350 Part III: If Drawings Could Talk

Figure 16-6: Settings for plotting a paper space layout.

9.Click the Preview button, ensure that the drawing displays on the paper at the correct orientation and size, right-click, and choose Exit from the menu that appears to return to the Plot dialog box.

If you found any problems in the preview, change your plot settings and preview again until it looks right.

10.Click OK to create the plot.

Plotting Lineweights and Colors

In previous sections of this chapter, we help you gain some plotting confidence. Those sections show you how to create scaled, monochrome plots with uniform lineweights in model space or paper space. Those skills may be all you need, but if you care about controlling plotted lineweights and colors or adding special effects such as screening (plotting shades of gray), read on.

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Chapter 16: The Plot Thickens 351

Plotting with style

Plot styles provide a way to override object properties with alternative plot properties. (See Chapter 6 for information about object properties.) The properties include plotted lineweight, plotted color, and screening. Figure 16-7 shows the full range of options. Plot styles come in two exciting flavors:

Color-dependent plot styles

Named plot styles

Color-dependent plot styles are based on the standard way of plotting in earlier versions of AutoCAD (before AutoCAD 2000), whereas named plot styles provide a newer (but not necessarily better) way.

Figure 16-7: Editing a color-dependent plot style table.

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352 Part III: If Drawings Could Talk

It’s remotely possible that you won’t need to bother with plot styles. If the drawings you want to plot have layer and object properties (especially lineweights) that reflect how you want objects to plot, you can dispense with plot styles. But most people and most drawings use plot styles, so you should at least be familiar with them.

A couple of common reasons for using plot styles are to

Map screen colors to plotted lineweights. If this idea seems completely loony to you, try to suspend judgment until you read the “Plotting through thick and thin” section, a bit later in this chapter.

Create screened lines on monochrome plots. Lines that are screened display in various shades of gray, not black. Drafters sometimes use screened lines to de-emphasize secondary objects that otherwise would overwhelm the main objects in the drawing. Screening is expressed as a percentage, with 100 percent being completely black and 0 percent being invisible. For example, on a subdivision layout, you might want to de-emphasize all the property and house outlines except one.

Using plot styles

If you want objects in your drawing to plot with properties that differ from their display properties, you need plot styles. For example, you can plot with different lineweights or colors from the ones you’re using for display purposes. Or, as we mention in the preceding section, you may need to map display colors to plotted lineweights. AutoCAD groups plot styles into plot style tables, each of which is stored in a separate file.

Color-based plot styles live in color-dependent plot style table (CTB) files, and they map the 255 AutoCAD display colors to 255 plot styles. AutoCAD automatically attaches the color-dependent plot styles to every object, based on (you guessed it)the object’s color. (Are those AutoCAD programmers brilliant, or what?) Color-dependent plot style tables mimic the old color-

mapped-to-lineweight plotting approach of AutoCAD R14 and earlier releases; this remains the most common method in most companies.

Named plot styles were introduced in AutoCAD 2000, and are object properties, just like color, linetype, and lineweight. Named plot styles live in (wouldn’t you know it?) named plot style table (STB) files. After you create a named plot style table, you create one or more plot styles and give them any names you like. Then you can assign the named plot styles to layers or to individual objects. (See Chapter 6 for more information about object and layer properties.)

To use the plot styles in a plot style table (whether they’re color-dependent or named), you must attach the plot style table to model space or a paper

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Chapter 16: The Plot Thickens 353

space layout. The attached plot style table affects plotting only for that layout or for model space. This approach lets you plot the same drawing in different ways by attaching different plot styles to different tabs.

You can attach a plot style to model space or a paper space layout by selecting its image in the Quick View Layouts panel and opening the Plot dialog box; or, by right-clicking an image, choosing Page Setup Manager, and then clicking the Modify button. Choose the plot style table name from the Plot Style Table (Pen Assignments) area of the expanded Page Setup or Plot dialog box. See the section “Controlling plotted lineweights with screen colors,” later in this chapter, for an example.

When you start a new drawing in the usual way — that is, by using a template drawing (see Chapter 4) — the template drawing’s plot style behavior determines whether you can choose CTB or STB files. If you want to change from color-dependent plot styles to named plot styles (or vice versa) in a particular drawing, use the CONVERTPSTYLES command.

Creating plot styles

If you’re lucky, someone will provide you with the plot files you need. If that’s the case, you must put the CTB or STB files in your Plot Styles folder for AutoCAD to recognize them. (To find the location of your Plot Styles folder, open the Options dialog box, choose the Files tab, and look for the Printer Support File Path Plot Style Table Search Path setting.)

If you’re not lucky, you’ll need to be smart — that is, you’ll want to know how to create your own plot style table files. (Personally, we’d rather be lucky than smart; hey, it’s worked so far in life!) Here’s how to create plot style table files:

1.Click the Application button to open the Application Menu, choose Print, and then choose Manage Plot Styles.

Use the tiny down arrow at the bottom of the list to scroll farther down if necessary. The Plot Styles folder opens in a separate Windows Explorer window.

2.Double-click the Add-a-Plot Style Table Wizard program shortcut.

3.Read the opening screen and then click Next.

4.On the Add Plot Style Table – Begin page, choose the Start from Scratch option or one of the other three options if you want to start with settings from another file. Then click Next.

The remaining steps in this procedure assume that you chose Start from Scratch. If you chose another option, simply follow the wizard’s prompts.

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354 Part III: If Drawings Could Talk

If the creator of a drawing provides you with an AutoCAD R14/AutoCAD LT 98 PC2 (version 2) or AutoCAD R12/AutoCAD LT 95 PCP (version 1) file, choose the Use a PCP or PC2 File option. With this option, the wizard imports color-to-plotted-lineweight settings automatically.

5.On the Add Plot Style Table – Pick Plot Style Table page, choose whether you want to create a color-dependent plot style table (CTB file) or a named plot style table (STB file). Then click Next.

Choose Color-Dependent Plot Style Table to map screen colors to plotted lineweights. Choose Named Plot Style Table to create named plot styles that you can apply to layers or objects.

6.On the Add Plot Style Table – File Name page, type a name for the new CTB or STB file and then click Next.

7.Click the Plot Style Table Editor button on the Add Plot Style Table – Finish page.

The Plot Style Table Editor dialog box opens to the Form View tab if you’re creating a color-dependent plot style table (refer to Figure 16-7), or to the Table View tab if you create a named plot style table.

If you choose a named plot style in Step 5, the Plot Style Table Editor dialog box opens in Table view, with one plot style named Normal in the first data column, a blank column to its right, and Add Style and Delete Style buttons at the bottom. New named plot styles that you create continue to be added in columns to the right of the previous column. For more information, click the Help button in the Plot Style Table Editor.

8.If you created a color-dependent plot style table, assign Lineweight, Screening, or other plot properties to each color that’s used in the drawing. If you created a named plot style table, click the Add Style button and then assign plot properties to each of the named styles that you create.

To determine which colors are used in a drawing, switch to the AutoCAD window and open the Layer Properties Manager palette by clicking the Layer Properties button located on the Layers panel of the Ribbon’s Home tab.

To change a setting for all colors or named styles, select them all first by clicking the first color or named style, holding down the Shift key, scrolling to the end of the list, and then clicking the last color or named style. Any subsequent changes you make get applied to all the selected colors or named styles.

9.Click the Save & Close button to close the Plot Style Table Editor dialog box. Then click Finish to complete the steps for the wizard.

The Plot Styles folder now displays your new CTB or STB file.

10.Close the Plot Styles folder by clicking the X in its title bar.

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