I have a 3ds model i want to annotate with dimensions

Hi guys hank you for readig my thread i have a 3ds model i want to show dimensions of. will autocad do this ? i am a complete noob and this is a college project. do i have to make sure the units and scale are the same in both programs aswell ? not sure about units setup in autocad.

thanks for any advice

DJ

Were you planning on exporting to 3ds or DWG file format?

A unit in AutoCAD can be equal to an inch, a foot, a mile, a millimeter, a meter, or whatever you want it to be.

Would you be working in metric or imperial units?

The models are book shelves for a libary mainly just boxes , their are some warddobes to do and a clothing island, the furniture ill be modeling in 3dsmax, then i want to bring it into autocad and be able to do dimensional scale drawings. ive managed to get a 3ds model into auto cad using the import panel. in terms of units ill need to work in millimeters (metric). i was told this is easy stuff but am a nood cadet with auto cad but its fun learning new stuff at college. Am not sure what to export out too i thought i could do the modeling in 3dsmax and then finish in autocad printing the dimensional drawing

thanks remark

So you have managed to get what you did in 3ds Max into AutoCAD?

yes my friend. its in auto cad imported as a .3ds am just figureing out how to annotate the dimensions of the 3d model

You really want to do that? Wouldn't it be better to extract the 2D views of each object and dimension those instead?

i did nt know you could do that its my first time doing anything with autocad, i use 3dsmax mostly but my lecturer said i need to have better technical skills. i have 11 days to do this project so am nervous ha ha

I am not a big believer in dimensioning 3D objects. Can it be done? Yes. You just have to be a bit careful making your "picks" when it comes to dimensioning the object. I'm "old school" so I typically revert to creating the 2D views (extracted from the 3D model) and dimension those instead.

i can see the logic in your point your way just from imagining it seems alot less fiddly. i looked at max and it can export to dwg, dxf, ill see how to do a specific view in a min do you free lance ? am doing my final, id prefere to do it my self but time waits for no man . lol

Can't help you with exporting a specific view from 3ds.

Yes, I freelance on occasion. I usually make it a policy not to accept student assignments/projects on a freelance basis. It has nothing to do with you personally so please do not take offense.

Having been a student with a tremendous school workload (multi-sheet submissions for an assigned project) and holding down a full-time job at the same time I'm fully aware of the time constraints one faces. But I muddled through somehow and I am confident you can find it in yourself to do so too. Have as much faith in yourself as I am putting in you now OK?

If you have questions all you need do is ask. There are many smart and talented people here at CADTutor who are more than willing to assist you.

No offence taken at all my friend id rather do it myself , its better to learn it and understand the process than to let someone else. time is time arrrhhhh lol ill get their. i really appreciate your help though.

See post #2 HERE.

thanks for the pointer mate. that will definately come in handy. you can do the same with 3d objects brought in from max right ? even though the video looks like objects made in auto cad.

Just export your Max model as .dwg format and then open it in Autocad. Then follow the instructions in the video.

i loooooooooooooooove you

I use max alot as a hobbyist. After reading this thread I made a small rectangular block to represent the outside walls as a house. I made another block slightly larger and collapsed the top vertices to represent a pitched roof. I then placed the roof onto the first block to represnt a small house. I made sure that I used exact measurements when creating the 2 objects in max...house rectangle was 12 x 20 x 8 high. roof rectangle was 16 x 24 x 7 to tip of roof. I imported the 3ds into autocad and each viewport annotated just fine. you will of course have to adjust your units and dimensionstyle to match architectural settings and your needs.

if you want different views of your creation you will also have to copy and rotate the new geometry so that they show up at different angles in 1 viewport. you can then dimension each view, (side, front, top) in a single viewport

thanks so much for your help guys am just modelling everything max at the moment (furniture) then ill be needing the autocad soonish. is their away i can make a donation to the site for all the advice as i understand thing cost money to run sites, band width space ect.

if you want different views of your creation you will also have to copy and rotate the new geometry so that they show up at different angles in 1 viewport. you can then dimension each view, (side, front, top) in a single viewport

Different views of the same geometry can be created in a paper space layout utilizing Viewports. There is no need to copy the geometry. You have a choice of dimensioning your geometry in model space (using annotative scaling) or even in your layout.

You can also create viewports in Model Space.