Civl 3D 2012 - Help is on the way!

Continuing with my updates on New Features in Civil 3d 2012 I wanted to introduce you all to a new resource that has been added to the software.

The new "Help" tab.

This is a great addition to the software for everyone from the "new user" down to the "old pro". It's your one stop shop for all things civil. In here you will find things like "What's New" video's, "Learning path" where you can pick up new tricks. "Developer Resources" where you can learn how to customize your software. "User Groups which will take you to AUGI (Autodesk User Group International). And my favorite, "Task Workflows" where you can not only learn how to use the tools but you will learn Best Practises, Drawing Structure, in what order to do things. Not to mention direct access to "Disscusion groups", "Customer Involvement" and "Product feedback".

I know it will be hard to abandon that long list of favorites in you Internet explorer that you dig through everytime you need an answer but I think you'll manage.

Civil 3d 2012 in Style

Anyone who has used Civil 3d for any length of time knows that it is heavily Style driven. You should also know that it is vital to have a template containing all of your Styles to make your workflow easier. However, sometimes we still have a need to share styles, either with each other or from drawing to drawing. Prior to the 2012 release of Civil 3D, this was not an easy process.

Traditionally, we could drag-n-drop one style at a time or we could insert one drawing into another to gain access to its styles. Or if you are a hardcore user you may have known that in Civil 3D 2011 there was a system variable you could type called
AECCIMPORTSTYLES
and its brother
AECCIMPORTSTYLESANDSETTINGS,
but these were not very user friendly. They were command line driven and you would have to know the exact name and path of the file you were trying to steal from. Civil 3d 2012 has resolved this issue. On the MANAGE tab of your ribbon we now have a couple of new buttons: "Import Styles" and "Purge Styles" (yes, I said Purge styles).

This new dialog driven feature is very user friendly and make sharing Styles quick and easy. You can select one or several Styles, entire categories of Styles, or the entire drawing and quickly drop them right into you current file. It will even allow you (or prompt you) with an option to overwrite existing Styles if you happen to have Styles with duplicate names.

With the Purge Styles option you can quickly view a list of unused Styles within you current drawing and then select the items to purge and then easily remove them from your files. yes, working with Styles just got a lot easier.

Civil 3d 2012 will be released into the wild shortly so everyone hold on tight, we have a lot of other new tools and enhancements we will be showcasing for you so check back soon.

Are you ready for 2012

Can you believe that the 2012 products are just around the corner? And even thou we are still on a "hush hush" from Autodesk regarding the specifics of the new features or even the exact release date (even thou I'm staring right at it) I can tell you that they have done a great job incorporating many of the top requests you've all been asking for. Yes there are some great new features coming our way and if you're one of those who likes to upgrade every other release and are still in 2010 you really should start building a rollout plan now.

Also if you've never been to or its been a while since you've gone through formal training you definitely should include that in your planning. As I tell everyone, Civil 3d is a great program and anyone can click buttons and make stuff appear on the screen but you won't have well built, stable files nor will you be able to take full advantage of the software without someone showing you the proper workflow. Civil 3d is NOT a program you can or should teach yourself on your lunch hour, well maybe you could but it will take a long time to ramp up to where you need to be and you won't learn the best practice workflows of the software. I'm not trying to preach or sell you anything. I just know from experience Civil 3d can be a beast but with proper guidance it will be the greatest civil design program you will ever use.

Stay tuned. As soon as Autodesk releases the discussion ban from me I will be showcasing new feature tips and demos here so check back soon, check back often.

Enjoy my latest tip provided below.

Rotating North

Personally, I enjoy Civil 3d's "north is always up" environment but I have received the question from some of you old-schoolers that REALLY want to rotate the environment so that north is something other than up. If you're of the same mind then this one is for you.

To rotate your north direction:
First make sure you have assigned a coordinate system to your drawing (do this ALWAYS). You can do this by  activating the SETTINGS tab on your Toolspace, right-click on your drawing name and select "Edit Drawing Settings" (I think the rest is pretty self-explanatory).

After you've completed this and have returned to your drawing workspace.
type NORTH and press Enter.

A dialog box indicating that a geographic location already exists in the drawing.

Select "Edit the geographic location".

The next dialog box that will appear will have many options including the one to change the North direct by either typing in an angle or selecting it within the drawing. When you are finished and return to your workspace you will then see that your view cube now points north to the angle you have specified. Make sure you set your UCS and create some of your favorite named views to make it easy to navigate.

Blog Update

Just a quick note about my site. I have been hearing that some people are finding it difficult to leave comments or to register in order to comment so you'll all be happy to know I've opened it up to everyone so feel free to provide feedback. Also, I was asked to provide an email link so that new questions could be suggested for future post so you will now see that link to the right. Hope to hear from you all soon! :)

Creating a basin from User-Defined Contours

Creating a basin from User-defined Contours can be fast and easy in Civil 3D. Here are the steps you need to take in order to achieve this:
The first thing you should do is to determine the location for your basin and decide what the pond edge elevation is going to be. In this exercise I will use the surface shown below and my edge elevation will be 184.35.

Next we need to create the User-Defined Contour for the Basin Edge.
To do this: Click on your surface and then select "Surface Properties". In the Surface Properties dialog box select the "Analysis" tab. On the "Analysis Type" Properties pull down select "User-Defined Contours". In the Number of Ranges type "1" and then select the Add arrow. After the contour has been added to your Range Details click on the "Elevation" and set it to your edge value.

*Note: Make sure your surface style has the User Contours" turned ON in the Display tab.

Next select your surface and select "Extract objects" from the Surface Tools panel. In the "Extract Objects from Surface" box, deselect all items except "User Contours" and select OK. After doing this you will have an elevated polyline of your pond edge. Select the polyline and then (on the Home tab) select "Feature line" and then select "Create feature line from Object. In the Create feature Lines box select your site and style and/or press OK. You now have a feature line you can use to create your pond. Now use your grading tools to grade inward to create the pond condition to meet your needs.

**Note: Don't forget to Create the infill to create to bottom of your basin.

***One last Note: If your unsure of your basin bottom elevation but know your capacity. Select your surface and expand the Analyse panel. You will find the "Stage Storage" tool. This tool has many options to help you calculate your basin. I hope you enjoy this. Check back again soon.

Pipe Crossings in Profile

Several people have been asking lately why pipe crossings look so bad in Civil 3D within profiles. Whenever they project a crossing pipe onto a profile it looks something like this:

Well there is a solution and NO you don't have to just "live with it". The answer is the create a ""Crossing Pipe Style". So here's how it works. Create a new (or copy an existing) Pipe style to be used just for your pipe crossings. In your style editor on the Pipes tab select "Draw to outer walls". You may also want to select "Hatch Walls". On the Display tab switch the "View Direction" to "Profile". In the Componenet Display section turn off all the "Visable" lightbulbs except "Crossing Pipe Inside Wall", Crossing Pipe Outside Wall", & "Crossing Pipe Hatch".

After you've completed this make sure that you set this to be the current style on all your crossing utilities. It will then look like this:

I hope this helps. Check back soon for more tips and updates.