Advance Steel – Shaded GA Drawing Views

Would you like to produce a nice, high-impact, shaded view like the one above from your Advance Steel models? Well you can.

Although Autodesk Advance Steel cannot natively create shaded drawing views in the same way as packages like Inventor, you can get results like the above image by combining native AutoCAD functionality. Basically you superimpose an AutoCAD viewport on an AS GA drawing view. Here are the steps to follow.

1. Create an Advance Steel view – Set up a camera in your model and create the GA drawing view in the normal way.

2. Open the GA drawing –

3. Attach the model –
a. Switch to Model space. (e.g. click the Model tab at the bottom left or type TILEMODE 1).
b. On the Export & Import ribbon click XRef Manager.
c. Click Attach, browse and select your model file, leave all other settings as this image and click OK and OK. This brings your model into the drawing.

d. Use UCS 3 Points to set your UCS to match the camera (use the Endpoint snap to select the corners of the camera).

4. Create the Viewport –
a. Switch back to paper space. (Click “Advance Steel A#” tab at bottom left or type TILEMODE 0)
b. On the Ribbon go to Layout > Layout Viewports > Rectangular. Draw a rectangle around your AS drawing view. A new image from the model will be created with a black frame around it.

5. Set up the Viewport –
a. Double click INSIDE the black frame.
b. At the top left of the frame select Realistic or Shaded visual Style.
c. On the palettes click UCS. View on UCS.
d. On the AutoCAD status line select the scale for the viewport to match the AS view. If necessary pan to ensure the right part of the model is visible. Then click the lock viewport icon next to the scale. 
e. Turn off the Camera layer and any other layers you do not want to see.
f. Double click OUTSIDE the black frame.

6. Align the views using the AutoCAD Move command (modify palette) to move the viewport – select the black frame as the object to move but snap to corresponding points in the shaded view and the AS view as start and end points.

7. Turn off the layer with the black viewport frame on it.
The Advance Steel view will update as normal through Document Manager. The shaded view will update automatically when the drawing is opened so long as this is after the model has been saved.

Check out our Autodesk Advance Steel Training Courses If you’d like to increase your skills or refresh your knowledge. Get in contact with us on 023 8086 8947 of by following the link below if you’d like more information about this software or if you’d like to request a quote.