How to do this?

[ReMark]

Don't get me wrong, I love CAD, but it gave us a freedom to do things just because we can. The result is we have started to slowly pull away from standards that have been used for many years and for good reason. My personal opinion is this is not necessarily a good thing.

[Mason Dixon]

OK, I've got one of the pieces how I like it. It was a real pain to get it there tho. I saved the view of it under named views but, when I hit that view for the next one over to the right it doesn't turn into the special rotated angle I set the first one to.

[a1harps]

You are welcome Mason.

 

When I first started 3D drafting I thought I had to use strictly 3D commands like 3D rotate and 3d mirror etc. Those are good commands but are a bit tricky to use at first and depending on what view you are in and what you need to accomplish....the regular 2D rotate and 2D mirror are still very useful in 3d space.

 

The "gizmo" you mention only appears when you use 3D rotate. If you are up to speed with that command it would be a faster way to completely get your model oriented the way you want.

[ReMark]

I don't quite see what the angled view you have chosen (20 deg?) has over a standard isometric view. It actually appears more distorted. That's not the "look" you were trying to achieve was it? Maybe it's my monitor/video card.

[a1harps]

OK, I've got one of the pieces how I like it. It was a real pain to get it there tho. I saved the view of it under named views but, when I hit that view for the next one over to the right it doesn't turn into the special rotated angle I set the first one to.

 

 

 

I am not the best help when it comes to "Paper Space".

 

The way I would have to do this:

 

Make separate drawing files for each of your concrete models/products profile. I would only draw the profile as a closed poly line and draw it in "front view" on layer zero. By separate drawings I mean use the command "wblock". You save each molding profile as a separate drawing with "wblock" . Choose the individual molding profile and the use the "pick point" option in the wblock dialog and select the same basic point on each model as you save it with wblock. For instance...choose the lower left hand corner as your pick point for each molding profile.

 

To begin making the catalog items, start a new drawing and get in front view. Now command "insert block". Browse to find your first saved wblock profile and check explode and specify insertion point on screen and then click ok.

 

Now simply enter 0,0,0 as your insertion point. This will be the entry point that you choose for all subsequent saved wblock molding profiles.

 

Next....extrude the part your desired length. Copy the extruded part...select the lower left hand corner as the base point and type 0,-15,0 as your first destination point and then enter and exit the command.

 

Now...you are still looking at the section view of the upper extruded profile so center it with "pan" and zoom it to taste and then use "named view" to save the current view and give it an appropriate name like "profile".

 

Now zoom extents and find the copy profile that you placed @ 0,-15,0(the lower one on your screen).

 

 

Change views to either SW or SE isometric (your coice per taste) and zoom in on the lower model. Now use "constrained orbit" if you need to or want to in order to sweeten the view to your taste. Pan to center and zoom to taste. Enter "newview" and name this view something like "Perspective" and select current and click ok. Now when you go to paper space and make two viewports....you will be able to choose each of those two "named views" in the two different viewports at the same time.

 

 

When all is panned and zoomed the way you like in your paperspace layout, plot the layout to file or however you need to save it.

 

For the rest of your profiles...you need to either change the properties of the current molding profile/profiles to an off layer or otherwise move it or delete it from the current position/positions (0,0,0 & 0,-15,0).

 

Now you simply insert the next saved wblock molding profile drawing at 0,0,0.

 

Do the same extrude and copy to @0,-15,0 to each one.

 

Now when you go to your layout tab in paper space, your new molding will be there in the two viewports and the rotated view is automatic for every new profile.

 

Let me know if any of that is unclear.

[ReMark]

If the object has been created in 3D then the best way to get all of your different views would be to switch to a layout and use either SolProf or the combo commands of SolView and SolDraw. I guess even Flatshot would work too.

[MikeScott]

OK, I've got one of the pieces how I like it. It was a real pain to get it there tho. I saved the view of it under named views but, when I hit that view for the next one over to the right it doesn't turn into the special rotated angle I set the first one to.

 

 

You highlighted/activated the second mview window, and then selected that named view?

 

As long as you hit that "Set current" button, it should work, assuming you saved the view correctly.

 

I can't recreate the problem you're having.

[Mason Dixon]

Thanks for the help A1, unfortunately it appears I don't have a good grasp on naming views either because I couldn't get the rotated view to automatically appear. If you could tell me step by step what you did to get this to work I would appreciate it. Thanks.

[MikeScott]

You could try using mview in paperspace, and then make that mview current and select 3dview viewpoint.

 

That's the best method I can think of, in terms of being able to manually enter a view with precision percentages.. and allow you to reenter the same numbers to get something consistent each time, that you can pan and zoom in.

[a1harps]

Thanks for the help A1, unfortunately it appears I don't have a good grasp on naming views either because I couldn't get the rotated view to automatically appear. If you could tell me step by step what you did to get this to work I would appreciate it. Thanks.

 

hmmm. Ok...practice making a named view a few times.

 

Try this...change to sw isometric view and zoom in on any interesting object in your model space. Enter command " newview" ...have view set to current....give your view a name... click ok. Now you can do anything you like to your current model space view with orbit or pre-set views, but anytime you select that new named view from the pull down menu you see the saved view exactly as it was.

 

Be aware that after you create a named view... any changes to the objects in the view will show up in the named view. If you move all those objects that are in a named view to a different coordinate with a large enough distance and the saved view will now be a blank screen. Any new objects placed in model space that come into the named view will be seen.

 

The key thing I told you in the other post was that "named views" causes auto cad to recall an exact coordinate and direction and angle of view. So if you set up a named view of a model that was brought in as a block @ coordinates( 0,0,0 ) in front view and then , any other block model of similar dimensions and the same relative pickpoint that is entered @ (0,0,0) will share that named view. Of course you can use any coordinates you like and 0,0,0 is just easy to remember.

 

I'm not sure but ReMark may be saying it is possible to make a layout of the section view of your model and then create a second view of the same part oriented to a different view

without affecting model space?

 

Anyway Mason, I feel I did give you a step by step in my previous post of a way I devised to speed up the process. Please read it carefully and if still lost,ask me a specific question?

[a1harps]

Mason, I must apologize for a mistake I made.

 

This is regarding the long post I made on 10th Mar 2010, 10:22 pm

 

I have corrected the mistake and can see why you had a problem.

 

Here is the corrected text:

 

"Change views to either SW or SE isometric (your coice per taste) and zoom in on the lower model. Now use "constrained orbit" if you need to or want to in order to sweeten the view to your taste. Pan to center and zoom to taste. Enter "newview" and name this view something like "Perspective" and select current and click ok."

 

Mason, the above correction is in regards to setting the view for the copied lower model. You do not rotate it at all with the rotate command(sorry). What you do is look at it from a preset isometric view(SW or SE) and use constrained orbit to fine tune the look. Once zoomed and centered on the screen using 'pan' in model space,naming this view will show the same with any other similar extruded molding that gets moved to or entered as a block to the coordinates (0,-15,0) while in front view.

[a1harps]

Here is the first layout with a molding profile brought in to "front view" as a block /pick point lower left corner/exploded.

 

I entered 0,0,0 for on screen point specification in model space.

 

I extruded the profile to 11 inches and copied it once to (@ 0,-15,0) using the lower left corner of the block as the "base point" for "copy".

 

I zoomed in on the upper extruded profile on my screen in front view and panned to screen center/zoom to taste and save as named view "profile".

 

I then switched to SW isometric view and zoomed in on the lower copy of the extruded profile. I used "constrained orbit" to adjust it a little to my preference and then panned it to screen center and zoomed to taste. I then used the "newview" command to name this view "Perspective".

 

In my layout I selected the two named views ...one in each of my two viewports.

 

Here is how it looks:

[a1harps]

Part Two:

 

Now I saved that layout to file and returned to model space and choose "front view".

 

I used the move command to move the first models out of the way(move them to a different area).

 

I enter "insert block" and browse for the next profile. I select the next profile drawing and explode/specify insertion point on screen/click ok. ( When the block was made,the profile drawing block was saved with "wblock" and the lower left corner was chosen as the "pick point")

 

I then entered (0,0,0) and hit enter.

 

I extrude the new profile to 11 inches and then copy it once to the coordinates (0,-15,0) using the lower left hand corner as the "base point" for the "copy"

 

 

Now when I enter my layout I see the new molding profiles in the same two views as the first layout. This is still work but the two named views do not need to be made again.

 

Here is number two:

[a1harps]

Oh man...you are teaching me a lot here Mason.

 

I just realized you can skip the step of copying the extruded profiles to (0,-15,0).

 

After you enter the first new profile block in front view and extrude...stay in front view and use "new view" to save as "profile" named view.

 

Now..instead of that copy baloney, just switch to SW isometric...use constrained orbit to adjust your view/pan center/zoom to taste. Now use "newview" command to save as "perspective" named view. You see??...you could leave the extruded profile right where it was inserted and create 100's of different named views of it without ever moving it. You move the view(not the model) with the view toolbar and/or constrained orbit and make it a named view/views.

 

This saves a lot of work. Each new profile gets placed @ 0,0,0 and the named views will be set in your layout after the first profile is done. Save each layout in a file and replace the profile in model space with the next and repeat until you have all your profiles done.

[Mason Dixon]

Thanks for helping me out with this, I haven't had a chance to work on it but I should early next week. Thanks again!

[a1harps]

Good luck MD.

 

For what I do I don't currently use paper space or even viewports but after this thread I am sure I will find some reasons to use them.

 

What I have learned in a nutshell is that if you arrange things properly in model space you can then go into paperspace and make layouts of everything you need by making viewports and panning and zooming objects or sets of objects and changing views within those paperspace viewports of any of the objects you placed in model space. As long as none of the objects in model space are moved to a different coordinate or edited in some other way, your layout work in paperspace remains static.

 

It really isn't necessary to create or use any named views to layout a set of moldings the way you describe. It can all be done in a paperspace viewport/viewports and single uniform extruded models of each molding profile in model space.

[MikeScott]

Kinda like this.. back on page one.

www.cadtutor.net/forum/showpost.php?p=308069&postcount=10

 

With so many different ways to do things, it's always useful to pursue different methods every now and then.

 

I hadn't heard of constrained orbits before, and discovered "named veiwpoint" for myself while trying to recreate some of the issue. That "named viewpoint" is useful as hell.. allowing you to set your view with percentages.