Using colored lines in deisgn layer, publish as black with weights / dashes

[John Whyte]

Is there a way to work with colored lines in a Design Layer, so everything is ordered, but when you publish have these converted to a mixture of line weights and line styles..

For instance any thing that is red in my design layer i would want to change when publishing to black, solid, 0.25 weight. Anything that is cyan, i would want to change to black, 0.05, dashed. (so that the order an hierarchy of lines in the drawing is still readable)

The reason i ask i someone is joining us from an Autocad background at they said this is how they work with their Design layers, which get automatically changed from colored lines to lines with dashes and weights when viewed in the sheet layer.. so that when you publish / print the drawing the lighter colored lines still show up (when on a white background)

[atari2600]

Yes, by creating class overrides.

First, I assume that every linetype that you wish to have a different appearance for, they are on a unique class from eachother, and you have not changed their appearance using the attributes palette. You need to make sure the attributes of the lines are all set to "by class" on this palette before proceeding.

Next, if you go to the sheet layer and select the viewport you wish to edit, bring up the object info palette and pick the "classes" button.

Once you get the list of your classes up, simply click on a desired class and hit "edit". Any appearance changes you make here will only affect the object on this class, on only this particular viewport. You can also select multiple classes at once and make them all look the same.

And if you are dealing with a black & white appearance, don't forget you can set that under the viewport's "advanced properties."

(we use this feature all the time when presenting different schemes to clients. We draw with all the walls with the same color, but have overrides set up in the viewports showing different colored walls to make each scheme appear different.)

hope this helps,

Matt

[John Whyte]

Thanks Matt,

That sounds like exactly what i was looking for !

One question you said "only this particular viewport" is there a way this can be set as a global setting for all the viewports in the file ?

[atari2600]

No, but you can make multiple copies of your "custom" viewport & simply change it's crop & design layer settings. (you can select multiple viewports and turn on/off classes at once, but not override.)

How many sheets do you print out, typically? If its a handful, you can set up multiple printing sheets on a single sheet layer, so you don't have to keep bouncing between sheet layers.

That way, you can set up one single sheet layer with all your customized viewports. You can do this under the "Page Setup" button while editing a sheet layer. You can set the number of horizontal and vertical pages once youve properly set up your printer and paper size.

[John Whyte]

Yeah i thought about making 1 VP and then copying it and re cropping although the downside of this is if you need to change them all across the whole file, you have to do them sheet layer, by sheet layer..

BUT thanks very much for letting me know about multiple pages in a single sheet layer.. not sure how i haven't stumbled upon that before VERY USEFUL !

[Nicholas Kargel]

The eyedropper tool with the proper settings will allow you to fairly easily copy class overrides from one VP to another without affecting class/layer visibilities.

[willofmaine]

Yet it would be really helpful if we could globally update overrides for multiple viewports...

[grant_PD]

Just my opinion, but isn't this the same as just changing the class attributes from the class palette prior to printing?

[Jonathan Pickup]

Wouldn't this be just as easy if you used the class to set the line weight and color in the design layer, then just print black and white only?

I often use colors with line weights to help me to see the line weights I have in my drawings, then set the viewport to b/w only for printing.

[willofmaine]

Wouldn't having to change the class attributes from the class (Attributes?) palette prior to printing, potentially for many classes, and then having to change them all back again for working be an awful lot of work? Not to mention the need to remember which attributes are use for which mode (working vs printing)...

Yes, I've always done what Jonathan suggests. But now I have a client that wants construction drawings with some color! So while my main drafting pens do go to black and white, I can't just print black and white only, because I need to preserve the color fills for some classes.

So... the ability for globally controlling overrides would be helpful (the eyedropper becomes very tedious as the set gets bigger and bigger and the kinks of working with color are ironed out...).

[grant_PD]

Or how about just adding another set of functionality to the class, sort of a " print pen" option?

[bcd]

Take a look at Layer Colors

[JoshW]

the ability for globally controlling overrides would be helpful (the eyedropper becomes very tedious as the set gets bigger and bigger and the kinks of working with color are ironed out...).

I submitted something along these lines as a wish list item already. We do a large amount of our work with some color fills, textures and lines now that more of the industry has gone digital (PDFs and such). Right now we attempt to streamline our workflow by putting a large amount of effort into setting our template up with all the classes and viewports we need. Our CAD manager has done a great job having viewports ready to go. The only problem is when you need to deviate from the typical classes or graphic style. Then its a lot of eye dropper.

https://techboard.vectorworks.net/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=199292#Post199292

Edited June 17, 2014 by JoshW