Different levels of drawing properties

In Tekla Structures, you can set up and modify drawing properties on different levels, depending on how permanent and extensive changes are needed. You can set up and modify drawings on the drawing level, view level, and object level. You can define the properties separately for each drawing type, view, and object type.

Recommended workflow for defining drawing properties

The recommended way of working is to work from top to bottom, from drawing level to object level:

Set your automatic drawing properties and drawing view properties as close as possible to what you want by first attempting this on the drawing level.
Then modify anything else that needs to be changed on the view level.
Finally, if any further cleanup or adjusting is necessary, you can make changes on the individual object level.

The modifications made on the drawing level remain when the drawing is recreated due to a model change.

Once you change a property on the view level you should not go to the drawing level properties and modify the same property there. This is because once you have changed a setting on the view level, changing the same setting on the drawing level may override the changes you have just made. For example, if you change the mark settings on the view level in a general arrangement drawing, and use different mark settings for different views, and then change the mark settings on the drawing level, the drawing-level changes override the view-level changes in all views.

Example workflow in a general arrangement drawing

The following image illustrates the idea of the three property levels in a GA drawing. The frame color and the shape of the mark are used as an example.

When you change the mark frame color and shape for the whole drawing on the drawing level, the changes are passed on to the view level and to the object level.
When you change the mark frame color and shape on the view level in the selected views, the changes take place in the selected views only. The properties do not change in the whole drawing.

If you change the frame color and shape on the drawing level after changing them on the view level in the selected views, the drawing-level changes override the view-level changes in all views.

Note that view properties and view label settings behave differently than the rest of the properties: changing them on the drawing level does not change them on the view level, for example, the view scale stays as you have set it for the individual views.
When you change the mark frame color and shape in the selected marks, the properties do not change anywhere else, only in the selected marks. If you try to change the mark frame color and shape on the view or drawing level, the properties do not change in the marks that you changed separately on the object level.

Drawing level properties

You can change the properties of the whole drawing in the drawing level properties. The drawing level is the highest level of properties in drawings.

General arrangement drawings

On the drawing property level, you can define the drawing name and title, drawing layout, properties of the main views, dimensions, marks, and building objects, protection settings, and the user-defined attributes for the drawing. You can also define selection filters that affect the whole drawing.
When you change the object properties in the available sub-dialog boxes, the changes affect all views and objects in the drawing. For example, you can set the view scale to be the same in all views, or the color for the part mark frame to be the same for all part marks in the drawing.
You can define automatic drawing settings before you create the drawing and also modify them in an existing drawing.

Single-part, assembly, and cast unit drawings

On the drawing property level, you can define the drawing name and titles, drawing layout, views to create and some view settings, some drawing-specific section view and detail view settings, and the user-defined attributes for the drawing.
There are also some common settings for all views related to bolts and welds that you can control on the drawing level.
You can define automatic drawing settings before you create the drawing and also modify them in an existing drawing. You can save the automatic drawing settings for later use.
You cannot set or modify the building object, mark, dimension, or protection area properties directly on the drawing level in single-part, assembly, or cast unit drawings.

View level properties

You can also change properties on the drawing view level, which means that you can have individual settings in each drawing view:

On the view level, you can control properties related to the view, dimensioning, protection, building objects, and marks separately for each view. For example, you can define that all marks have a blue frame in the top view, or that model weld marks are shown in the front view only. You can also define selection filters that affect the selected views only.
In single-part, assembly, and cast unit drawings, you can define the views that you want to create and specify the automatic view-specific properties before you create a drawing. It is very important to save the view level properties in property files to be able to load the desired view properties later on.
To modify view level properties, double-click a view frame in an open drawing. You can modify several views by holding down Ctrl and selecting the views and then double-clicking the view frame of one of the selected views.
Drawing view and view frame:
The changes take place only in the views that you have selected. For example, if you change the part mark leader line color, the part mark line color changes in all part marks in the selected views.

Property categories in the options tree in the drawing view properties:
If you change a property on the view level, do not change the same property again on the drawing level (GA drawings), because drawing-level changes override view-level changes.

Object level properties

Finally, you can change properties on the object level.

To modify the properties of an object, click the object, for example a part, in an open drawing and modify the object properties. Some objects do not have a property pane and the properties are displayed in a dialog box.
When you modify the properties, the properties change for the selected objects only. You can select several objects and change the properties in all of them. You can save the object level settings for later use.
It is important to remember that when you modify properties on the object level, these properties are no longer affected by the property changes on the drawing or view level.

Detailed object level settings

You can create detailed object level settings and apply the object level settings on the drawing or view level. The detailed object level settings functionality is based on filters that select the desired objects and object level settings that are applied on the defined objects. In the example below, the "columns" filter selects all columns in the drawing and applies object level settings called "part_blue" on the columns.

Detailed object level settings is a powerful tool: you can quickly change a particular property before you create drawings, for example, the reinforcement color, or the mark frame shape. The object level settings override the property settings in the view and drawing level properties. Changes in the object level settings that are applied on the drawing level are passed on to the view level if there are no object level settings defined on the view level. If you apply object level settings on the view level, they override the drawing level settings.

Click the following links to find out more:

Set automatic drawing properties before creating drawings

Modify drawing properties of an existing drawing

Modify drawing view-level properties

Modify drawing object properties

Create and apply detailed object level settings

How Tekla Structures applies drawing properties in drawing creation

Recreation of drawings