Menu
Cart

dimetric

AxoTools adds “Free” mode

Some of you may recall using a free “Isometric Line Tool” plugin for Adobe Illustrator. I wrote it in 1997 to simply draw straight lines constrained to isometric angles. When I rewrote my plugins for CS6 and CC, it was renamed simply “IsoTool.”

axo line toolThe plugin was discontinued after it was included in AxoTools, but remained free to use after the trial had expired. As AxoTools gained new features, the free tool could seem buried amid nine tools and six panels. Now AxoTools includes a “Free” mode to accommodate those users. Unlicensed installation of the plugin have a menu item File > AxoTools > Show only free AxoTools features. If you choose this item, the next time you launch Adobe Illustrator, AxoTools will load only the free features. As part of AxoTools, the free parts go beyond the old line tool.

Projection panel

The Projection panel gives you any axonometric projection you choose, not just isometric. The Projection buttons won’t do anything and the Options are irrelevant, but the preset menu will allow you to save and quickly recall your favorite settings.

draw tools free settings

Now you can choose to automatically apply either of two line weights as you draw, as well as to automatically concatenate lines. The stroke widths you choose will be saved in your plugin’s preferences.

The multi-purpose Axo tool now retains its Move functions for selected artwork for Free mode users to easily move artwork along the current axonometric paths. This includes selected anchor points within a path.

Axo Info panel

The Axo Measure tool is also available for free. It measures distances and angles, including the delta between two angles, as measured on any of the axonometric or orthographic planes.

And if you later decide to go for a license (annual licenses are currently on sale for only $5/year), that remains an option as well. You can download it here for Adobe Illustrator 2019 – 2022 for either Mac or Windows.

30+ years of isometric drawing in Adobe Illustrator

The process of doing isometric/axonometric drawings in Adobe Illustrator really hasn’t changed much since the mid 1990s, or even since the late 1980s, something I hadn’t fully realized until doing the first AxoTools video. How many of you can relate to this?

Working in Illustrator 88, I would project art to isometric by manually doing the scale-rotate-scale method. When the QuicKeys keyboard macro utility came out, it automated that process and also allowed me to change the constrain angle by pressing an otherwise-unused function key.

In 1994, when Illustrator 5 added support for plugins, I wrote one called Isometric that I shared free on my web site. It added menu items to project art to and from isometric planes, and to create box and cylinder primitives. Does anybody recall using this? I also wrote a free companion plugin Isometric Line Tool to draw straight lines in isometric, which was around quite a while and later merged into AxoTools.

In 1998, Illustrator 8 added recordable Actions, which was easier to maintain than updating the plugin as Illustrator’s API became more complicated. It also added Smart Guides, which I relied on when QuicKeys had compatibility issues with operating system changes.

About this time, Adobe had a simple 3D app called Dimensions (not the same as their current Dimensions product) that exported shapes to a file Illustrator could open. This app was the origin of the “Off Axis” projections I use in my Actions and in the current AxoTools presets. I used Dimensions in my first locomotive cutaway rendering. Unfortunately, it didn’t last long. Some of you may use SketchUp in that same way today.

Has anybody found Illustrator CS’s 3D effect actually useful for scale isometric drawings? I had high hopes when it appeared, but it never proved truly useful to me.

Hot Door’s CADtools has had support for isometric for several versions now, and in recent years supports axonometric views. I’ve found CADtools indispensable for technical drawing, but knew there had to be an easier way to assemble the pieces.

So for over 30 years, the process has been to project a shape to an isometric plane, then manually move it into position. This worked OK when one plane served as a sort of floor plan that other shapes could be snapped to, but it didn’t work well for most things I drew, like vehicles, machinery, and electronics. In order to get objects positioned correctly, I often drew a temporary “armature” with projected lines along two or three axes.

I’d actually envisioned today’s AxoTools plugin decades ago, using virtual armatures to position art and tools with custom constraints to move art along any defined axis. Using geometric formulas by Ron Kempke, it became possible to add support for any axonometric projection showing the left, right, and top views. Why it took so long, I’m sorry I can’t answer. I hope you agree that doing axonometric drawing in Adobe Illustrator is significantly easier than ever with AxoTools.