DWG Compatible Color Palette

[yasin2ray]

I am an AutoCAD user, and began using Vectorworks (VW) for the sole purpose of integrating it with my AutoCAD Civil 3D program. I have found the integration difficult and when I came upon VW's "DWG Compatible Color Palette" I thought all my problems were solved. Not so.

The color numbers and their associated colors are not the same as in AutoCAD. For example, I use color 66 for groundcovers in AutoCAD. Color 66 in the "DWG Compatible Color Palette" is not the same green as color 66 in AutoCAD.

Also, if I simply want to use the Black from the DWG Compatible Color Palette, when I export the file to a .dwg, and bring it into AutoCAD, the lineweights are wrong. I would assume AutoCAD should be able to read the VW Black (color # 0 or 7) as the same lineweight as the color #0 or 7 has that was drawn in AutoCAD.

Why are they not actually COMPATIBLE?! (or, what am I doing wrong?)

For the record, I keep most of the layer settings for my Classes at a generic black color and lineweight 0.05. I have different color and lineweight settings for 2D plant graphics, so that I can set Evergreens darker than Deciduous, and trees darker than shrubs, etc).

As always, thanks for your help -

Anna

[Pedro P. Palazzo]

For exporting back to AutoCAD you have to set "map line weights to colors".

At any rate, with recent versions of AutoCAD supporting the whole RGB spectrum, I don't see much of a point to the DWG-compatible palette. You can just specify the RGB values in either program to match the other.

The best practice for making VW and AC talk nicely is to have your .ctb in the same folder as your .dwg file for importing into VW, and keeping a VW class Standards (using the Standard Naming command) that relates to your AC layer standard. Afaik you have to set that one up manually.

[yasin2ray]

Pedro,

This is interesting. Using "map line weights to colors" assumes I have set line weights in the same way I'd like to differentiate colors. It means I use a single line weight in Vectorworks for a single color in Autocad. This is fine since I'd only be changing about seven to ten colors.

I have already tried this with all my line weights switching to Red on their way out of Vectorworks - and it came in fine. The only problem is Red is not the only color I use in Autocad, so with everything Red, all my Autocad line weights will plot at 0.13 (that's what my Red is set to).

I'll play around but for now, I will definitely consider this one of the solutions to the problem.

Thanks!

Anna