Measure, guides and units
Measure
Section titled “Measure”Measure (T) measures distances. Click a starting point, then move the pointer to see the distance. Click to keep the measurement on screen. Press Escape to clear it.
The Properties panel also shows lengths and areas of selected geometry.
Guides
Section titled “Guides”Guides help you place geometry. Tools snap to them, but they aren’t part of the model’s shape.
Make guides with Measure:
- Drag from an edge and release to place a guide line parallel to it.
- Drag from an endpoint and release to place a guide point.
Type a distance and press Enter while dragging to place the guide exactly that far away.
Choose View → Guides to show or hide guides, and Edit → Delete Guides to remove them.
Choose Window → Model Settings → Units to set:
- the length unit, such as millimeters, meters or inches,
- how many decimal places to show, from 0 to 6,
- whether to show the unit after numbers.
The unit decides what bare numbers mean when you type them. With millimeters,
18 means 18 mm; with inches, it means 18 inches. You can always type a unit
to override it, such as 18mm. The current unit is shown in the status bar.
New models use meters. Imported models keep the unit they were made with. Changing the unit never changes the geometry, only how sizes are shown. Unit changes can be undone.