Sketches (Drawing workspace)

Drawing sketches are custom geometry that you create in the Sketch contextual environment within the Drawing workspace. Use the Create Sketch command to add a View Sketch on a drawing view or an independent sketch on the sheet.

Note: Drawing sketches are documentation objects only. They are not the same as sketches that you create in the Design workspace. Drawing sketches do not change the design, schematic, or 3D model.

sketch contextual environment

In the Sketch contextual environment, you can create, constrain, modify, and measure sketch geometry and text. You can also add symbols, notes, and leader notes to a sketch.

View Sketch

A View Sketch is a parametric sketch scoped to a specific drawing view. Each View Sketch is bound to that view and inherits the view's coordinate system, scale, and orientation.

In a View Sketch, you can:

Use the full sketching toolset, including lines, arcs, constraints, and sketch dimensions
Reference or project geometry from the underlying model in the drawing view
Constrain sketch geometry to geometry in the associated drawing view

When you move or scale the drawing view, the View Sketch moves and scales with the view. When the design changes and the drawing view updates, geometry in the View Sketch stays aligned with the view.

Use a View Sketch to annotate a part or region on a view. For example, add shapes, text, or symbols that must stay aligned with the view when you change the view scale or position.

Independent sketch

An independent sketch is a drawing sketch that you create on the sheet outside a drawing view. Independent sketches are non-associative.

Drawing sketches belong to the drawing sheet and appear in the browser, within the Sheet node.

You can use independent sketches to:

Add lines to views to represent unique surface finish information, or
Create custom symbols to place on sheets, if the symbols you need are not available in the standard drawing symbols.

You can copy drawing sketches to:

A new location on the same sheet
Another sheet in the same drawing
Another sheet in a different drawing

Note: Copies of drawing sketches do not remain linked. If you edit one instance of a sketch, copies you created before you made the change do not update to reflect the change.

You can also rename drawing sketches in the browser to keep your design clear and organized.

Associativity

View Sketches are associative to the drawing view they are bound to. Sketch geometry moves and scales with the view. You can also constrain sketch geometry to view geometry so annotations stay aligned with features on the view.

Independent sketches are non-associative. You can snap to view geometry as you create, edit, or move an independent sketch. However, snapping to view geometry does not associate the sketch with the view. If you update the design and the view changes, the independent sketch geometry does not move along with the view geometry you snapped to.

Tip: If you need an associative leader that is not part of a sketch, use the Leader tool located in the Text panel on the primary Drawing workspace toolbar.

When you create sheet dimensions, snap the dimensions to view geometry, not sketch geometry.

For independent sketches, if you dimension between sketch geometry and view geometry or annotation symbols, the distance value represents point-to-point distance on the sheet. The dimension does not reflect the dimension scale of the view.