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File is CRAZY big


Thais Zuchetti

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Hello everyone!

I just started at a new office and they use VW and I must confess I'm still learning with the software.

The problem here is that we work with big projects (large scale hospital buildings) and the file I am currently working on has 1.33GB

I am working on a brand new latest model of iMac, so having a powerful machine shouldn't be the issue.

 

Drawing and analyzing drawings works very smoothly, the problem happens when I try to access inside a viewport through sheet layers, then I must wait all content to appear in the screen very slowly while admiring the rainbow carrousel loading.

I tried to purge this file, but I'm afraid it already got out of control and VW crashed the two attempts.

 

Is there any other possible way to try to reduce file size/get rid of unused information/getting it flowing better?

Thank you

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Hi Thais, and welcome to the forum. Are you running the latest version of VW (2018) ?

 

Chances are the file has a lot of legacy items that have been included over many years. It may take a bit of work to go in and explore everything - stripping out what's actually not needed.

Another possibility is that there are highly detailed components that have been drawn or imported at a resolution that you will never appreciate at Sheet Scale but which nonetheless are appearing and bogging everything down. One good idea is to try and isolate these, and simplify them or set the more complex geometry to a Fine Details calss which you can then show only selectively.

A third option you can try is to progressively  divide the drawing in half and perform speed tests on the reaming half. It could be that an errant object (objects) are causing your woes. (eg Auto-Hybrids, Imported geometry, overly detailed extrude along paths, etc.)

 

As for the file-size 13 GB is large for sure but I've seen bigger. You may find the answer in the above. You may also decide to extract some of the information into external files and then reference that back in via Referenced Viewports.

 

Finally - Check out the Sheet Layer & Viewport settings.

What's your SL dpi, Viewport Render settings? Smoothing Angle if Hidden Line Rendering ....

Good luck with it & let us know how you get on.

 

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  • Vectorworks, Inc Employee

If your file involves a large amount of imported 3D geometry, try going to the resources to simplify, particularly large or complex meshes, which can really bog down a hidden-line displayed viewport. Complex 3D meshes can be modified using the Simplify Mesh command. It has a preview so you can tune your simplification to be visually correct.

 

If your file involves a lot of 2D imports from AutoCAD, often time very "deep" hatches or inefficient line styles can slow down the file. Try modifying these to simplify in the Resource Browser.

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Another thing to check is if you have polylines/polygons with lots of vertices (e.g. ground contour lines from a survey or AutoCAD DWG import). Reducing the number of points  on those lines can make a lot of difference as well.

 

Such polylines/polygons tend to slow down working on design layers as well, so simplifying those is usually a good idea anyway.

Edited by Art V
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Hello!

Thanks for such a nice involvement!

 

Valuable information: I am using VW2018, the hospital is pure 2D lines imported from AutoCad file and many (MANY) layers and classes of our studies on top of it.

 

So I think that the possibility of 3D complex objects is not actually the case! But I am going to try to get this file into smaller fragments into new files and purge little by little!

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As for the "step by step" that I mentioned,

I meant to activate only one kind of Element Type in the Purge Options Dialog

at a time. Like purge unnecessary Symbols only, before going to more critical

things like "Special Symbols", conjectural "unused" Classes and such things.

In hope Purge will not crash.

Sometimes that helps to bring the file again into a state where even Purge

will not crash anymore.

But there will be cases where dividing the file in smaller fragments may be

the only way to find the problematic elements.

 

I think your files are mainly so big because the contain just so much content.

A non optimized DWG underlay drawn by separate lines or exploded hatches

may be only a part of the file size.

But it's always a good idea to clean Files up and avoid unnecessary complexity,

like in Symbols where it may have more problems than have value.

Or to always create Symbols from Elements that appear again and again in a file.

 

Edited by zoomer
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All super valid input from everyone above.

My latest file for an event was way over 2GB ..., and it slowed down my work processes a lot! So I learned that various settings help:

 

1. When I work on larger presentations then I purposefully separate corresponding VW files

 

Keeping various VW file separate as "MASTER Files' e.g. main building, symbols, photos of the project, images for creative inspirations, etc. 

And then --> creating 'Referenced Viewports on Design Layers' / 'R-VP -DL' within your current VW file.

     

Note - 'Referenced Viewports on Design Layers' don't import information from another VW file, and only provide the drawing in your working file, keeping the file size down.

 

2. Importing DWG's makes my VW files explode in size.

    Check/uncheck at the import settings which elements you really need to import.

 

Also keep imported DWG files as separate VW files and reference them as 'R-VP -DL' .

Or clean them up and delete all unnecessary elements prior to importing them into your file. Either in the separate VW file or in Illustrator.

 

3. Textures 

These take up a huge amount of space. I usually reference textures on import.

And then purge later on what I don't need any longer.

 

4. Some of imported furnitures I use from the internet have a huge amount of Mesh Geometry.

Either I re-draw them if they are not too complex or I use  --> Tool - 'Simplify Mesh' 

This will help to bring down the file size. Test it in a separate / empty VW file to see the size difference.

 

5. Sheet Layers & Viewport Renderings

These take up a huge amount of space in my VW files. This as I do a lot !!!! of test renderings in order to compare and find the best RW Settings.

 

Once I am happy I usually duplicate the VW file ( keeping it as an Original and/or Backup file ) and then delete all unnecessary Viewports and Sheet Layers on my current VW file.

 

6. Publish to PDF

Personally my main problem is when I 'Publish to PDF' for presentations from Sheet layers with lots of renderings. Then the PDF's are huge and I have to sacrifice on quality/dpi in order to reduce the file to a digestible size small enough for emailing my project portfolios to potential new clients whom I don't have an FTP accounts with.

 

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On 5/20/2018 at 8:43 AM, Grethe Connerth said:

Or clean them up and delete all unnecessary elements prior to importing them into your file. Either in the separate VW file or in Illustrator.

Cleaning up is best done in either VW before further use or in a DWG editor , e.g. like the free Draftsight if it is a 2D drawing (the free Draftsight does not fully support 3D editing).

Using Illustrator or another DTP drawing program is something I've found to be more of a hassle than a useful option, e.g. because you may end up having splines instead of polylines depening on the editing etc. so I'd recommend using a DWG editor instead or import and clean up in an empty VW file.

 

On 5/20/2018 at 8:43 AM, Grethe Connerth said:

Personally my main problem is when I 'Publish to PDF' for presentations from Sheet layers with lots of renderings. Then the PDF's are huge and I have to sacrifice on quality/dpi in order to reduce the file to a digestible size small enough for emailing my project portfolios to potential new clients whom I don't have an FTP accounts with.

It is not uncommon that part of what is outside the viewport may get rendered as well, or that imported images extending beyond the viewport are are exported in full into the PDF.

 

Instead of changing the resolution settings in Vectorworks (other than for having a not higher than necessary resolution) I suggest to get a PDF Editor (e.g. Bluebeam, Adobe Acrobat (the full version, not the reader) etc.) and then use the Reduce Document/File Size option. That way any content beyond the viewport will get cropped and removed (which by itself can make a huge difference, e.g. reducing the PDF from 50+ Mb to 2.5 Mb) and you can experiment with resolution settings in the PDF size reduction settings. This should be a faster way of bringing down your PDF file size than a series of renders and re-renders in VW. Along with these two aspects you can often also remove other unwanted items in the PDF (metadata, included fonts etc.)

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