Just getting started

[Marshall Wright]

Drawing a simple planting plan. Several questions about tools to use.

1. Sidewalk. Use line tool,polyline or polygon? Is the decision whether I plan to ever add color or texture fill? If adding texture use a poly; otherwise try to always use lines whenever possible?

2. Curvilinear Plantbeds. I've tried freehand. It's very shaky. I've tried the various arc and elipse tools but they are hard to control. Is there another tool I'm missing or do I have to lay plant bed edges out like roads; tangents, radius PC, PT? It's the compound curves that I want.

Thanks in advance.

[Marshall Wright]

I discovered "smoothing". That solves the plantbed question.

Regarding the line, polyline and polygon. When limiting oneself to only 2d, is there a recommended pattern of use for various typical siteplan items, say edge of curbs, sidewalks, plantbeds, etc? Lines best? Polylines better?

[Robert Anderson]

Marshall, one of the great strengths of Vectorworks is its ability to create closed (or open) shapes. We call these "Polylines". Learning the way the polyline tool works, and how the 2D reshape tool works, and how to use shape commands such as clip surface, combine surface, intersect surface, combine into surface, compose, etc. will give you a lot of power. The power of VectorWorks is not only lines but filled shapes. You're definitely on the right track....