KiCad / Beginner PCB design

[baremountain]

Hey y'all, so I've got my first pedal design figured out and I'm ready to start prototyping it. I tried prototyping with Vero, but somehow I always screw up unless I've got the layout in front of me, and this case was no different. I think I wanna go the PCB route for efficiency and ease of production. I've never done PCB design, but I looked into it and KiCad seemed to be the way to to go.
Long story short, I've got the schematic all marked out there, and I think I successfully matched the components to footprints at this point. I just need to import those footprints into the PCB designer and figure out how to create holes to wire to off-board hardware like switches & pots. It didn't seem readily apparent how to do this when I tried for 10 minutes the other day, but I've gotta look into it when I get home.
Am I correct in assuming that it's easier to get a company to send you a small number of PCBs than to make your own if you've never done so and don't have the supplies already? I think I saw a company on instagram that'd do 3 boards for $3/board baseline, which seems perfect for developing a prototype. Any other places I might look for small volume PCB prototyping? And any tips for a beginner whose never used a CAD software while making my first PCB layout?

[crochambeau]

I'm using KiCad version 4.0.2+dfsg-stable, but it's probably similar in other versions:

While you're in PCBnew there's the image of an IC four down on the right. Click that and then click the field to open a dialog box, you can then select footprints to insert from browser, etc.

In order to drop a trace on that, you need to edit the pad (mouse hover and press "e") to reflect the netname you want to connect to (or turn off the no-bug at left and drop traces willy nilly, but you can cause problems doing this because it ignores all rules).

[baremountain]

Okay, so update: I have now designed 3 PCBs & I am *really* into this. I didn't understand the two layer thing at first and was having a real hard time, but now I'm zipping through two layers and feel like I'm no longer constrained by where a component is located in the circuit, so I can do more aesthetically pleasing layouts by sorting similar components with one another. Creating those kinds of geometric puzzles is really fun to me haha
I might look into offering PCB design services to folks, because I could do this for hours on end.

[crochambeau]

Creating those kinds of geometric puzzles is really fun to me haha

Yeah, I find drafting PCBs to largely scratch the same mental itch as video games, only with a tangible result. Congrats on churning a few out!