AutoCAD Tips & Tutorials

Tutorial: Create a page setup for plotting

Do you change your plot settings a lot? Do you plot drawings in various ways, for example, a draft plot and a final plot? Or do you create various layouts and need to plot them differently?

You can save page setups, which contain settings for plotting. A page setup is attached to a layout, so you can easily switch settings from one layout to another.

Creating a page setup is like specifying plotting settings, so you should know how to use the Plot dialog box first.

1. To create a new page setup, right-click the desired tab (including the Model tab), and choose Page Setup Manager. (If you don't see the layout tabs, you have model and layout buttons on the status bar. Right-click either button and choose Display Layout and Model tabs.)

2. In the Page Setup Manager, click New. Enter a name. If you have existing page setups, you can choose one from the Start With list, to avoid having to create all the settings from scratch. Click OK.

3. In the Printer/Plotter section, choose the desired printer or plotter from the drop-down list. This lets you use different devices for different layouts.
4. In the Paper Size section, choose a paper size. This allows you to use different sheet sizes for different layotus.
5. In the Plot Area section, choose what you want to plot. Your choices depend on whether you're on a Model or Layout tab, and can include: Layout, Display, Limits, Extents, and Window.
6. In the Plot Offset section, you can specify an offset from the lower-left corner. You might do this to place several plots on different parts of one sheet of paper. You can also cneter the plot by checking the Center the Plot check box.
7. In the Plot Scale section, set the scale from the drop-down list, or check the Fit to Paper check box. You can also type a scale int eh text boxes. Most layouts are plotted at 1:1 because you scale the individual viewports. You can also check the Scale Lineweights check box to scale the lineweights along with your drawing.
8. In the Plot Style Table section, choose a plot style table if you want to use one. Plot styles determine how plots look and let you create different looks for different plots.
9. In the Shaded Viewport Options section, you specify how a model plot (not a layout plot) looks. You can choose from visual styles and resolution options. The Shade Plot drop-down list is not available if you're on a Layout tab. You can also choose a quality from the Quality drop-down list.
10. In the Plot Options section, you can choose whether or not you want to plot lineweights and plot styles. You can also choose whether you want to plot paper space objects last. Finally, if you created 3D objects in paper space (who ever does that?), you can hide their back lines.
11. In the Drawing Orientation section, you can plot portrait, landscape (the default), or upside down.
12. Click the Preview button to see if you like the result.
13. Click OK to return to the Page Setup Manager. Select the new page setup, click Set Current, and click Close.

To modify a page setup, open the Page Setup Manager again, choose the page setup, and click Modify.

To use the page setup, start the PLOT command. In the Plot dialog box, choose the page setup from the Name drop-down list in the Page Setup section at the top of the dialog box. Then plot the drawing.

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