGE REGION that may change, or a PROTECTED REGION that must stay as it is. You mark it with Rectangle or Brush, and the request carries the regions you tick.
Regions are PROVISIONAL. Plyvel records them with the request and lists them in its receipt. The render engine does not use them yet, and Vel does not check them yet. A result can still change outside a change region or inside a protected one.
In the app’s Help: Marking regions (provisional)
Drafts and Verified Renders
| Render type | For | Reviewed by Vel | Credits |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ply Draft | Fast exploration | No | 2 |
| Targeted Edit | One defined local change | No | 4 |
| Verified Render | Ply renders, Vel reviews | Yes | 10 |
| Portfolio Render | The highest-quality final | Yes | 20 |
A Ply Draft or a Targeted Edit is marked NOT VEL VERIFIED. Prices are beta prices, and the request shows the price before you start.
You can cancel a render while it waits or runs. During the beta, all its reserved credits are released. How cancellation works.
In the app’s Help: Draft vs Verified vs Portfolio
Vel’s review
Vel reviews Verified Renders and Portfolio Renders. It compares the result with the approved source and your request, meaning the requested change and the protected elements. It does not edit the image. It answers PASS, FIX or UNCERTAIN.
A reviewed render ends as VEL VERIFIED, VERIFICATION UNCERTAIN, ACCEPTED WITH FINDINGS or VERIFICATION FAILED. Vel says what each one means and what Vel cannot certify.
In the app’s Help: Vel’s review and its outcomes
Compare and approve
A completed result is shown against the approved source, unless you pick another version: Slider, Side by side, Blink, Difference, or the result alone. Difference shows the result in grey with every changed pixel in red. It is not a geometry check, and it is not Vel’s review. Comparing a result.
Approving is a person’s decision: this is the result we keep. It is recorded with who approved it and when, for example “Approved by you · 15 Oct 10:16”. Approval is not a state: the render keeps Vel’s state beside it, and the receipt is never rewritten.
Download image and receipt then gives one ZIP: the final image, its signed receipt, the acceptance if there is one, the approval record and a README.
In the app’s Help: How approval works
These docs describe the Plyvel app in your browser, in private beta. Its Help has every article in full: open Help.
The Render Receipt
Every completed render gets a Render Receipt, and so does a render that ends in VERIFICATION FAILED. It records the state, the request, what was protected, what could vary, the references, the regions, Vel’s review, the attempts and when it was issued.
It is signed with Plyvel’s key. Check the signature checks it in your browser against Plyvel’s published public keys; Check the file computes the file’s SHA-256 and compares it with the receipt. Checking a receipt.
A receipt, not a certificate. This receipt records Plyvel’s visual checks. It is not structural, engineering, building-code, construction, or dimensional certification.
In the app’s Help: Reading the Render Receipt
Credits
Each render type has a price in credits. The request shows it, with your balance after, before you start anything. Credits are reserved when a render starts and charged only for an accepted outcome.
- Ply Draft and Targeted Edit: charged when the render completes.
- Verified Render and Portfolio Render: charged when Vel answers PASS, or when you accept an uncertain result with findings.
- Released, nothing charged: when the render fails, when you cancel it during the beta, when it ends in VERIFICATION FAILED, and while it is VERIFICATION UNCERTAIN.
Credits belong to the workspace. During the beta, Plyvel adds them, and buying is not open. Pricing shows the plans as they will open.
In the app’s Help: How credits work
Teams
Each account has a personal workspace, yours alone. A team workspace shares its projects, renders, receipts and credits.
| Role | What they can do |
|---|---|
| Owner | Full authority over the workspace: members and roles, the plan and its payments, and deleting the workspace. |
| Admin | Manages members, invitations and spending limits, sees the plan and deletes projects. Cannot change or remove an owner. |
| Member | Creates projects and requests renders with the workspace credits. |
| Viewer | Sees the projects, renders and receipts. Cannot change anything. |
An owner or admin invites one email address at a time, with a role. The invitation is a link that works once, for that address only. Plyvel emails it to that address, and you can also copy it and send it yourself. Inviting someone.
In the app’s Help: Team workspaces, roles and shared credits
Privacy and your data
Sources, references, regions and results are kept in private storage. In the app, only members of your workspace can open them, through signed links that expire within minutes.
Export project builds a ZIP with every file and every receipt, so receipts and files can be checked without Plyvel. Delete project removes the project for everyone in the workspace; its files are erased after a recovery window. Export or delete a project.
Security and Privacy say how, and for how long.
In the app’s Help: Where your images are kept
Troubleshooting
- A render failed or would not start: what each failure message means. A failed render is never charged.
- Sign-in links and sessions: a link works once; open the newest email.
- My credit balance looks wrong: available, reserved and charged are different numbers.
- Feedback and reporting a render: tell Plyvel whether a render was usable, or open a case with its details.
In the app’s Help: A render failed or would not start
How a CHECK works
A hand-run CHECK is a separate service, available today. Your render is compared with its reference image, on the founder’s computer in Iraq.
- Ask for a CHECK on the contact page: tell me about your practice and the render you want compared, and I write back.
- You share the two images through a link you control: the approved render and the edited one, exactly the same size. Please do not attach files. They go to no AI model provider.
- You also share a folder I can upload to. I put the review material there: each check shows what it measured beside its limit, with a heatmap that shows where the two images differ.
- Your reviewer confirms each group, writes what they saw, and puts the sign-off file back in that folder. What cannot be measured goes to your reviewer.
- I sign the receipt and put the results in the same folder. The receipt states what was measured, what was not, and that Plyvel did not make the image.
A pair whose check failed still goes to your reviewer, and its signed receipt says it is not ready and names the check.
A studio’s first CHECK job is free for up to 3 pairs; further pairs are quoted per pair.
Thirty days after delivery, I delete the job’s files and its emails. The copies in your own folder stay yours. How a CHECK handles your files.
Updated 19 October 2026.