Top, Front and Side Views of a 3D Object

0:00This object is made of 6 linking cubes: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6.

0:09How do we draw what it looks like from the top, from the front and from the right side?

0:15A view is a flat drawing of what you see when you look straight at the object from one direction. We draw each view on grid paper.

0:24First, turn to look straight at the front.

0:27Now every face you see is a flat square, and you cannot tell how far back each cube is.

0:34Copy the squares onto the grid: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. The front view has 5 squares, not 6, because one cube is hidden behind another.

0:47Next, turn to look straight down from the top.

0:51Copy the top view onto the grid. It has 4 squares, because the tower of 3 cubes shows as just 1 square.

0:59Then turn to look straight at the right side.

1:03Copy the right side view. It has 4 squares: the front row of 3 cubes shows as 1 square on the left, and the tower is on the right.

1:13A common mistake is to draw a view in 3D, with slanted tops and sides.

1:19When you look straight at the object, every cube face you see is a flat square, so a view has no slanted faces.

1:27Check: the front and side views are both 3 squares tall, and the front and top views are both 3 squares wide.

1:36To draw a view, look straight at the object from one direction and draw only the flat squares you see.