History of Drafting

Drafting is the art of preparing a design to make something useful. From earliest times, human beings had the desire to record how they lived, what tools they used, and how they died. These earliest records were found on the sides of caves where they lived. It wasn't until the Chinese developed a process of drawing on rice paper that drafting was born. They put their ideas on paper, and from these drawings, tool makers had an idea of what the end product should look like.

Drafting changed little over thousands of years except for the tools that were used to create a design and the means of preserving the designs. Until the 1800's vellum or animal skin was used to preserve a design because it did not shrink as paper did. When a process to make synthetic vellum was discovered, the art of drafting was revolutionized. However, it was still a slow process because all of the drawings had to be done by hand.

In the past 75 years electronics have been used in the industry of drafting and more recently, the computer has been used to enhance the art of drafting. It has helped to make drawings extremely accurate. Many computer-aided design programs are also available. Variations of a project can be generated without much difficulty.

The use of computer-aided design has made drafting much less labor intensive. Companies do not need to enlist the help of trained draftsmen. Rather, many of the larger companies have their own software and generate their own designs. All of this is a long way from human beings drawing on cave walls.