Datasheet

IT’S ALL ABOUT STYLE 23
Figure 1.21
Don’tforgetthearrow!
How Many Dialogs Is That?
You can see why many Civil 3D instructors refer to label creation as ‘‘heading down the rabbit
hole.’’ You’re a couple of dialogs deep just making the simplest of label styles, with one static
text component. It’s easy to get confused, but don’t worry — it becomes second nature! The Text
Component Editor is another common dialog t hat appears in every label-style creation exercise.
Let’s look at the rest of the options, even though you won’t be making any changes:
Text Height determines the plotted height of the label. Remember, Civil 3D knows you’re
going to print and will attempt to give you inches or millimeters.
Rotation Angle, XOffset,andYOffsetgive you the ability to refine the placement of this com-
ponent by rotating or displacing the text in an x or y direction.
Attachment determines which of the nine points on the label components bounding box are
attached to the anchor point. See Figure 1.18 for an illustration. Change the attachment of the
reference text component to Top Left. This will attach the upper-left corner of this proposed
elevation reference text to the bottom left of the Surface Elevation component.
Color and Lineweight allow you to hard-code a color if desired. It’s a good idea to leave these
values set to ByLayer unless you have a good reason to change them.
The final piece of the component puzzle is a Border option. These options are as follows:
Visibility is obvious, turning the border on and off for this component. Remember that com-
ponent borders shrink to the individual component: if you’re using multiple components in a
label, they all have their own borders.
Type allows you to select a rectangle, a rounded rectangle (slot), or a circle border.
Background Mask lets you determine whether linework and text behind this component are
masked. This can be handy for construction notes in place of the usual wipeout tools.
Gap determines the offset from the component bounding box to the outer points on the border.
Setting this to half of the text size usually creates a visually pleasing border.
Linetype and Lineweight give you the usual control of the border lines.