2 Point Perspective

It's been years since I've done architectural cad (I've been doing civil design for 15+ yrs), but I've had to go back to college and one on the courses I'm now required is "Architectural Autocad". Our prof. wants us to do a 2 Point Perspective without the use of 3D. He wants us to use a "Ground Line" (GL), "Projection Plane" (PP), a "True Height Line" (THL), "Station Point" (SP) and "Horizontal Line" (HL). He showed a very short video (useless) and then proceded to explain (even more useless). Now I have to do is interpret his instructions (very vague).

Does anyone have any experience in this manner of autocad procedure. I'm using Autocad 2008, not the Architectural version.

Thanks

I did that in college 20 years ago, I think your proffessor want you to practice that without the help of a Cad program, although you can use

autocad just as a substitute for a drawing board, It is not hard to draw 2 points perespetive if you can find instructions, I cannot help you

in that as it been 20 years since I left college and I never needed to draw prespective since. I think you will find some instuctions on the

internet, good luck.

Do you have a drafting text book? Everything will be explained in there with examples. Or use google.com.

We used Autocad 2008 in class, but as I mentioned, his explanation was mind boggling at best. Unfortunately, the paperwork he gave us is even more confusing and the AutoCAD book we are using has no reference to this type of drawing at all.

Perspective and AutoCAD. A good explanation can be found here:

http://www.augi.com/publications/hotnews.asp?page=1419

Thanks ReMark,

I tried the site you gave, but it's limited on explaination. I actually need a walkthough and steps from setup to final output on this. If anyone has an old drawing (dwg format) in which they may have done it this way, I'd greatly appreciate it. I have my house elevations and floorplan done, it's the steps for the combination of the drawings to produce the perspective that has me stumped. The prof. appeared to be proud of himself, but I'll reserve comment.

A walkthrough would entail much more typing than I have the time or patience to do. Might I suggest you visit your local library and get your hands on a copy of Engineering Drawing by Thomas E. French, 7th edition, 1947, published by McGraw-Hill Book Company. Open the book to Chapter 22, Perspective Drawing, and read pages 483 to 507. Plenty of detailed information is provided.

There also must be any number of better (i.e. - more detailed) explanations on the Internet. Since the link I provided you at least had some connection to AutoCAD I felt it was the most relevant. I'm sorry it did not meet your needs.

Another good source of information, book-wise, would be Basic Technical Drawing by Henry Cecil Spencer, 1956, published by The MacMillan Company. While it does not have an entire chapter devoted to perspective drawing if you look on pages if you look on pages 274 through 277 you'll find explanations for one-point and two-point perspective.

For something a bit more up-to-date the book Technical Graphics Communication, 3rd edition, by Gary R. Bertoline and Eric N. Wiebe, and published by McGraw-Hill, 2003 has a entire chapter (Chapter 10) devoted to perspective drawing. It covers pages 517 to 536. On page 523 is a simple diagram showing the differences between one, two and three-point perspective. Even I can understand it and I've only completed two perspective drawings my entire drafting career and both were for an architectural drafting/design class.

And finally, the book Architectural Drafting and Design, 5th edition, by Alan Jefferis and David A. Madsen, Thompson-Delmar Learning, 2005 covers perspective drawing techniques in Chapter 40, pages 785 to 810. It covers the types of perspective drawings, terminology, vanishing points, picture planes, true-height lines, etc. Pages 791 through 793 specifically cover two-point perspective including how to get started and the setup of basic elements. It has six nice details that cover every aspect of constructing a two-point perspective.

Is that enough information to get you started?

Any one or all of these books should have been on the course syllabus as required reading by your professor. We tend to forget that long before the advent of computers and CAD programs people were making these types of drawing by hand and doing a damn good job of it too! Board drawings have a personality and vibrancy unmatched by computers so much so that they have become sought-after works of art.

This might be helpful:

http://www.khulsey.com/perspective_2pt.html

you are number one ReMark,

those set of drawings in this web page was all I needed to learn 2 points prespective (20 years ago),

you are very helpful to people who want to learn in this great site,

thanks, keep the good work going.....

You're entirely welcomed morgos. Thank you for your kind words as well.

that took me back to a nice prespective I was proud I made, it was an old castle somewhere in England I saw a picture of it in a magazine, I used my imagination to draw a plan and elevations of it, and then draw the prespective from them, the outcome was a nice prespective very similar to the Photo I had, unfortunally I cannot share my drawings with you as they are thousands of miles away from where I live now.