Autodesk AutoCAD 2010: Basic 2D Concepts Tutorials
Using Viewports in Layouts / Creating Viewports
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Subtitles of the Movie (Autodesk AutoCAD 2010: Basic 2D Concepts / Using Viewports in Layouts / Creating Viewports)
We're now going to add some Viewports to our Title Block to allow us to scale and view the information and design and drafting that we do in the Model tab. Now, we're going to place four equal Viewports in the drawing. Now to do that we need to go to our View tab here. If we go to View there's a Viewports Panel here. Now you can see various Icons. Now there are many different types of Viewports that you can put into your AutoCAD drawing. Now before we place any Viewports we must make sure that we go to the Home tab, we go to the Layers Panel, and we place our Viewports on a separate Viewports Layer. There's nothing worse than inserting a Block in a drawing and placing it on a Layer that may be, might not be required, might be frozen, might be thawed, or anything like that. We need to make sure that we distinguish our Viewports from everything else. So we go to the View tab again and to our Viewports Panel here, and we need this Icon here. It looks like a little television screen with a star on it. It's the New Viewports Icon and it will bring up the Viewports dialog box. Now, the good thing about AutoCAD is it provides you with some default arrangements of Viewports, so you can have a Single Viewport, Two Vertical Viewports, and you get a Preview here on the right-hand side. Two Horizontal Viewports. And the good thing is you can work in either 2D or 3D here, and if you've got any named Views in your drawing you can also select them here. We need four equal Viewports: this one here. We need four in this arrangement here. The Viewport Spacing is going to be 5 millimeters between each Viewport. That just gives us a little bit of tolerance, a little bit of clearance between each Viewport on the actual Layout itself. It just makes life that little bit easier sometimes. The Setup there is 2D, not 3D. Now, that Viewport Spacing that I set up earlier there will also make sure that these Viewports aren't sitting on each other. As you can see, even in the Preview there, there's a little gap just allowing you, if you need to move a Viewport or perhaps change its size, you can click on it and select it easily. So, if I now click on OK. I get prompted for the first corner of the area that is going to take on board these four Viewports. Make sure that you've got your Object Snaps on. Down on the bottom on the Status Bar you can see I've got POLAR, OSNAP, and OTRACK switched on. I'm going to use the Endpoint Snap here, left-click, down to the Endpoint Snap here. Now make sure you get the Endpoint Snap. You might need to zoom in a tad. There is some text there that could get in the way. So, it's that one there. It's either an Intersection or an Endpoint. Left-click. Now, if I do Extents on the Navigate Panel there I've now got my four Viewports. Now the good thing about these Viewports is I can activate each one in turn, so if I now double-click here that Bold Viewport is the Current Viewport. Now there is a really nice keyboard shortcut to toggle between each Viewport and make it live. You hold down the Control key on the keyboard, and you press the R key with the Control key held down and you can toggle around your Viewports like so. All I'm doing though is holding down the Control key and pressing R on the keyboard. To deactivate your Viewports just mov the crosshair outside of the Live Viewport, double-click in the gray area in the Layout tab, and it deactivates your Viewports for you. So, there you go. What you've now done is created a Title Block with four Viewports ready for your new project.
Tutorial Information
| Course: | Autodesk AutoCAD 2010: Basic 2D Concepts |
| Author: | Shaun Bryant |
| SKU: | 34013 |
| ISBN: | 1-935320-56-4 |
| Release Date: | 2009-07-03 |
| Duration: | 7.5 hrs / 107 lessons |
| Work Files: |
Yes |
| Captions: | No |
| Compatibility: |
Vista/XP/2000, OS X, Linux QuickTime 7, Flash 8 |
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