Linear takeoff

Linear takeoff measures length rather than area: edging, kerbs, fencing, pipe runs, retaining walls, irrigation lines.

Select Linear Region (L) to start. As with areas, set the name and colour first, because together they form the group that carries your total.

Drawing modes

Selecting Linear Region expands the toolbar into seven modes in two families, the four you drive yourself and the three that follow the drawing for you, with the Cut tool at the bottom. Each mode suits a different kind of line.

	Mode	Shortcut	Use it for
	Polyline	1	Straight runs with corners. Click each corner in turn.
	Dashed Trace	2	Following a line that is dashed or broken on the drawing.
	Freehand Trace	3	Drawing the path yourself by dragging.
	Ellipse	4	Circular and elliptical runs.
	Dot Trace	5	Placing points along a route and letting PixelTakeoff follow the line between them.
	Auto Boundary	6	Following the edge of an area automatically.
	Auto Line	7	Following a drawn line automatically.

Polyline is the one to learn first. It is predictable, works on any drawing, and is quickest for anything with straight segments.

The automatic modes (Dot Trace, Auto Boundary, Auto Line) are much faster on long curved runs, since they follow the drawing for you rather than asking you to click your way along it. They need the line to be clear enough to follow, so on a poor scan fall back to Polyline or Freehand Trace.

Saving and discarding a run

Every run you draw starts at a dot marked S and ends at a dot marked E. Those two dots carry the save and discard controls, and both use Shift so a stray click can never commit or delete a line:

1. Draw the run.
2. Hold Shift and click the E dot to save it, or press Enter.
3. To throw it away instead, hold Shift and click the S dot.

Without Shift the dots are safe to click:

• Clicking E turns the dashed preview line on or off. Preview on means the next click extends the run from that end.
• Clicking S does nothing.
• Shift and click on a middle dot trims the run back to that dot.
• Esc clears the preview without saving, and pressing it again cancels.

The panel on the left shows this contract beside the drawing modes while the tool is active, so it is always one glance away.

Smooth curves

Curved runs are common in landscape work: a curved bed edge, a winding path edge, a circular planter.

The automatic modes carry one toggle for this, under Trace Settings with Auto Boundary or Auto Line selected. It has two states and names itself after the one it is in:

	State	What a traced run becomes
	Smooth curves	A genuine curve. The line looks right on screen and the length follows the curve itself
	Straight lines	Straight segments between the points

This matters for quantities. A straight line between two points on a curve is always shorter than the curve itself, and on a strongly curved run the difference is significant. Measuring along the curve is the correct behaviour and is what you are billed for when you install edging around a curve.

Leave it on Smooth curves unless you specifically want straight segments.

Length and derived areas

A linear item often drives an area as well as a length, and that area may be what you actually price.

In Measurement Settings for a linear group, set H1: Depth and PixelTakeoff derives an area alongside the linear metres:

	Value	What it is
	L	The length of the run
	A₁	Length multiplied by H1: Depth
	A₂	Length multiplied by H2: Second Height, when you set one

Two heights are useful when one run drives two quantities. A kerb might need its face area for one rate and a bedding area for another, both derived from the same measured length.

Worked example: a 45 m edging run with H1 of 300 mm gives A₁ of 13.5 m².

Note

Line Width is a different setting and does not produce A₁. It controls how wide the region is drawn, while H1: Depth is the height used to turn a length into an area.

Setting up a new region

Editing a linear region

Every run in the right panel has an Edit Region button, which reopens the line so you can work on it. Click it again to finish.

Moving a point. Drag any point on the line to move it. The length updates as soon as you release.

Adding and removing points. Add a point on a segment to introduce a corner, or remove one to straighten.

Branches. A run can branch, which suits irrigation and drainage layouts. The group total includes the main line and every branch.

The Cut tool

Cut (C) removes a section from the middle of a linear run.

Draw a polygon over the part you want gone and confirm. Everything inside the polygon is removed and what remains stays as measured runs. If you cut through the middle, you are left with two separate runs whose lengths add up to the original minus what you removed.

Use it where a run is interrupted, for example edging that stops at a driveway crossing and resumes on the other side. Cutting is quicker and more accurate than deleting and retracing.

Checking your work

Compare against the drawing. Zoom out and confirm your line follows the route you meant, with no stray segment shooting off from a misclick.

Sanity check the number. A boundary edging run around a villa plot reading 8 m or 8,000 m is telling you the scale is wrong.

Watch for double runs. If a trace was restarted partway, you can end up with two overlapping runs and a doubled total. The right panel lists one row per run, each with its own length, so a group with more rows than you expect is worth opening.

Common questions

Should the length follow the curve or the straight line between points? The curve. That is what gets installed and what you pay for, and it is what PixelTakeoff measures on a traced run set to Smooth curves.

My traced curve looks slightly short. Check the toggle in Trace Settings reads Smooth curves rather than Straight lines. On straight lines the run is measured as segments between the points, which is shorter than the true curve.

Can I convert a linear run into an area? Not directly, but setting H1: Depth gives you A₁, which is the derived area of that run and is usually what you wanted.

Why does my linear group show both a length and an area? Because H1 is set. L is the run length and A₁ is that length multiplied by H1. Both come from the same measurement.