Hello, welcome to this video! Let's see in a very short time all the
basics to start working with Autodesk AutoCAD 2021!
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AutoCAD is one of the most used and complete CAD products on the market,
suitable for both academic and business environment. It is available in
several versions, each including dedicated features and tools for either
architectural, mechanical or engineering projects. In this video we will
cover only the main version, seeing all the basic tools you can use to
realize simple 2D projects from scratch.
AutoCAD also includes advanced tools to build houses and buildings: check
our dedicated tutorial to discover the features for 3D projects.
When opening AutoCAD the main Start page shows up. At the bottom you can
click on Learn to get suggestions and official tutorials from Autodesk and
switch to Create to find everything to start working with AutoCAD. You can
use Open Files... to open any existing project or use Start Drawing to
create a new AutoCAD project completely blank. This gets open on the wide
preview on the center and listed on a dedicated tab on top, from which
you can also come back to the Start page at any time. Around the preview you
also get the Ribbon bar on top, with all the tools and features inside
AutoCAD; visualization tools on the right and the Command Line at the
bottom. You can also customize this workspace with the Minimize button on
top or the View tab to show and hide the panels you need.
By default any new project starts in a 2D environment, taking the cartesian
system (or gizmo) in the bottom left corner as reference, with the red X
axis representing the horizontal direction and the green Y axis the
vertical direction. So let's see how to draw 2D objects, using either the
mouse cursor or the keyboard.
All the 2D drawing tools are collected inside the Home tab, under the Draw
section. Some of these shapes can be made in different ways, just hover
over any tool to get help at the drawing steps. In this video we will just
see the default drawing process.
Use Line or Polyline to draw straight and consecutive segments by fixing
points on the preview. You can finish drawing with the Escape key.
Remember that the current drawing tool gets disabled every time you finish
creating the object. You can always use the Enter key to enable the tool
again and continue drawing.
Use Arc to drop an arc by fixing three points and use Circle and Rectangle
to drop a regular circle or rectangle by defining two points.
With Polygon you can draw regular polygons by typing the number of sides,
applying with the Enter key and then fixing center and second point. Use
Ellipse to drop an ellipse with three points.
AutoCAD has several drawing aids to help you with the creation of your
objects, all collected in the bottom right corner. Use GRIDMODE to hide or
show the basic grid; SNAPMODE to enable snappings to such grid and
ORTHOMODE to bind the cursor to the horizontal or vertical direction.
With Objects Snap you can get snappings to the main objects keypoints shown
in green color like endpoints, centers and midpoints. Moreover if you hover
over these, AutoCAD saves and uses them to generate dashed guidelines along
segment lines, perpendicular and parallel directions, useful to extract
intersections and tangents. You can manage the snappings to take into
account next to the Object Snap button.
While drawing any object, AutoCAD shows a live preview of it, with
measurements on length and angles. Angles are measured in degrees in
respect to the X axis; whereas length is always unitless, taking the
default measurement unit specified for the whole project. To manage the
units, just type UNITS on the Command Line and apply with the Enter key,
setting the format, decimal precision and unit to use from the dialog box.
To undo any drawing in progress, just use the Escape key.
The keyboard can play an important role while realizing drawings. From
the Command Line you can launch any tool by typing its name. For example
if you type POLYLINE and apply with the Enter key you enable the Polyline
tool directly.
In addition, if you have any drawing in progress you can type the exact
length and angle to use directly from your keyboard, using the Tab key to
switch parameter and update the drawing preview. Then use the Enter key to
apply and proceed with the next step.
You can also use the Up and Down arrow keys to browse through the list
of options available for the current drawing step. For example you can
choose Arc to turn the current segment into a curve and Line to come back
to a straight side. This same list of options is also available from the
Command Line. Just type the highlighted blue letters corresponding to the
interested function and apply with the Enter key to enable it.
The visualization tools on the right allow to change and control the
preview on your project. For example you can enable the Pan tool to move
through your project by clicking and dragging on it, using the Escape key
to finish; or the 3D View Cube to rotate, clicking and dragging its
circumference or using its top arrows to rotate by 90 degrees. Use your
mouse wheel to zoom in and out around your cursor.
Now let's see how to edit 2D drawings. When no drawing tool is ON, the
cursor is in the selection mode, showing a small square on its center. This
way you can click on any object to select it. This gets highlighted in blue
color with several nodes that you can hover over to get quick measurements
on the object and several options you can use to edit it.
On regular objects like Lines, Arcs, Circles and Ellipses you can click
and drag from the central node to move and drag from the others on the
sides to reshape the object. You can also use Stretch to move any endpoint;
Lengthen to resize any line or arc length and Radius to adjust any curve
radius.
On other objects like Polylines, Rectangles and Polygons you get big and
small nodes. You can use the big ones to move, add or remove vertices and
the smaller ones to manage the sides, using Stretch to move the single
side; Add Vertex to add a new vertex and Convert to Arc or Line to
transform the straight side into a curved one and viceversa.
With the object selected you can use CTRL (or CMD) and X, C and V to cut,
copy and paste it. Use the Delete key to remove the object and CTRL (or
CMD) and Z to undo any of your latest actions in order.
AutoCAD also includes advanced 2D editing tools inside the Modify section,
under the Home tab. Just select any object on the preview and then enable
the interested tool. With the Move tool you can move the object; with the
Rotate tool you can rotate it, fixing rotation point and its angle; with
the Scale tool you can scale the object without deforming it shape.
You can also make multiple selections to move or edit several objects in
the same manner. To select multiple objects just click on each object or
use the Lasso selections. If you click and hold on while dragging from the
left to the right, you create a Window Lasso, selecting all the objects
fully contained within the blue area. If you do the same from the right to
the left you use a Crossing Lasso, which includes all objects touched by
the green area. To deselect all, just use the Escape key.
To save your AutoCAD project, click on the A icon in the top left corner
and go to Save As. This gets saved as a .dwg file that you can open later
at any time, saving all your work in progress.
Whereas to export your work, open the Output tab and use Plot to send all
to any printer or Export to export your drawing in .dwf/.dwfx format (a
read-only project file) or in .pdf.
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