Civil 3D Template Tips & Shortcuts - Pt. 2 Style Creation

hi I'm Jeff bartels infrastructure technical specialist at Autodesk and today we're going to be completing our series called civil 3d template tips tricks and shortcuts throughout the session we've been looking at several time-saving shortcuts that are applicable to civil 3d template creation and styles these shortcuts have been organized into two major categories template settings and style creation throughout the presentation I've been using a rapid-fire approach so we get through as many concepts as possible this recording represents the style creation tips and shortcuts and it's part two of the overall session I have just launched civil3d 2016 and I'd like to start by opening a drawing I'm going to come up to the quick access toolbar and I'll launch the open command and I'll select this drawing called points this drawing was created using the default civil3d template so all of these are stock styles let me zoom in on some of these points the shortcuts that we're going to look at here are applicable to point objects let's start by pulling some of these point labels out in two leaders I'll select the point I'll click this grip and I'll pull out the label I will then do that for a couple more points it's not press escape when finished notice that when you pull out a leader the leader does not point back to the node or the insertion point of the point object in fact if I select the leader and drag this around the outside you can see that leader follows an imaginary rectangle around that symbol maybe you would like the leader to point back to that node location we can do that at first you may think that that properties associated with the label it's not it's associated with the point object let's find out what point style is being used I'm going to hover over this point I can see it's using the basic style to edit that style I'm going to go to the Settings tab and then I'll open the point category I love in point Styles basic is right here we can see it's in use to edit the style I'll right-click and I'll choose at it in the point style editor I will go down to the summary tab and then I'll click this button in the lower right corner to expand all of the categories right here leader stops at marker let me open that and I'll change it to no I will then come down and click OK and you can see the difference on screen now this is nice but what if you'd like to make this change on a one-off basis you only want to do it to one or two points well we don't have to create a specific style we can do this on a point by point basis I'm going to come up and open the undo menu let's back up a few steps I'll do a quick regen to put things back the way they were if you'd like to adjust the leader for individual point objects select the point and then come over to the properties palette let me drag this down to the bottom down here you'll find a setting called leader attachment option I'll change this to point and I'll press escape when finished let's start a new drawing I'll do that by going to the application menu and I'll choose new we'll create a new drawing from the default civil3d template I'll click open and then I'm going to create some geometry on-screen I'll come up and launch the polyline command I'll start my polyline and then we'll create a line segments 125 feet long I'll just type 125 and press Enter I'll press escape let's pan this down and then I'm going to launch the copy command and we'll create some copies of this object the shortcuts that we look at here are going to be associated with linear labels but the concept can work with virtually any label let's take a look at child label styles I'm going to start by labeling this line I'll do that by going to the annotate tab I'll come down and click this price tag to bring up the add labels dialog box under feature I'll choose line and curve label type single segment line label style notice what we have here we've got a lot of different label styles bearing only distance only bearing over distance I'm going to choose bearing over distance in this case and I'll click add I will then select the line to label it I'll press escape when finished let's zoom in before to create additional styles let's make some edits to this one one way I can edit the style is by going to the settings tab I can also edit it right here through this dialog box let me click the edit button I will then jump down to the Layout tab this is where the label is built if I open the component menu we can see this label is created from a couple of different components I'm going to choose the bearing component that's the one I want to edit I will then come down to the contents field and click I'll select the ellipsis button I will select the programming code that represents that label and then I'll come over here and adjust its properties I don't like the spaced option let me click in this field and I'll open the menu and I'm going to choose degrees minutes seconds without the spaces I will then set the precision of this label to the even second and then I'll come down under direction we'll change this to short name spaced this will put a space between the letters and the bearing when finished I'll click the arrow to overwrite the original code then I'll click OK we can see the difference here on screen before we jump out let's edit this distance label as well I'd like to drop this down to two decimal spaces I'll do that by selecting the component under contents I'll click the ellipsis button I'll select the code will change its precision to two decimal spaces will overwrite the original I'll click OK and I'll click OK so this bearing over distance represents the base point for one of my labels now I'd like to create a variation called bearing only well this label style includes the bearing let's create a variation or a child of this style I'm gonna start by closing this dialog box let's go to the Settings tab and we'll find this style since it's a line style we'll find that in the general category let me open label Styles lime there's bearing over distance right there I'm going to right click on this style and I'll choose new as you can see I'm creating a child of this style or a variation I'm going to call this one bearing only and let me come down and click OK notice now the bearing over distance style contains a plus let me click that to expand it and we can see the child style right here let's edit the style because right now the child is the same as the parent dad if the style I'll right-click on it and I'll choose at it I will then go to the Layout tab since the style represents bearing only I'm going to choose the distance component and then I'll change its visibility property to false I will then click OK let's create a child style that labels distance only once again I'll select the parent I'll right-click and I'll choose new this child style will be called distance only I'll go to the Layout tab when I'm using the distance only style I do not need to see the bearing component so I'll set that to false and I'll click OK so now I have one style doing the work three let's label these next two lines with the new child styles I'll go back to the annotate tab I'll click the price tag I want a label line and curve I'll label bearing only I'll click Add and I'll select this line I will then change the style to distance only I'll click Add and I'll select this line when I'm finished I'll press escape to get out of the command let's look at one more thing the child styles can have children let's close this dialog box maybe I'd like to create a variation on distance only I'll right-click on it and I'll choose new I'll call this one recorded vs. measured we'll go to the Layout tab and in this variation I'm going to go to the distance component I'll click in the contents field then I'll click the ellipsis button for this component I want more than just the label I'm gonna click in front of it and we'll add some text I'll type re-see colon and then a placeholder xxx Point xx a couple spaces and then I'll type measured colon space I'll click OK and then I'll click OK and we can see the distance only now has its own child let's label this last line using the new child style add labels line curve we'll use recorded versus measured I'll click Add and then I'll click this line I'll press escape when finished at this point you may be wondering why create the child styles I could get away with this just as easily by creating a bunch of separate styles yes we could the place where the child styles come in handy is if your label Styles need to change for instance after creating these maybe I realized they all have the wrong text height had I made these as separate styles I'd have to edit all four of them separately in this case all I have to do is edit the parent and those properties will pass down to the children for example I'm going to select the parent style and I'll click Edit then we'll change the text height for the bearing component to be point 1 I'll press ENTER I will then change the text height for the distance component to be 0.1 I'll press ok and ok and you can see that property's applied to all of the styles let's make one more change I'll click Edit on the parent well go to the general tab and maybe I realize they placed these on the wrong layer I'll click the ellipsis button I'll choose one of these other layers and I'll click OK ok and you can see the change on-screen once again we looked at this parent-child relationship with line labels but it works with virtually any civil3d label I'm going to close this dialog box let's zoom out and I'd like to create an alignment I'll go to the Home tab and let's create a polyline first I'll launch the polyline command I'll pick a couple points maybe we'll right-click and we'll put some arcs in here to turn this into an alignment create alignment from objects and I'll select this one I'll press ENTER a couple of times we'll call this Main Street I'm gonna go with the proposed style and then we'll take the default label style I'll click OK let me zoom in on the end of the line these shortcuts that we look at here are going to be associated with alignments but same thing these concepts will work with virtually any civil 3d style take a look at this major station label at the end 6 + 81 that's actually not correct we can see the end of the alignment stationing right here 6 + 80 points 7 8 this label is actually rounding to the even foot so what can we do if I select this label we can see that civil3d selects all of the major station labels it's like I'm selecting a group let me zoom back in I'll press escape if you want to make changes to a component in a group hold your ctrl key and select the object that will select that object only let me zoom in at this point I could make changes to it I could press the Delete key and take it out if I want to and only that label goes away let me click undo I'll hold my control key and I'll select this label from here I could go to the properties palette and I could change the style on this label only I'll press escape when finished I'm going to hold the ctrl key and I'll select it again we can also use these properties up here in the ribbon I'll choose flip label to flip it to the other side let's also choose edit label text this shows me the programming code for this label only I'll select it and I'm going to change the precision for this label to two decimal spaces I will then click the arrow to overwrite the original and I'll click OK when I'm finished I'll press escape to deselect so I don't have to create a special major station label to two decimal spaces if I want to do a one-off edit I can select that individual label and use the Edit label text option now let's take the labels off of this alignment I'll select the alignments I'll go to add labels and I'll choose add edit station labels I'll choose import label sets and we'll import the no label set and I'll click OK let's put the labels back on I'll go to add labels edit station labels import label sets and we'll import the same label set we were using before I'll click OK and then I'll press escape so we're right back where we started let's look at an even better way to correct this precision issue for this last station label I'd like to edit this station label style I'm going to do that over here on the Settings tab let's find it I'll close the general category I'll open up alignment I'll go to label Styles station major station parallel with tick that's the one that's being used I'm going to right click and edit this I will then go to the Layout tab notice that all of these label styles are built the exact same way we'll go to the contents field I'll click the ellipsis button I will then select the programming code and let's change the precision for all of these labels to be 2 decimal spaces I will then pull the slider down and I'll say you know what let's drop the decimal 4 whole numbers I'll set that to yes I'll click the arrow to overwrite the original code I will then click OK and then if I click and zoom in on the preview here we can see how that applies to decimals to the last station only I'll click OK and that also updates the drawing let's look at one more concept I'm going to zoom out let's create another alignment I'll click the alignment button I'll choose alignment creation tools will call this alignment second Street I'll press ENTER I will then click this button and I will draw my alignment when finished I'll close the toolbar let's zoom in let's say I'd like to label the alignment stationing for both alignments at this intersection to do that we'll create a new style I'm going to go over to the Settings tab we are still inside the alignment category under label Styles let's go to station offset we can see that there's a couple styles in here currently I'm going to make a brand new one I'll do that by right-clicking on the category name and I'll choose new I'll call this style station intersection label I will then go to the Layout tab as you can see the default contains a single component I'm going to click the red X we'll take it out we'll build this label style completely from scratch let's create a new text component I'm going to call this primary station label we'll come down to contents right now it just says label text let me click the ellipsis button I will select that generic label and then we'll come over to properties and I'll choose what I want let's choose alignment name I'll send that over maybe we'll put a dash after that let's open properties and I'll choose station value to decimal precision is fine let me send that over and I'll click OK if I click in this preview and roll the mouse wheel forward to zoom in we can see that in addition to the primary alignment station label I'd like to label the station of the crossing alignment to do that I'll open the component menu and I'll choose reference text reference text allows you to label a similar object or a completely different object within the same label I would like to label in alignment I'll click OK let's name this component I'll call it secondary alignment label I would like to anchor it to my previous component Anchor Point will make that bottom left and then my attachment will make that top left so I would like the table left of the new label to be aligned to the bottom left of the original label next we'll click in the contents field I'll click the ellipsis button will select this generic text since I used reference text alignment if I open this menu I can see a lot of properties associated with alignments I'm going to choose alignment name we'll send that over we'll put a dash I'll open the menu and I'll choose station value I'll send that over I will then click OK reference text will always show up as question marks in this preview when finished I'll click OK and we'll try it out I'm going to go back to annotate will click the price tag I want to label in alignment I want to use a station offset label style we'll use this one we just created the station intersection label now do we want a marker that'll put a small marker at the intersection in this case I'm gonna say no let me just drag this up and I'll choose none I will then click Add civil3d says select alignment this would be the primary alignment I'll click Main Street this gives me a jig it says what station do you want to label I'm going to label the intersection of these two alignments finally it says select alignment for label style component called secondary alignment label that would be this alignment when I'm finished I'll press escape I can then select this label and we can pull it out into a leader now that I'm finished I will close this dialog box it's important to note that this reference text concept will work with virtually any civil3d label if you found this content helpful please rate it by clicking the thumbs up icon this will help other akn users identify valuable content on behalf of Autodesk this is Jeff Bartles saying thank you for watching

Channel: Jeff Bartels

Views: 35,790

Keywords: Bartels, AutoCAD Civil 3D, Style, Tips, Tutorial, Tricks, shortcut, Template, Label, akn_include

Id: sSjmS8zYwIQ

Length: 16min 51sec (1011 seconds)

Published: Wed Jun 24 2015