Draw in XZ plane - help

[igor.horvat]

Hi,

In xy space this 3D polyline represents a profile cross section of the terrain that I want to manually edit.

So  I've made a custom UCS in the direction of a 3Dpolyline and now I'm in xz space,  now I'm viewing the 3D poly in the way so I can edit vertices but civil 3d want let me draw or drag vertices on Z - axis. I need help.

Thank you in advance

 

[J-Porter]

What are you attempting to accomplish.  If you've got to edit vertices of the polyline why not convert it to a feature line and then edit the z-values in the feature line editor?  If you need it to remain a polyline (well, a 3D polyline), you can then explode the feature line.  

Also, is the polyline in the image a polyline or a 3D polyline.  If it's a regular polyline then you're efforts will be useless.  Every vertex of a polyline is same z-value as the previous vertex.  You can only modify the elevations of a 3D polyline or feature line.  

You don't need to make a custom UCS.  That complicates many other issues.  Why not change to an isometric view and draw there?  Take a look at this:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hz2HCKC0eo0  

Hope this helps, 

JP

[AllenJessup]

If for some reason you don't want to convert it to a  Featureline. You can edit the vertex elevation in the Properties palette. 

BTW. Can you post the drawing with the example you show and what edits you want to make? That will help get the best answer.

[igor.horvat]

My goal is to manipulate 3D poly line points in x,y,z. X and Y coordinate is not a problem and Z value can be bypassed by edit vertices value in properties. I want to assign custom UCS to 3D poly plane (because my 3D poly represents a cross section and it lies all in on plane) and from there I want to position my view perpendicular to my 3D poly ( so I can see it in cross section) and edit like a normal 2D poly drag and add points where I want. The reason I want to do it that way is that I can draw slopes and add/edit points and instantly see the changes on cross section. So that is what I want to achieve and maybe is science fiction! I am relatively new to 3D editing techniques. I'm familiar to feature lines and if a feature line can be edited that  or similar way I will use feature lines, and than explode to 3d poly after editing no problem. If you'd be kind and share with me a tutorial of editing a feature line in the way described above, you'll help me a lot. Thank you in advance from your help J-Porter.

[AllenJessup]

I think I'm catching on now. I believe you're saying you have a 3D Polyline that looks like a profile in the World Coordinate System and you want to edit it in 3D. I'd suggest drawing a line from the first point to match the polyline theoretical start X,Y,Z in the WCS ending at the theoretical end X,Y,Z in the WCS. Use the ALIGN command to make the original polyline match those coordinates. Your polyline will then be in WCS.

Then you could Create a Profile from the polyline.

Working with Civil 3D objects in anything other that the WCS usually confuses the program and gets unexpected results.

[Kyle-L]

It is a little strange but you can achieve the method you describe. It is a little difficult to describe in text how to go about it but I will try.

1. Draw your 3D polyline in plan view with your coordinate system set to WCS
2. Next change OSNAPZ variable to 1. This will force you to snap in 2d not 3D, we need this for the next step.
3. Type in UCS and when prompted snap to the beginning of your 3d polyline then the end of the polyline and finally indicate the direction you want to view your polyline in. Basically we are creating a custom ucs along the polyline with the origin at the start of your polyline, the x axis along the polyline and then the Y axis either above or below it. Look at the Image 1 below to see what the result should be. The green line is a 3d polyline with 3 vertices with the middle vertice having a z value of 100. The red line is just a line with z values of 0 used as a reference in the images below.
4. Next we need to rotate the UCS so that the ucs plane comes out of the screen, basically a "section" plane. To do so run the UCS command again and this time choose the "X" option. When prompted for an angle type 90. This will rotate the previous UCS plane by 90 degrees using the X axis as the axes of revolution. The result is in image 2.
5. Next we need to orientate the camera so it is facing our UCS plane. Type "PLAN" and and select the option "Current ucs". The camera will now face the ucs. See image 3 for the result. Note the uce icon has x to the right and y up and the view cube is on its side.
6. You can now grab and move vertices and the z value will be affected. See image 4 below.

Hope that all makes sense. I have never done this before, so I just made up the above workflow and I do not know what limitations you may run into but maybe it will give you an idea of what you can do. Also, I suggest that once you have your view and UCS setup you name the UCS and save the view so you can always quickly restore the view and UCS.

Image 1: UCS along the polyline:

Image 2: UCS rotated 90 around x axis

Image 3: Orientated camera.

Image 4: Editing