Also, what software do you guys use for designing this stuff? I've got a couple of photo packages that enable me to manipulate images etc, but I don't have anything that has a scale so I can get the size of the panel and location of joysticks right. I've got photosuite & M$ photo editor and I don't want to have to buy another art package - too many parts to buy already!!
A lot of the professional CAD and drawing packages seem very overpriced to me.
I've tried out a number of programs for designing the layout of the buttons and joysticks on my panel, and I've limited my choice to PD or shareware packages because I didn't think it would be worth spending a lot of money on a program that I would only use a couple of times.
By far the best of the free programs I've seen is TurboCAD Learning edition. In fact it's so good that I'm now considering purchasing the full version. It's the only free program I've seen that offers full direct co-ordinate entry, a vital feature in my opinion.
If you're lucky you may see it on a magazine cover disk (that's how I got my copy). However you can also download it from
http://www.imsisoft.com/free/Incidentally, If anyone is interested I have designed 2D TurboCAD models for most of the buttons and joysticks in my possession. They were drawn with an accuracy of greater than 1mm. I have no webspace of my own, so I would have to either email or FTP the files somewhere.