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Publish to PDF


HEengineering

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We have decided to start publishing to PDF.  The quality is great it saves time and paper.  One major gripe I have tho is line weights really don't show tru based on zoom level.  What I mean is unless you zoom in, at appears the PDF digital copy is doing some processing.  Our drawings rely heavily on line weight appearance.  Why must I zoom into the drawing 3-4 times to see the difference in line weights?

 

I have attached one without zoom activated and one with. Just wondered if this has to do with to hi a DPI or some setting maybe Im missing?

Screen Shot 2017-11-03 at 8.02.32 AM.png

Screen Shot 2017-11-03 at 8.05.14 AM.png

Screen Shot 2017-11-03 at 8.05.28 AM.png

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This has to do with the resolution of your monitor and the monitor size (diagonal), the higher the resolution and to some extent also depending on whether the lines fall exactly on a full pixel or not etc.

 

I'm having the same issue. On a 25" 2K monitor I have to zoom in as well to see differences in line width more clearly, not just with VW PDF's but also with PDF's of other CAD/drawing programs.

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Art you seem to be the specialist on all things PDF!  This coupled with how it prints makes it pretty questionable as to how well it reads for a client.  It surprisingly hasn't caused me any issues yet. The quality is superior to print and scan.  Simply wish it was a little more predictable across printing or using the digital version of the file.

 

Do you find this causes issues for clients being able to interpret?

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30 minutes ago, HEengineering said:

Do you find this causes issues for clients being able to interpret?

I've never had complaints about line width display on monitors, given the drawings and drawing size they usually have to zoom in anyway for the details.

 

One thing to keep in mind is that depending on how you create a PDF and which PDF viewer/editing program and printer you use, line widths may display and print slightly different.

E.g. if I know a PDF has to be printed and I normally would use 0.18 and 0.35 mm line width then from e.g. printing from AutoCAD to Acrobat PDF and then considering the printer they used office wide  I needed to set the output (printing) line width for PDF to 0.15 and 0.30 mm instead to make it look more like proper line thickness on print, as it would look a little too thick otherwise in print. While with other combinations this was less of an issue.

Fortunately with AutoCAD the plot styles make it easy to do this, just change the plot style on the fly when printing and you're good to go. VW unfortunately does not have such a thing.

 

Your issue is slightly trickier, as you are more concerned with the display of the line thickness and a bit less with the printed output. Unfortunately there is no simple answer as it really depends on your client's monitors and that you have no control over. You could try to adjust the line widths a little bit to have some more differentiation at zoomed out view, but that would require talking to each of your clients to determine what the setup should be for them. If you need to send the file to multiple parties (e.g client and local authorities and someone else) then you are back to square one.

 

Long story short... decide on whether you want the output to be for monitor only, print only or both print and monitor. In the latter two cases I'd simply use the common line widths, maybe one step thinner or thicker depending on output preference etc., and not worry too much about it.

 

If you are really finicky about this and it is for monitor only then adjust the line widths either in general or per client, with the caveat that it only lasts for current technology used and in a few years from now it may look odd again anyway. Personally I think I wouldn't bother about this unless it is really important to a client and they really would want it. You might then end up having two sheets instead of one for each output document, one for monitor only and one for print or monitor&print. In that case you could try using the line width scaling in the viewport overrides settings.

 

Or inform your clients when they ask that it is dependent on monitor resolution and size and that there is little to be done about this at the moment due to technology limits.
Only when you have e.g. highres real world size monitors (.e.g A0 screen and very high DPI etc.to avoid lines falling on half a pixel etc.) and proper handling by the viewer it may no longer be a in issue. We're not there yet.

 

 

 

Edited by Art V
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@Art Vis completely correct that it is about screen resolution. Here are some examples. I am basing this on a wide screen monitor (16:9) as it can be considered to be a 3:4:5 right triangle.

 

A 30" monitor with 2K resolution:

30" diagonal = 24" horizontal  24"/2000 pixels = 0.012"/pixel = 12 mils = 83 pixels/inch.  So the minimum individual pixel will be 12 mil.  Anything with a line weight of 12 mils will show as 12 mil. Depending on the display driver algorithm, line thicknesses between 12 mil and 24 mil will either be scaled up to 24 mil or down to 12 mil. The problem is less at higher thicknesses, but two line thicknesses with less than a 12 mil difference in thickness might show as the same thickness.

 

A 30" monitor with 4K resolution:

30" diagonal = 24" horizontal 24"/4000 pixels = 0.006" = 6 mil = 166 pixels/inch.  This will provide a much smaller pixel size and therefore can show finer liner thicknesses and greater difference between line thicknesses.

 

A 45" monitor with 4K resolution:

45" diagonal = 36" horizontal  36"/4000 pixels = 0.009" = 9 mil = 111 pixels/inch.  So the larger monitor will have less ability to show differences in line weights because the pixels are larger.

 

Now if you zoom, the line weights will scale proportionally. A line that you drew at 18 mil, when you are zoomed to 50% to be drawn perfectly would need to be drawn as 9 mil wide. This would work on the 45" 4K, but the 30" 4 K would have to draw it as either 6 mil or 12 mil. And the 30" 2K would have to display it as 12 mil (single pixel width). Conversely, as you zoom in 200%, an 18 mil line would need to be displayed as 36 mil. So this could be 3 pixels wide on the 30"2K, 6 pixels wide on the 30"4K and 4 pixels wide on the 45"4K.

 

Until we get to screens giving 300 to 600 dpi resolution like we have in printers, you will never be able to have perfect reproduction of line weights/thicknesses on a display to exactly match a printer. And even when we have 600 dpi screen, someone will still complain about the 1.7 mil pixel dimensions are to much and why can't they see the difference between the 10mil and 11 mil line weights they are using in their drawing. ;-)

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