Draw faces with lines, rectangles and circles

Everything in ModelCraft starts as a flat face: a surface closed by edges. You can draw a face directly with Rectangle, Circle or Polygon, or outline one edge at a time with Line. Faces are what Push/pull turns into solids.

Draw a rectangle

1. Press RR.
2. Click the first corner: on the ground, or on any face of the model.
3. Move the pointer. The rectangle stays on the ground (or on the face you started on), and the value box (Dimensions) shows its width and depth. The tip says "Square" when the sides are equal.
4. Click the opposite corner, or type the two sizes separated by a comma and press ReturnEnter: 4m,3m, 4000,3000 in a millimeter model, or 12',10'6" in feet and inches.

A face appears with four edges around it.

The typed sizes go in the direction you were pointing: if the pointer is to the left of the first corner when you type, the rectangle grows to the left.

Draw a circle or a polygon

1. Press CC for a circle or NN for a polygon.
2. To change the number of sides, type it before you click: 12s (or just 12) and ReturnEnter. A circle starts with 24 sides and a polygon with 6. The tip shows the current number, and ModelCraft keeps it for the next circle until you change it or switch tools.
3. Click the center, on the ground or on a face.
4. Click to set the radius, or type it (Radius in the value box) and press ReturnEnter.

A circle is a polygon with many sides. When you pull a circle up with Push/pull, its sides are softened so the cylinder reads as one smooth surface.

Draw with lines

1. Press LL.
2. Click where the line starts.
3. Click where it ends, or type a length and press ReturnEnter. The typed length goes in the direction the pointer shows.
4. Keep clicking. Each click starts the next line from the end of the last one.
5. Close the outline by clicking the first point again. When the lines close a flat loop, it fills with a face and the tool stops chaining. Press EscEsc to stop at any time.

Lines follow the red, green and blue directions when you get close to them; the line turns that color and the tip says "On red axis". See Inference and snapping for how to lock a direction and snap to points.

Where a line goes when it touches nothing

• A line that starts on a face stays in that face's plane.
• A line that starts on the ground, or in empty space, stays level with its start point. If you look at the model edge-on, it goes in the vertical plane facing you instead.
• To draw a line to an exact place, type a point: [x,y,z] for a point in the model, or <dx,dy,dz> for an offset from the start. See Type exact sizes.

Split a face

Draw a line across a face, from one edge to another (or from edge to edge through other lines). The face splits into two faces. Each keeps its side and color. The same works with a rectangle or circle drawn on a face: the shape becomes its own face inside the bigger one, which now has a hole.

This is how you lay out rooms on a floor slab, a window on a wall, or a step on a stair: draw the outline on the face, then push or pull the new face.

Faces facing the wrong way

Every face has a front and a back. The back shows blue-grey. Faces drawn on the ground face up; faces drawn on another face face the same way it does.

If a face shows its back where you expect the front, select it and click Reverse face in Entity info.

What you see while drawing

• A colored marker where the pointer snaps, and its name in the tip at the bottom left.
• A preview of the line or shape.
• The live size in the value box. You can type over it at any time.

If the shape is not where you expected

• On a touch screen, see Troubleshooting.
• If a line snapped to something far behind, orbit a little: points hidden behind a face never snap, but points on its edge do.
• Press ⌘ZCtrl+Z to undo the last shape; one undo removes one line or one shape.