Areas we service · United States

Architectural rendering · California

Renders from your model, for projects in California.

California is a market where the first question about a render is not what it should show, but whether the person deciding is permitted to be persuaded by it at all. The state has moved whole categories of housing onto ministerial approval, where an application is checked against published standards rather than judged, and for one defined class of project it has legislated the visual question out of the significance test that environmental review turns on. Section 21099 of the Public Resources Code provides that aesthetic and parking impacts of a residential, mixed-use residential or employment center project on an infill site within a transit priority area shall not be considered significant impacts on the environment. Where that applies, an image stops being evidence on aesthetics inside a California Environmental Quality Act document. It becomes a sales tool, a lender's exhibit or a coordination drawing, and each of those is worth commissioning. None of them wants the same picture. Settle which path a project is on before anybody writes a shot list.

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Where renders get used here

Read the carve-outs first, because this state writes them down. Section 21099 of the Public Resources Code lifts aesthetic impacts out of the significance test for that defined class of infill project near transit. Section 21080.66 goes further, providing that the environmental quality division does not apply to any aspect of a qualifying housing development project, including any permits, approvals or public improvements it requires. A permit application for an accessory dwelling unit is to be considered and approved ministerially, without discretionary review or a hearing. Government Code section 65913.4 puts a qualifying multifamily development on a streamlined, ministerial approval process that is not subject to a conditional use permit or any other nonlegislative discretionary approval. Each of those turns on conditions somebody has to test against the actual site.

What survives is narrower than it first looks, and it matters more. Section 21099 leaves a lead agency's authority to consider aesthetic impacts under local design review ordinances or other discretionary powers untouched, and its carve-out expressly excludes impacts on historical or cultural resources, which section 21084.1 handles under a separate test of its own. Design review can still happen on the streamlined route, but it has to be objective, strictly focused on the criteria and on published objective design standards adopted before the application arrives, and it may not be used to inhibit the ministerial approval. The Housing Accountability Act writes the same idea down. For the purposes of the subdivision it sits in, objective, quantifiable, written development standards, conditions and policies are criteria involving no personal or subjective judgment by a public official, uniformly verifiable against an external benchmark both sides can know before submittal. Measured, in other words, rather than argued. Kallo supplies imagery to the agreed brief. Working out which process a project is in, and what it asks for, sits with your planner.

Who decides

California Energy Commission

Approves the compliance software the performance path is proven in, which is where the glazing, overhangs and shading an image shows have already been described once.

Division of the State Architect

Provides design and construction oversight for K-12 schools, community colleges and various other state-owned and state-leased facilities against structural, accessibility and fire and life safety codes, which decides what an interior view can honestly contain.

California Building Standards Commission

Oversees development, adoption, approval, publication and implementation of the state's building codes, and holds the express findings a city or county has to file before a local change to them can take effect, so visible fabric starts from one statewide edition rather than from a locally chosen model code.

Governor's Office of Land Use and Climate Innovation

Hosts the State Clearinghouse, which sits at the centre of state agency involvement in environmental review, and receives the notice of exemption a lead agency has to file when it relies on the statutory exemption for a housing development project.

Preparing your brief

For a California project, clarify whether the images are for a client decision, a lender presentation, a property launch or a submission specified by your consultant. These audiences ask different questions, so one attractive image may not answer every need. Share the approved design information, confirmed finish selections and any written presentation requirements. Tell us which details remain provisional and who is authorised to approve changes. Your brief should also identify the delivery date and intended uses, allowing the proposal to set out a relevant image or film package for your team.

What gets built here

Which section of code does the project sit under? The sections here do not all treat an image the same way, so the answer changes what is worth commissioning. Accessory dwelling units run under Chapter 13 of Division 1 of Title 7 of the Government Code, where an ordinance adopted by a local agency has to impose objective standards covering architectural review among other matters, together with standards that prevent adverse impacts on real property listed in the California Register of Historical Resources. Qualifying multifamily schemes take the streamlined route in Government Code section 65913.4. Qualifying housing development projects lean on the statutory exemption in Public Resources Code section 21080.66. Residential, mixed-use residential and employment center projects on infill sites near transit sit inside section 21099. K-12 school, community college and other state-owned and state-leased work answers to the Division of the State Architect for structural, accessibility and fire and life safety compliance.

Working with Kallo

Kallo works with your team wherever your project is based. Share the approved design, the audience and the date you need the work. Your proposal confirms the images or film, review stages and delivery schedule.

  • Your presentation or launch date helps shape an agreed delivery schedule.
  • The proposal sets out the review stages and the changes included in your project.
  • Bring feedback together so your team can approve a clear direction.
  • Larger sets and complex projects get a confirmed schedule before work begins.
  • Project files and images are private unless publication is approved in writing.

Units and sheets

Units

Imperial, with metric accepted

Sheets

ANSI and ARCH series

Models authored in feet and inches are read as supplied. Output is sized for ARCH D and ANSI D sheets rather than A1, so a set drops straight into a submittal without rescaling.

Questions

Our approval path is ministerial. Is a render still worth commissioning?

Usually yes, but be honest about who it is for. On a ministerial path nobody is being persuaded, because the application is checked against published standards. The image then earns its keep with lenders, buyers, tenants and the site team, and those readers want different things from a decision maker. Name the one you are aiming at and the brief gets shorter, not longer.

Can a render carry the aesthetics argument in our environmental document?

Sometimes there is no argument left to carry, and that is a question for your environmental consultant rather than for us. Where section 21099 applies, aesthetic impacts are not treated as significant impacts on the environment. Where it does not apply, the assessment is still your consultant's to scope, write and defend. Planning advice is not something Kallo offers, and no part of a submission is prepared here.

We are next to a listed building. Does the aesthetics carve-out cover that?

No. The same subdivision states that aesthetic impacts do not include impacts on historical or cultural resources, and section 21084.1 treats a project that may cause a substantial adverse change in the significance of a historical resource as one that may have a significant effect on the environment. The visual question returns through a different door, in front of a different reader.

Our energy consultant built a separate model of the same building. Does that reach your work?

It reaches the facade. The performance path is proven in software the California Energy Commission has approved, and the shading, overhangs and glazing in that run are inputs somebody already chose. If an image shows a cleaner elevation than the compliance model assumed, two descriptions of one building now disagree. Send whichever version is the committed one, and say which it is.

Design review is still happening on our streamlined application. What should we send you?

Send the adopted standards before you send a view list. On that route design review has to be objective and strictly focused on the criteria and on published objective design standards, and it may not be used to inhibit the ministerial approval. An image there explains a scheme that is already being measured against something published. A set built to win an argument will read as noise.

What we checked, September 2026

This page names the bodies and the checks rather than quoting rules, because rules change. It is background for planning a set of images, not planning advice. Your project team stays responsible for what is lodged.

Other areas

Tell us about your project.

Tell us what you are planning, who the images are for and when you need them. We will discuss the right views and film for the project, then prepare a tailored proposal.

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