jackamus

British Standards did not create a 'standard' for technical illustrations because it is an 'artistic' concept. It would like trying to apply a set of standards for paintings!

Ads soon as Serif allow nodes and handle to be visible when moving a guide I will change my tune.

You say its "logical" tell me why you think that?

Yes that is exactly how I would expect Expanded Stroke to work as in A but not in B. In your opinion what do you think B is telling you?

Yes that's what I think however I will look to see if the History is still available.

All my technical illustrations were done using ADV1 and I have used the Pressure tool ever since AD was first published without any problems. Regarding the Gaussian blur the illustration was a modified version of the attached image where Gaussian blur was used. I probably did not remove this effect when modifying the original drawing. Drawing a gear 2.afdesign

No. When I want to use it I usually go to Layers>Expand Stroke. Should I report this as a possible bug?

Yes I realise that is what it looks like but there is no reason for me to do that when doing this kind of drawing. There are several places on different illustrations where this has happened. In one case I was able to to change it back to a single stroke. This is something that has never happened before! I cannot repeat how I changed it back again to correct in another place. Do you have any suggestions? Would this show up in its History?

Usually when I comment on this forum I'm either asking a question or bitching about why handles and nodes disappear when moving a guide. However today for a change I'm praising on of AD's features that I feel is very underrated, speaking as a technical illustrator that is! This is the 'Pressure' feature in the Stroke tab. I have attached a file that shows how much more of a 3D effect you get when using this feature especially on ellipses shown in the top illustration. The lower illustration is the kind of drawing you get from an expensive full CAD program. All the lines are the same thickness and it doesn't look very inspiring. Aligning the ellipses with each other using guides and relying on snapping does not work very well as I've said many times in previous posts. Turning snapping on and off all the time in order to get nodes and handles to coincide with a guide is a waste of time. I work with snapping off. It would be a lot easier if the handles and nodes always remained visible when moving a guide whether snapping is used or not. As an aside can anyone work out how I decide when to use thick and thin lines? There are no prizes except a pat-on-the-back for the anyone who can figure it out. Use of pressure.afdesign

In the attached file I have had to reproduce 'B' in its original form 'A' when drawn in AD V1. Can any one explain how it changed from being a stroke to a filled shape and how I can change it back from B to A again? Stroke thicknes.afdesign

Well said. However I do understand how a thread can get very frayed at the ends. Although I was satisfied with the video there were others who had an opinion and that's OK If starting this thread has helped others then the forum is doing its job. Many thanks to all who contributed.

Brilliant! Thank you very much - a video is worth a 1000 words and explains it much simpler. Now that I know this I withdraw my suggestion to the developers to create a Tone inserting tab as, in my case, it is not necessary now. Regarding the rearranging the shapes into new layers that's because I am sloppy when doing technical drawings and just draw as if I was still working on a drawing board! At my age old habits die hard!

I did exactly as you describe above but when I used ctrl/cmd+j I just get a bleep as though I was doing something illegal. Can you do a video for me please?

I can't get your instruction to work! I drew a line at 45º now what do you mean 'drag as far as you like'? Are you talking about it's length or the distance of the area to be covered?

This sounds a bit complicated! I think my original posting has been over-reacted to! I have attached a file showing a cross section of a box with crudely drawn hatching. I'm looking for a very simple way to do this as an extra feature in AD. AD2.afdesign

Yes I agree that a vector based feature would be better than a bitmap.

I don't use AP much and I wouldn't want to swap between AD for drawing and AP for applying tones.

That's correct but I deliberately didn't use 'Halftone' as I thought users might not know what I meant.

That's exactly what I was referring to. It would be great if AD could offer a vector feature like those.

I'm not sure how I would use bitmap tones in a vector drawing. I imagined the tones to be vectors.

Childhood! LOL that dates me! My suggestion is that it would be a useful feature to add to AD if there was a way to add these kind of tones to shapes. In my case I am referring to technical drawings where hatching and cross-hatching or dots can be added to fill a shape rather than a continuous tone as is currently available. I imagine another 'Tone filling Tab' where you gave control of the size of the lines, thickness, angle and frequency. The same would apply to dots except there would also be a variable 'Pitch' distance between the dots. Can you understand what I am explaining or do you want to see an example?

This question is directed at the moderators. Do any of the moderators and developers remember 'Zipatone' or 'Benday' Before these complimented 'Leteraset' They were A4 size sheets of very thin film that had all manner of line and dot tones that could be applied to illustrations. If there are then please respond and I'll explain why.

Just done it!.

Hi Walt, I am using 2.3 and I found the background change box. Thanks.

I have created an asset which are dimensions lines for applying to engineering drawings (because AD haven't yet added them as a useful feature) and the lines are black. It is impossible to see them against the dark grey background. Is there a UI feature to change the background colour of studio tabs?