Re: cad/drawing package question.

--- In CAD_CAM_EDM_DRO@yahoogroups.com, "snokket" <graham@...> wrote:

>
> Hi everyone.
> Can anyone advise me please on which cad/drawing package would be the
> most useful for drawing mosaic type tile floor patterns, I would like
> to be able to quickly draw repeating patterns from standard geometric
> shapes ( triangles, squares, octagons, hexagons etc and change the
> colours to suit the ones from old victorian floors.
> Cheap would be best for me as I am on a tight budget.
> I would like to be able to save them in a graphic type format suitable
> for web publishing if possible.
> Any advice will be gratefully received.
> Sorry if this is a bit OT, hopefully the CAD part wil cover the
> question.
> All the best.
> Gray
>

Try CorelDraw which is better suited to doing drawing, importing
clipart, doing color fills, and exporting in web formats than pure CAD
programs. You can pickup ver 12 (two versions back) pretty cheap now
and it will have all of the tools you will need. A lot of basic
shapes are in the drawing tools so you just pick the type (Square,
rectangle, hexagons, circles, ellipses, stars, spirals, etc and it
draws them based on the shape rules you set. There are some free
celtic weave patterns on the web that can be strung together to make
complex designs in just a few minutes. You can fill any object with a
solid color or a sweep (or even a texture) and use it for illustration
for a catalog or to a client to show them what the finished product
looks like.

The same drawing in color with fills (and even done in isometric) can
be exported in JPG, GIF, or PNG format. Same base vector format can
be exported in DXF to take directly to a CAM program to develop a
toolpath if needed.