Basic drawing functionality in Civil 3D

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To carry out basic drawing functions in Autodesk Civil 3D,

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it is important to know how to access and use a few of the common features.

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From the Home or View tab, in the Palettes panel, click Toolspace.

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The Toolspace window is an integral component for accessing commands, styles, and data.

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Use it to access the Prospector, Settings, Survey, and Toolbox tabs.

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Click to display the Prospector tab.

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From this tab, you can manage project and drawing objects.

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In the Prospector tree, right-click on a civil object, such as an alignment or pipe.

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Select Zoom To from the options to zoom to the object location in the model.

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Since Civil 3D is built on AutoCAD, the same navigation commands—such as pan, zoom, and orbit—apply

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and can be used in the same manner.

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The Navigation Bar can also be turned on from the View tab, in the Viewport Tools panel.

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Object selection can be achieved by clicking on objects, or by drawing a window or box to highlight objects.

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A window selects everything that completely falls within the window, whereas a box selects anything it touches.

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Window selection works from left to right.

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Draw a window at the top left corner of the surface.

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Note that nothing is selected, as the object is not completely within the window extent.

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Box selection works from right to left.

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Draw a box at the top right corner of the surface.

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The surface is selected, despite not being completely within the box extent.

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Holding the left mouse button while moving the cursor creates a lasso effect.

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The lasso can be applied from left to right, or from right to left, to achieve the same effect of a window or box selection.

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Object snaps are used to select points that may be difficult to pick, such as the end point of a line, midpoints, or intersections.

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To specify an object snap at a prompt for a point, do one of the following:

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Press and hold SHIFT as you right-click to display the Object Snap shortcut menu.

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While drawing, right-click and from the Snap Overrides submenu, choose an object snap.

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On the Object Snap toolbar, click an object snap option.

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Object snaps can be toggled on or off by pressing F3 on your keyboard,

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or by clicking the Object Snap button on the status bar of the application window.

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If several running object snaps are turned on, more than one object snap may be eligible at a given location.

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Press TAB to cycle through the possibilities before you specify the point.

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Other basic drawing commands can be accessed from the ribbon, on the Home tab,

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in the Draw, Modify, Layers, and Clipboard panels.

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AutoCAD keyboard shortcuts also work with these commands.