How do I print out a sketch?

[Anonymous]

Hi all,

What's the best way to go about printing out a sketch on a regular inkjet printer to scale?

[TrippyLighting]

@oookookachoo Have you read through this thread?

I believe you have not quite grasped what folks here are asking for!

[Dirtboat]

This request for printing from the sketch environment has been going on since 2015.  And since 2018 you have either been telling everyone that they "can print a sketch" in some awkward manner not suiting their needs, or that they don't need it just because you have "never needed to print a sketch".  Good for you.  Your opinion is well known but not helpful to those that do need to print a dimensioned sketch.

And many people seem to confuse a DRAWING with a SKETCH.  Not the same, and creating a drawing and having to re-dimension it is horribly inefficient anyway.  As for "save as a DXF" and print....good luck getting dimensions.

The need for many people to print a dimensioned sketch with everything visible as it is on the screen will remain regardless of your opinion.

And so it goes on......

[jmvannoy]

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@oookookachoo wrote:

Open the Design you want to print>Click on File in the upper left>Click on New Drawing>choose From Design>the Create Drawing window will open>make sure it set at Create New and From Scratch>click OK>It takes a moment but a Drawing with a border and a title block will open. You will need to Set the Scale in the Drawing View Window that opened on the right. Once you have the scale you want click OK>click on the PDF Icon in the upper right and your printer will cough and hack then print out a drawing. It took me a month to figure this out.

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Thank you for sharing this.  I see that the component (top view, side view etc.) can be pulled into a drawing; is there a way for the sketch, showing dimensions, to be pulled into the drawing?  

[g-andresen]

Hi,

 is there a way for the sketch, showing dimensions, to be pulled into the drawing?  

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No! 

These must be created in the drawing.

Günther

[Anonymous]

And just like that we came full circle.. The whole ask is to be able to just send the **** sketch which you have already added all dimensions straight to a printer. So you don't have to "find" a roundabout way to achieve 80% of that ask.

[etfrench]

print screen

[colinNJB25]

I started this thread before the drawing environment was available. I had made a 2D shop print I was wanting to glue to a sheet of plastic as a template. Now, I extrude a shape and move it to the drawing environment and re-dimension. You can place and print a sketch in the drawing environment. You have to re-dimension and the lines are not solid. The print screen option is very hard to get to be a 1:1 scale, but it works fine if you need to run into a meeting with a quick sketch.

[laughingcreek]

"...and the lines are not solid..."

That ha also been improved.  You can now make the lines for include sketches solid.

[jmvannoy]

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@g-andresen wrote:

Hi,

 is there a way for the sketch, showing dimensions, to be pulled into the drawing?  

---

No! 

These must be created in the drawing.

Günther

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And therein lies the problem.  After I've carefully created & dimensioned a sketch, if I want to print it 1:1, I must create it all over again in the drawing environment.  It would be nice to be able to import the fully dimensioned sketch into the drawing. 

[TrippyLighting]

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@jmvannoy wrote:

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  It would be nice to be able to import the fully dimensioned sketch into the drawing. 

@ClintBrown3D With a little bit of pre-canned or automated workflow, that sounds quite doable and would help alleviate this issue. 

[leocb]

I also need this feature. I have two interfaces connected to each other at a 20° angle. so one sketch is axis aligned, the other is 20° off this axis.

I want to print the sketch before I 3D print / send to manufacture so I can check with a piece of cardboard if the interfaces physically align where I need them to. I cant do this with a drawing since there NO way to align the drawing at 20°

Also, it's been 8 freaking years since OP posted. I am a programmer and, while I don't know your codebase, I think this feature is not THAT hard to implement, give it to an intern to program or something if you need your hardcore programmers on more complicated stuff.

[laughingcreek]

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@leocb wrote:

... since there NO way to align the drawing at 20°..

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that's incorrect.  you do have to create a named view in the design space first.  you would do a "look at" on a plane or planer face that is at the angle you want and then name the view.

Also, it's been 8 freaking years since OP posted. I am a programmer and, while I don't know your codebase, I think this feature is not THAT hard to implement, give it to an intern to program or something if you need your hardcore programmers on more complicated stuff.

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lots of changes since the ordinal post.  for instance sketches from the design space can be shown on a drawing, which can be saved or printed.  other options also.

[Anonymous]

8 years ago my point was simply that EVERY program from word processing, to
Adobe products, to MS programs and beyond had a print function under
FILE/PRINT. It was just a no brainer that it would be there! Most of
Autodesk's competitors even have it. It isnt even a feature really since it
is so interconnected with Windows or Mac's Print function. All programs are
the same because they are native to Win and Mac. What would that do for
THIS program? It would simply give the user the ability to Print whatever
they see on the screen at 100% (or whatever Windows allows) the very same
as any other program out there. No added features, simply PRINT. This would
allow us amateurs who make cardboard templates of simple things so much
happier than trying to wrestle with a learning curve that is seemingly (to
me anyway) sort of convoluted for something so simple. You go to
File/Print, choose Portrait or Landscape, be subjected to the simplicity of
the normal Windows feature, and just hit Print. WARNING.. most printers
print at 98% so Windows has the feature of choosing your percentage so be
sure to change it if you want accuracy, but as an amatuer programmer
myself, its simply a HOOK. Hook into Windows Print feature and call it a
day. Its mind blowing to me that I am 65 and they STILL haven't bothered
with this feature. Love the program otherwise! My hope is with all of the
replies to this I have seen over the years, they might take us seriously?

[leocb]

Your answers are technically correct (thanks for the tip on how to align the drawing btw, but look how convulated it is),

That said, your reply completely misses the point:

I don't want to add a drawing.

I don't want to create a named view and align it to a face.

I just want to print my sketch.

[colinskaminski]

“lots of changes since the ordinal post”

This post is so old, there wasn’t even a drawing space at all. I was taping a pen to the side of my CNC router to get any output at all. 

[jamieQ6FGQ]

is it just me or cant you print a model to paper from this program?

[etfrench]

It's just you😁

You have to make a drawing first.

[jamieQ6FGQ]

so i cant print a plate with a few holes in it after i extrude it

[colinskaminski]

The workflow looks looks like this:

create sketch

extrude plate

go to the drawing environment

dimension the plate

mark the holes

dimension the holes

export to pdf

print from acrobat

[Andy_Phillips]

It's possible to Render images if your model, even little movies, from within the Rendercontext.  You can also get drawings of your model from the Drawing context