AutoCAD 2005 For Dummies (2004)

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Pick a pattern, any pattern: Predefined hatch patterns

To use AutoCAD’s predefined hatch patterns, select Predefined from the dropdown list box at the top of the Hatch tab in the Boundary Hatch and Fill dialog box. This selection sets the stage for choosing the hatch pattern.

You specify a predefined hatch pattern in one of two ways:

If you know the name of the hatch pattern, select it from the Pattern dropdown list. The list is alphabetical, except that SOLID (that is, a solid fill) is at the very beginning.

If you don’t know the pattern’s name, or you prefer the visual approach, click the Pattern button (the tiny button with the ellipsis [three dots] to the right of the Pattern prompt and pattern name) to display the Hatch Pattern Palette with pattern previews and names.

AutoCAD has about 80 predefined hatch patterns from which to choose. The list includes ANSI (American National Standards Institute) and ISO (International Standards Organization) standard hatch patterns. Figure 11-3 shows the Other Predefined hatch patterns, which cover everything from Earth to Escher to Stars. Hatch patterns whose names begins with ARare intended for architectural and related industries.

Figure 11-3:

Plenty of hatch patterns.

After you’ve selected a pattern, specify angle and scale, as I describe in the section “Getting it right: Hatch angle and scale,” in this chapter.

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Make it solid, man

Although you may not guess it, AutoCAD treats filling an area with a solid color as a type of hatching. Simply choose Solid from the top of the Pattern drop-down list.

Like any other object, a solid hatch takes on the current object color — or the current layer’s color if you leave color set to ByLayer. Therefore, check whether the current object layer and color are set appropriately before you use the Solid hatching option (see Chapter 4 for details).

You can create the effect of a solid fill in AutoCAD in several other ways:

If you want a filled-in circle or donut, use the DOnut command and specify an inside diameter of 0.

If you want one or more line segments with either uniform or tapered widths, use the PLine command’s Width option. (Chapter 5 discusses the DOnut and PLine commands.)

If you want a pattern that starts out solid but then fades away (or transitions to a different color) in one or more directions, use the Gradient tab on the Boundary Hatch and Fill dialog box. This option creates a gradient fill. You can control the color(s), direction(s), and angle of the gradient.

Solid and gradient fills are a good way to mimic poché — an old hand-drafting technique in which you shade areas with a lighter colored pencil (usually red) to make those areas appear lightly shaded on blueline prints. The figure shows some examples of solid and gradient fills.

It’s up to you: User-defined hatches

A user-defined hatch pattern makes a hatch pattern out of parallel lines. Use this option to create a simple pattern and specify the space between the lines in drawing units. For example, you can hatch a wall in a building plan with a user-defined pattern and specify that the hatch lines be three inches apart.

After you choose User Defined from the Type drop-down list in the Boundary Hatch and Fill dialog box, you specify the angle and spacing of the lines. You can select the Double check box to achieve a crosshatching effect (two perpendicular sets of hatching lines).

Getting it right: Hatch angle and scale

Predefined and custom hatch patterns require that you enter the angle and scale for AutoCAD to generate the hatching. You usually won’t have any trouble deciding on an appropriate angle, but a suitable scale can be tricky.

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The hatch scale usually should be a pattern-specific multiplier times the drawing scale factor, as described in Chapter 3. For example, the EARTH pattern (in the Other Predefined tab of the Hatch Pattern Palette; refer to Figure 11-3) looks pretty good in a full scale (1 = 1) drawing with a hatch scale of 0.75. If you’re adding EARTH pattern hatching to a 1” = 1’–0” detail (drawing scale factor equals 12), try using a hatch scale of 0.75 × 12, or 9.0. This patternspecific multiplier and drawing-scale-factor approach ensures that hatching looks consistent (that the spaces between the lines are the same) at all scales when you plot.

Assuming that you know your drawing’s scale factor, the only complication is figuring out what the pattern-specific multiplier should be for a particular hatch pattern. In a more rational world, the pattern-specific multiplier would always be something sensible, like 1.0. Unfortunately, that’s not the case for all hatch pattern definitions. Even worse, there’s no way to predict before you use a hatch pattern for the first time what an appropriate pattern-specific multiplier might be. (Autodesk created the hatch patterns whose names begins with AR- — that is, the ones intended for architectural drawings — with a final hatch scale of 1.0 in mind, but in some cases you’ll have to adjust up or down in order to achieve a suitable scale.) You have to use trial and error the first time, and then make a note of the hatch pattern and multiplier for future use.

The first time you use a hatch pattern definition, try 1.0 as the multiplier. Don’t forget to multiply by the drawing scale factor. Preview the hatch and then adjust the hatch scale iteratively; preview after each change. After you settle upon a scale for the current drawing, calculate the corresponding multiplier (for future use); divide the hatch scale by the current drawing’s scale factor.

User-defined patterns require that you enter an angle and spacing, not angle and scale. Spacing is expressed in the current drawing units.

Do fence me in: Defining hatch boundaries

After you specify the hatch pattern, angle, and scale you want to use, you define the boundary (or boundaries) into which you want to pour that hatch pattern in one of two ways:

Picking points within the area(s) you want hatched

Selecting objects that surround those areas

The actual operation involved in using either of these options is confusing to most people. You’ll probably need a little practice before you get used to it.

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The idea behind either definition option is simple when applied to simple areas — that is, closed areas with no additional objects inside them. To define the hatch boundary for a simple area, do one of these two things:

Click the Pick Points button in the Boundary Hatch and Fill dialog box and then click a point inside the boundary.

Click the Select Objects button and select one or more objects that form a fully closed boundary.

This simple hatching gets more complicated if you have one closed object inside another, as in Figure 11-4. The AutoCAD hatch preview and a bit of experimentation will clarify all these potentially puzzling permutations.

Pick one point between two areas

Pick inside	Pick points
a simple area	inside both areas

Figure 11-4:

Get picky about your hatching (“X” indicates a pick point).

Select a single	Select both
boundary object	boundary objects

Select one boundary object with another nested inside

As I warn earlier in this chapter, boundaries must be completely closed before AutoCAD will hatch them. That’s one of the reasons you should employ the precision techniques from this book whenever you draw or edit objects. If the lines surrounding your boundary don’t either meet exactly or cross, AutoCAD scolds you with a Valid hatch boundary not found error message.

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The Valid hatch boundary not found error message means you need to “repair” lines or other objects so they are a fully closed boundary. Sometimes you can use the Fillet command with a zero fillet radius to force two lines to meet exactly. Another possibility is to use grip editing to align one endpoint precisely with another. Chapter 6 discusses these two editing techniques.

If you don’t want to go to the trouble of repairing your drawing in this way, you can use AutoCAD 2005’s new Gap Tolerance setting, located on the Advanced tab of the Boundary Hatch and Fill dialog box, to tell AutoCAD to overlook small gaps when dealing with hatch boundaries.

Hatching that knows its place

In AutoCAD 2005, the Boundary Hatch and Fill dialog box includes a new Draw Order setting that controls where AutoCAD places the hatching with respect to the boundary in terms of object selection. (Refer to Figure 11-2.) The default setting, Send behind boundary, puts the hatching “underneath” its boundary for object selection purposes, and that’s usually exactly what you want.

Have palette, will hatch

With Tool Palettes, described in Chapter 2, you can create click-and-drag hatch palettes. With a hatch palette, you click a tool (a swatch) and drag into an enclosed boundary to hatch the area. If your hatching needs are simple, you can create a Tool Palette for the patterns and scales you often use. See “hatches, adding to tool palettes” in AutoCAD’s online help for more information.

Editing Hatch Objects

Editing an existing hatch pattern is simple after you’re familiar with the Boundary Hatch and Fill dialog box. Follow these steps:

1.Select the hatch object.

2.Right-click anywhere in the drawing area and choose Hatch Edit from the cursor menu.

AutoCAD opens the Hatch Edit dialog box and displays the hatch object’s current settings.

3.Make any desired changes, use the Preview button to look them over, and click OK to keep the changes.

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Alternatively, you can use the Properties palette (described in Chapter 6) to make most existing hatch pattern changes. The Properties palette is especially good for changing several hatches at once.

To make one hatch look like another, use the Match Properties button on the Standard toolbar.

The TRim command (described in Chapter 6) is now capable of trimming hatch patterns in most cases — although it removes associativity of the hatch pattern with the boundary.

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Chapter 12

The Plot Thickens

In This Chapter

Configuring printers and plotters

Plotting model space

Plotting to scale

Plotting paper space layouts

Plotting lineweights and colors

Controlling plotting with plot styles

Using page setups

Troubleshooting plotting

Despite the increasing number of offices with a computer (or two) on every desk, many people still need to or want to work with printed

drawings. Perhaps you thought that using AutoCAD means you don’t have to rely on hard-copy versions of drawings, but can view them on-screen instead. Even if that’s true, you may need to give hard-copy prints to your less savvy colleagues who don’t have AutoCAD. You may want to make some quick prints to pore over during your bus ride home. You may find that checking drawings the old-fashioned way — with a hard-copy print and a red pencil — turns up errors that managed to remain hidden on the computer screen.

Whatever the reason, you’ll want to print drawings at some point — probably sooner rather than later. Depending on where you are in a project, plotting is the pop quiz, midterm, or final exam of your drawing-making semester. This chapter helps you ace the test.

You Say Printing, I Say Plotting

Plotting originally meant creating hard-copy output on a device that was capable of printing on larger sheets, such as D size or E size, that measure several feet on a side. (See Chapter 3 for information about drafting paper sizes.)

These plotters often used pens to draw, robot-fashion, on large sheets of

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vellum or Mylar. The sheets could then be run through diazo blueline machines — copying machines that create blueline prints — in order to create less-expensive copies. Printing meant creating hard-copy output on ordinary printers that used ordinary sized paper, such as A size (letter size, 81⁄2 x 11 inches) or B size (tabloid or ledger size, 11 x 17 inches).

Nowadays, AutoCAD and most CAD users make no distinction between plotting and printing. AutoCAD veterans usually say “plotting,” so if you want to be hip, you can do so, too.

Whatever you call it, plotting an AutoCAD drawing is considerably more complicated than printing a word processing document or a spreadsheet. CAD has a larger range of different plotters and printers, drawing types, and output procedures than other computer applications. AutoCAD tries to help you tame the vast jungle of plotting permutations, but you’ll probably find that you have to take some time to get the lay of the land and clear a path to your desired hard-copy output.

The plotting system in AutoCAD 2005 is essentially the same as the one that Autodesk introduced in AutoCAD 2000, but with a reorganized, somewhat less imposing Plot dialog box. In addition, Autodesk has improved the page setups feature and added background plotting. I describe all these changes in this chapter.

Get with the system

One of the complications you face in your attempts to create hard copy is that AutoCAD has two distinct ways of communicating with your plotters and printers. Operating systems, and the programs that run in them, use a special piece of software called a printer driver to format data for printing and then send it to the printer or plotter. When you configure Windows to recognize a new printer connected to your computer or your network, you’re actually installing the printer’s driver. (“Bring the Rolls around front, James. And bring me a gin and tonic and a D-size plot while you’re at it.”) AutoCAD, like other Windows programs, works with the printers you’ve configured in Windows. AutoCAD calls these system printers because they’re part of the Windows system.

But AutoCAD, unlike other Windows programs, can’t leave well enough alone. Some output devices, especially some larger plotters, aren’t controlled very efficiently by Windows system printer drivers. For that reason, AutoCAD comes with specialized nonsystem drivers (that is, drivers that are not installed as part of the Windows system) for plotters from companies such as Hewlett Packard, Xerox, and Océ. These drivers are kind of like nonunion workers. They ignore the tidy rules for communicating with Windows printers in order to get things done a bit more quickly and flexibly.

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Using already-configured Windows system printer drivers usually is easiest, and they work well with many devices — especially devices that print on smaller paper, such as laser and inkjet printers. However, if you have a large plotter, you may be able to get faster plotting, better plot quality, or more plot features by installing a nonsystem driver. To find out more, choose Contents Driver and Peripheral Guide Use Plotters and Printers in the AutoCAD online help system.

The AutoCAD 2005 CD includes a Windows system printer driver for HewlettPackard DesignJet large format printers. This driver is optimized for CAD plotting. To install the driver, load your AutoCAD 2005 CD, click Install, and then click Hewlett Packard DesignJet Printer Drivers.

Configure it out

For now, you simply should make sure that AutoCAD recognizes the devices that you want to use for plotting. The following steps show you how:

1.Launch AutoCAD and open an existing drawing or start a new, blank drawing.

2.Choose Tools Options to open the Options dialog box, and click the

Plot and Publish tab.

3.Click the drop-down arrow to view the list just below the Use As Default Output Device option, as shown in Figure 12-1.

The list includes two kinds of device configurations, designated by two tiny, difficult-to-distinguish icons to the left of the device names:

•A little laser printer icon, with a sheet of white paper coming out the top, indicates a Windows system printer configuration.

•A little plotter icon, with a piece of paper coming out the front, indicates a nonsystem (that is, AutoCAD-specific) configuration.

The nonsystem configuration names always end in pc3, because they’re stored in special AutoCAD Printer Configuration version 3 files. So, if you can’t tell the difference between the icons, look for the pc3 at the end of the name.

4.Verify that the list includes the printers and plotters that you want to have available in AutoCAD.

If not, choose Start Printers and Faxes (in Windows XP) or Start Settings Printers (in Windows 2000), launch the Add Printer Wizard, and follow the instructions. If your printer isn’t in the default Windows list, cancel the wizard and hunt down a driver disk that came with your printer, or, better yet, download the current driver from the printer manufacturer’s Web site.