by Martin Phelps
In many drawing situations when adding “Hatch”, all that is required is a series of diagonal lines, which are available as “Pre-define” patterns as shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1.
However, as an alternative the “User Define” option could be used. This can be accessed by selecting “User Defined” from the “Pattern” drop down list in the “Properties” panel of the “Hatch” context sensitive tab as shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2.
The “Hatch Pattern” pallet now only displays one hatch pattern which comprises of straight lines, as shown in figure 3.
Figure 3.
This option allows the user to specify the rotation of the “User Define Hatch” using the “Hatch Angle” slider or typing in the angle as shown in Figure 4.
Figure 4.
The scale option now allows the user to specify the distance between the hatch lines instead of using a scaling factor as with the “Pre-Defined” patterns . For example, by setting the scale to a value of 10, the distance between the “Hatch” lines will now be 10 drawing units, as shown in Figure 5.
Figure 5.
As with “Predefine” patterns, multiple variations of “User Define” hatch patterns may be added to a custom “Pallet”.