How do you convert lines to outlines?

[Tony W]

Hi 
 

I have Architect and for the life of me, cannot work out how to outline a line.  Im Adobe Illustrator there is a command that converts lines to an outline.  For instance, if I am drawing 5mm wide line x 20mm long line, illustrator will convert it to a 5 x 20 rectangle where I can amend the stroke thickness.

 

In my VW case, I have drawn a 1mm line for indicate the thickness of a piece of acrylic but when I got it into sheet layer it scales the thickness of the line

 

Any clues?

 

 

[markdd]

You can’t do what Illustrator will do, but you can scale the line thickness in a Viewport by clicking on the Advanced Tab and making a scale adjustment there. It will scale all the line thicknesses though. 

 

In Vectorworks (2D only) one would normally indicate the 1mm thickness by offsetting a duplicate by 1mm and then joining the ends.

Edited July 30, 2023 by markdd

[zoomer]

4 hours ago, markdd said:

and then joining the ends.

 

AFAIk there is an option to do that automatically ....

[Benson Shaw]

@Tony W   if you want an enclosed area or volume in Vectorworks, draw it as such. Adjust line weight as needed. 
 

Alternately, if an existing line (or curve) needs conversion to an enclosed area . . . The Offset tool with option to “Close open curves” does what is described in original post. Tool pref provides parameter for offset distance.

 

Possible problem:  the offset tool offsets to one side or other of source object, but does not offset centered on the source. 
 

Workaround: Offset twice: 1st time to one side, at half distance, disable the “Close open curves” option. 2nd time offset the new curve to opposite side, full distance, enable the Close option. 
 

-B

Edited July 31, 2023 by Benson Shaw
Ahoy matey.

[Kevin McAllister]

19 hours ago, Tony W said:

I have Architect and for the life of me, cannot work out how to outline a line.  Im Adobe Illustrator there is a command that converts lines to an outline.  For instance, if I am drawing 5mm wide line x 20mm long line, illustrator will convert it to a 5 x 20 rectangle where I can amend the stroke thickness.

 

I have used Benson's solution in the past. You could also switch to the double line tool if you need to do this regularly.

 

Kevin

 

[markdd]

There is a neat trick if you want to offset a line in both directions - Just group it and then run the offset tool on either side and a closed double line version will be made.

[E|FA]

I guess I learned my one thing for today.   Now I'm going to have to start grouping things to see which other tools have strange behaviors.  

[Pat Stanford]

Or if you are modeling a 1mm thick object, don't draw a line, but draw a rectangle instead. Then you can set the line thickness separately from the scale.

[Grethe Connerth]

On 7/30/2023 at 6:52 PM, Tony W said:

Hi 
 

I have Architect and for the life of me, cannot work out how to outline a line.  Im Adobe Illustrator there is a command that converts lines to an outline.  For instance, if I am drawing 5mm wide line x 20mm long line, illustrator will convert it to a 5 x 20 rectangle where I can amend the stroke thickness.

 

In my VW case, I have drawn a 1mm line for indicate the thickness of a piece of acrylic but when I got it into sheet layer it scales the thickness of the line

 

Any clues?

 

 

Hi @Tony W,

this may not be 100% to what you are looking for - but in case you need to convert/connect, ... 2 or more lines you can use the "COMPOSE" command in the MODIFY dropdown menu. 

See the 2 red lines in my drawing of the attachment. This works with multiple lines.