CAD Question

For you CAD users out there. Is it possible to import a photograph into a CAD type program and start your design off of it. I have no CAD experience but would like to try. Also can anyone recommend a good program to use? It doesn't have to be real intense. Just enough to get a layout off of.

uuuhm, I'm not up to date on the newest versions, as in any version past 14. But I don't really think so. I understand what you are trying to do, superimpose over the picture. Oh, I'm talking about autocad too btw. I just realized you meant CAD in general. Autocad is good for your 2-D drawings, solid edge is great for solid modeling. At least that is how it was back when I was using them. Superimposing on a picture though is just not a good way to go imo. but that is all it is, an opinion.

In most CAD programs you can bring the photo in as a background and use the background as something to trace over if that makes any sense. You can then scale your tracing to the actual dimensions of the object if you know them. You can use polylines to get an approximation of the curve and then use smoothing - but this has limitations and can be frustrating.

Obviously it can be time consuming playing with photos of really irregularly curved objects or if the photograph was taken from an angled perspective.

At some point I think I converted a line drawing in an image file to dxf using some online utility (can't remember what it was exactly now). The program was rather nifty but it was an image of a line drawing not a photo of an object.

Yes inserting a raster image still works well on AutoCAD. For guitar shapes, I use 3 point circles so they are tangent to each other. Scale the raster image to a known measurement, like scale length, or start with the Terry Downs cad and work around the pickup layout.

http://www.gitarrebassbau.de/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=6&start=0
Very good site

Also try to find G Thang , I found it on the web ,it was free a while back and it may be useful to you.

If you find you want a great program for the bucks,try Rhino 4.0

dude, you can do that now? shows how out of touch I am.

Yep, in Rhino you can have the jpg file as a background, and then trace arcs, lines, or splines accordingly. Then if the scale of an item is a known dimension (nut to 12th fret, for instance), you can scale the picture and/or the cad file to that dimension. I've done lots of layouts of jewelry, and guitars that way. Mark Crenshaw (Guitarnut) also uses Photoshop to create realistic and usable drawings to scale. Most graphics programs have some utility like that. I also use CorelDraw 10 for designing accurate engraving patterns by bringing in photo views and creating a rectangle to the measured sizes, and scale the photo till it looks right behind the rectangle.

Thanks for all of the replies. I figured there must be a way.

Yep, in Rhino you can have the jpg file as a background, and then trace arcs, lines, or splines accordingly. Then if the scale of an item is a known dimension (nut to 12th fret, for instance), you can scale the picture and/or the cad file to that dimension. I've done lots of layouts of jewelry, and guitars that way. Mark Crenshaw (Guitarnut) also uses Photoshop to create realistic and usable drawings to scale. Most graphics programs have some utility like that. I also use CorelDraw 10 for designing accurate engraving patterns by bringing in photo views and creating a rectangle to the measured sizes, and scale the photo till it looks right behind the rectangle.

Rhino is also what I use - it's a great intuitive programme.

There are also JPG to DXF converters.... I have one, but it is an old version and is iffy on its usefulness. Rhino has the capability of opening up PDF, DXF, DWG formats. Most all of your popular instruments are in one of those forms on the net. That one line above has just about all of them and more.

I've never seen rhino. All my experience is with AutoCad and Solid Edge.

I would recomend DraftSight. Its free and you can insert a referance image. Its similar to auto cad. Also there are dwg/ dxf files on this forum you can open. you can also print to scale to make your jigs or if you konw someone with access to a cnc you can take the dxf file and the cnc will cut it for you.

I would recomend DraftSight. Its free and you can insert a referance image. Its similar to auto cad. Also there are dwg/ dxf files on this forum you can open. you can also print to scale to make your jigs or if you konw someone with access to a cnc you can take the dxf file and the cnc will cut it for you.

Thanks. I'll check that out also.