Starting Your First Drawing

Starting Your First Drawing

In Chapter 1, you looked at a preexisting sample drawing. This time. you’ll begin to draw your own
drawing by creating a door that will be used in later exercises. First, though, you must learn how
to tell AutoCAD what you want, and, even more important, you must understand what AutoCAD
wants from you.
TIP
In this chapter, you’ll start to see instructions for both Imperial and metric measurement. In
general, you’ll see the instructions for Imperial measurement first, followed by the metric
instructions. You won’t be dealing with inches or centimeters yet, however. You’re just getting to
know the AutoCAD system.



You’ll start by opening a new drawing and setting the size of the work area, known as
the drawing
limits
. These limits aren’t fixed in any way, and you aren’t forced to stay within the
bounds of the drawing limits, but they can help to establish a starting area from which you can
expand your drawing:
1.
Choose File 
Close to close the current file. In the Save Changes dialog box, click No. Notice
that the toolbars disappear. and the AutoCAD drawing window appears blank when no
drawings are open.
2.
Choose File 
New to open the Select Template dialog box.


3.
Select the Acad.dwt template, and click Open.

You have a brand-new blank file, but it’s a little difficult to tell how big your drawing area is.
Next, you’ll set up the work area so you have a better idea of the space you’re working with:
1.
Choose Format 
Drawing Limits.
2.
At the
Specify lower left corner or [ON/OFF] <0.0000,0.0000>:
prompt, press
↵
.
3.
At the
Specify upper right corner <12.0000,9.0000>:
prompt, metric users should
enter
40,30
↵
. If you use Imperial units (feet and inches), then press
↵
to accept the default of
12.0000,9.0000.
4.
From the menu bar, choose View 
Zoom 
All.
In the last step, View 
Zoom 
All uses the limits you set up in steps 2 and 3 to determine
the display area. In a drawing that contains objects, View 
Zoom 
All displays the limits plus the
area occupied by the objects in the drawing if they happen to fall outside the limits. Now give your
file a unique name.
1.
Choose File 
Save As to open the Save Drawing As dialog box.
2.
Type
Door
. As you type, the name appears in the File Name text box.
3.
Save your file in the
My Documents
folder; or, if you prefer, save it in another folder of your
choosing. Just remember where you put it, because you’ll use it later.
4.
Click Save. You now have a file called
Door.dwg
, located in the
My Documents
folder. Of
course, your drawing doesn’t contain anything yet. You’ll take care of that next.

WARNING
The new file shows a drawing area roughly 12 inches wide by 9 inches high. Metric
users have a file that shows an area roughly 40 mm wide by 30 mm high. This area is your workspace,
although you’re not limited to it in any way. No visual clues indicate the size of the area. To
check the area size for yourself, move the crosshair cursor to the upper-right corner of the drawing
area, and observe the value in the coordinate readout in the lower-left corner. The coordinate
readout won’t show exactly 12 inches by 9 inches, or 40 mm by 30 mm for metric, because the
proportions of your drawing area aren’t likely to be exactly 12
×
9 or 40
×
30. AutoCAD does try to
optimize the display for the drawing area when you choose View 
Zoom 
All.
You’re almost ready to do some drawing. Before you begin, turn off the Dynamic Input display.
The Dynamic Input display is a great tool, but while you’re learning how to enter coordinates, it can
be a distraction:
1.
Locate the DYN button in the status bar.
2.
Click the DYN button so it’s in the up, or off, position.



You’ll get a chance to work with Dynamic Input display a bit later in this chapter.
Now you can begin to explore the drawing process. To begin a drawing, follow these steps:
1.
Click the Line tool on the 2D Draw control panel, or type
L
↵
.
You’ve just issued the Line command. AutoCAD responds in two ways. First, you see
the message
Specify first point:
in the Command prompt, asking you to select a point to begin your line. Also, the cursor
changes its appearance; it no longer has a square in the crosshairs. This is a clue telling you
to pick a point to start a line.
TIP
Throughout this book, you’ll be given the option to use the keyboard shortcuts for commands.
For example, in step 1, you were given the option to type
L
↵
in the Command window
to start the Line command.
2.
Using the left mouse button, select a point on the screen near the center. After you select the
point, AutoCAD changes the prompt to
Specify next point or [Undo]:
Now, as you move the mouse around, notice the line with one end fixed on the point you just
selected and the other end following the cursor (see the first image in Figure 2.2). This action
is called
rubber-banding.
3.
Move the cursor to a location directly to the left or right of the point you clicked, and you’ll
see a dotted horizontal line appear, along with a message at the cursor. This action also
occurs when you point directly up or down. Your cursor seems to jump to a horizontal or
vertical position.


This feature is called
Polar Tracking.
Like a T-square or triangle, it helps to restrict your line
to an exact horizontal or vertical direction. You can turn Polar Tracking on or off by clicking
the Polar button in the status bar. If you don’t see it, chances are it’s been turned off. You’ll
learn more about Polar Tracking in Chapter 3.
4.
Continue with the Line command: Move the cursor to a point below and to the right of the
first point you selected, and click the left mouse button again. The first rubber-banding line
is now fixed between the two points you selected, and a second rubber-banding line appears
(see the second image in Figure 2.2).
5.
If the line you drew isn’t the exact length you want, you can back up during the Line command
and change it. To do this, type
U
↵
. The line you drew previously rubber-bands as if
you hadn’t selected the second point to fix its length.
TIP
The Undo tool in the Standard Annotation toolbar offers an Undo drop-down list from which
you can select the exact command you want to undo. See the “Getting Out of Trouble” sidebar in
this chapter for more information.



You’ve just drawn, and then undrawn, a line of an arbitrary length. The Line command is still
active. Two onscreen clues tell you that you’re in the middle of a command. If you don’t see the word
Command
in the bottom line of the Command window, a command is still active. Also, the cursor is the
plain crosshair without the box at its intersection.
TIP
From now on, I’ll refer to the crosshair cursor without the small box as the Point Selection
mode of the cursor. If you look ahead to Figure 2.8, you’ll see all the modes of the drawing cursor.