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Manual Feature Authoring gives you control over the features you measure to and from. In Dimensioning Mode, the Features toolbar button lets you author planes and cylinders by hand to complement automatically extracted features. Authored features behave exactly like automatic ones — selectable, measurable, and usable as datums. They do not add new GD&T types. You are still working with plane and cylinder primitives that Direct Dimensions, Flatness, Cylindricity, Datums, and Profile already consume.

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Requirements

Manual Feature Authoring needs a Feature Set extracted with algorithm v20 or newer. See Feature Extraction. On older extractions, the authoring controls are greyed out and a tooltip explains why. Re-run Feature Extraction on the parent reconstruction to replace that Feature Set with a v20 (or newer) run, then author features on the result.

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When to use Manual Feature Authoring

Use authoring to complement automatic extraction — not to replace it. Typical cases:
  • Thin rims that automatic extraction under-represents
  • Multiple disconnected components that should belong to one plane
  • Small patches that mimic CMM probe points
  • Small pins and threaded holes that need a cylinder sized to the real geometry
  • Cleanup — delete features you do not want in the scene so measurement and datum work stay focused

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Create planes

Create planes large and small on contiguous and non-contiguous surfaces. Non-contiguous patches can still define a single plane, which is how thin rims and disconnected faces become measurable. Authoring a plane on a rim of a part.
1

Open Features

In Dimensioning Mode, choose Features in the Toolbar. Confirm the Feature Set is algorithm v20 or newer.
2

Create a plane

Author a plane on the surfaces that should define it. Include disconnected patches when they belong to the same geometric plane.
3

Review membership

Confirm the highlighted surface is the plane you intend to measure or datum from.

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Create cylinders

Create cylinders large and small, including small pins and threaded holes. Authoring a cylinder on geometry that had uneven edges in automatic feature extraction.
1

Open Features

Choose Features in the Toolbar.
2

Create a cylinder

Author a cylinder on the pin, hole, or thread you need to measure. Size it to the region that should participate in Diameter, Cylindricity, or an Axis datum.
3

Review membership

Confirm the cylinder captures the intended surface and not neighboring geometry.

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Refine automatic features

Right-click any automatic feature to adjust it directly. Refinement uses the same membership tools as a feature you created from scratch.

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Paint, erase, and erode

Paint, erase, and erode give full manual control over which surface belongs to the feature:
  • Paint — add surface to the feature
  • Erase — remove surface from the feature
  • Erode — shrink membership inward to drop noisy edges or over-extracted boundary
Use these tools after create or after right-click refine until the feature matches the geometry you will measure.

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Delete features

Delete features to clean up the scene and focus on just what you want. Deleted automatic or authored features are removed from the Feature Set for that reconstruction; remaining features stay available to every child ROI.

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Measure and datum from authored features

Once a feature is in the Feature Set, use it like any other primitive: