Book Image

Autodesk AutoCAD 2013 Practical 3D Drafting and Design

By : JOAO ANTONIO C DOS SANTOS
Book Image

Autodesk AutoCAD 2013 Practical 3D Drafting and Design

By: JOAO ANTONIO C DOS SANTOS

Overview of this book

AutoCAD is a computer-aided design (CAD) and drafting software application. AutoCAD supports both 2D and 3D formats. AutoCAD is used in a range of industries and is utilized by architects, project managers, and engineers, among others."Autodesk AutoCAD 2013 Practical 3D Drafting and Design" will take you beyond the 2D frontier and help you create accurate 3D models that simulate reality. This book is crammed full of creative and practical tutorials which will help you master the third dimension. From exercises on coordinate systems to creating solids and surfaces from 2D, you will wonder how you ever designed without this resource by your side."Autodesk AutoCAD 2013 Practical 3D Drafting and Design" is full of hands-on studies and projects that will help develop your 3D skills. Starting from the assumption of only a very basic knowledge of AutoCAD, this book will help you master 3D visualization and coordinate systems, create 3D models from 2D drawings, and from basic shapes, measure volumes, and other information, obtain 2D construction drawings from 3D models as well as how to apply lights and materials to get photorealistic images.
Table of Contents (20 chapters)
Autodesk AutoCAD 2013 Practical 3D Drafting and Design
Credits
About the Author
About the Reviewers
www.PacktPub.com
Preface
Index

Materials and textures


Corrected materials and respective textures are essential for good renders. AutoCAD provides several commands for selecting, creating, and applying materials.

Autodesk Material Library

Starting with Version 2011, when installing AutoCAD, the Autodesk Material Library is also installed. This material library is shared with other Autodesk software, as 3ds Max or Revit, and can not be modified, but allows their materials to be loaded into the current drawing, which are changed and then saved in a user library.

The Autodesk Material Library containing more than 1,000 textures is defined in a folder similar to C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\Autodesk Shared\Materials\ (depending on the Windows version and language).

Under this folder, textures (images or photos) are available in three groups:

  • \assetlibrary_base.fbm\Textures\1\Mats: More than 1,000 images with 256 x 256 resolution

  • \assetlibrary_base.fbm\Textures\2\Mats: More than 1,000 images (Versions 2011/2012) and almost...