3D PDF - writing

[trombe]

Hi,
OK so this is an interoperability issue as well, but does anyone know when Revit is going to have the latitude to write 3D PDF files , and without restrictions ?

I am sick of trying to explain to people about DWF and try and convince them about its use.
I am not happy about being a defacto employee of AutoDesk and really unhappy about not being able to supply clients with 3D PDF,

In this age of modern software, it is pathetic Revit does not have full PDF support and that it is required !!!!

I am also having problems with 2D PDF files in 8.1, does anyone have any recommendations for a writer that does not show a sheet border ?
I have used Primo PDF, and tried PDF995, the old Pinebrush writer worked well, but will not alias my ISOPEUR font at all properly so it had to be abandoned, what are you using successfully. please.

thanks
trombe

[Justin Marchiel]

I am not tottaly sure, but from what i have read the 3d viewer and righter will cost money, where the 3d dwf viewer is still free.

I could be wrong about the price, but this is what i have read so far

Justin

[GuyR]

but does anyone know when Revit is going to have the latitude to write 3D PDF files , and without restrictions

When Adobe buy Autodesk ;-)

Many are having great PDF success with acrobat 7. In most cases smaller or nearly as small as the DWF version.

Guy

[LRaiz]

I am not tottaly sure, but from what i have read the 3d viewer and righter will cost money, where the 3d dwf viewer is still free.

I could be wrong about the price, but this is what i have read so far

Not sure where you read this. The data on Adobe web site (http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat3d/main.html) suggests differently. Actually Acrobat 3d promises some intriguing functions.

1. One needs a full Acrobat 7 in order to publish 3d data. It appears that publishing is done by capturing OpenGL commands that a CAD application issues in order to display 3d data (similar to PDF Writer). Adobe adds some custom buttons to Autocad and some other applications to facilitate publishing. Adobe lists Revit 5.1 as an application that allegedly is capable of publishing 3d PDFs.

2. A user with full Acrobat 7 can send a PDF for review. Then users who have only free Acrobat Reader 7 in addition to the ability to read PDF can also do mark up and measurements (no need to pay for Composer). Author may prevent alterations to main PDF so reviewers are limited to mark up functionality only.

3. When there are multiple reviewers Acrobat 7 can work with a Adobe collaboration server that will reconcile multiple mark ups viewed by readers without resending entire PDF to everyone. Only small mark up increment of data is being send between server and clients.

Adobe is clearly challenging Autodesk and other CAD vendors and aiming to position itself to address collaboration market while leaving authoring market to CAD vendors.

It would be interesting to hear from people who actually have Acrobat 7 if this stuff actually works or if Adobe claims do not live up to the advertisement.

[trombe]

Many are having great PDF success with acrobat 7. In most cases smaller or nearly as small as the DWF version.


yuk yuk Guy.
Do you write PDF and what do you use please ?
I would grudgingly shell out for Acrobat as long as I can get surety it will work with my ISOPEUR font (and others), not produce the border which I seem completely unable to remove with any settings so far, and otherwise function correctly in Revit

Leonid:
I agree we are blessed with you and Irwin as the founders of Revit being prepared to comment, offer solutions etc, and hope you don't disappear in the future as your help and insights are highly valued by all on the forum - thanks

On the topic.....we the users need these things (like PDF) to do our job with and to communicate with others - despite any ideas about AD ruling the world, it is a fact of my life and millions of others in this wider industry that PDF is necessary and may even be desirable ? - and that not everyone has an AD product, in fact in NZ ArchiCAD and VectorWorks account for very large market share, so you are going to run up against this problem regularly when contracting or consulting and when partnering.

We need fully supported 2D and 3D PDF writing to be able to properly communicate with our target markets , our peers, clients. Similarly, it seems that rival software supports a host of formats and are supporting PDF whereas Revit seems to be looking inwards only to AD product lines, and which further snubs its nose at any thoughts of interoperability and genuine proposals for actual real world collaboration where others do not use an AD product for crying out loud !

trombe

[ecbulic]

Amyuni PDF Converter is awsome. Concatenate drawings and docs etc from any program, automatically.


http://www.amyuni.com/en/products/docum_converter/features.html

[Andre Baros]

We print through Acrobat 6.0, haven't bothered to upgrade to 7.0, without problems... except that batch plotting is slower. It doesn't have the font problems which we had with the Pinebrush writer. We're considering Bluebeam or Acroplot to make batch plotting more idiot proof if I ever find the time to test them both (not a priority since Acrobat works and is already installed on all our machines)

Both Adobe and Autodesk have free viewers but charge for the ability to mark up. We use PDF (2d for now and hopefully 3d soon) because we have clients on operating systems other than windows, and because PDF was already our standard for everything other than drawings.

[LRaiz]

Both Adobe and Autodesk have free viewers but charge for the ability to mark up. Not True. See my previous post where I pointed out that according to Adobe advertisement Acrobat 7 reader allows mark up for free as long as the initial document was sent for review by a paying Acrobat 7 customer.

[Andre Baros]

Hmm. I uninstalled my free Acrobat 7 viewer and went back to my licensed Acrobat 6 professional specifically because I couldn't mark up a document which someone else in the office made in Acrobat 6. Perhaps the issue was that it was created by a paying customer using 6 not 7 and 7 maybe worth it for this alone. Thanks for the correction.

[LRaiz]

Hmm. I uninstalled my free Acrobat 7 viewer and went back to my licensed Acrobat 6 professional specifically because I couldn't mark up a document which someone else in the office made in Acrobat 6. Perhaps the issue was that it was created by a paying customer using 6 not 7 and 7 maybe worth it for this alone. Thanks for the correction.
Andre,
Please take my statements with a grain of salt since I do not have direct experience in Acrobat 7. I just repeat what I read but it is possible that I overlooked some important detail. It would be interesting to hear from people who have direct experience.

[Scott Davis]

If you our your office uses Buzzsaw, you can get DWF Composer free of charge now, to do mark-ups of DWF files. These DWFs will "link" into Revit, showing the mark-ups in your file. You can even change the properties of the mark-up from "Revise" to "Completed" which changes the red-colored comment to yellow, whihc is standard practice for showing that a comment has been corrected.

I didn't like DWF until I started to use this feature (and the fact that we could now get Composer for free). Now I'm exploring how we can utilize this electronic markup capability. It's not flawless yet, but I've been told the complete DWF ToolKit (API) has been used in the next version of Revit, which will work much better.

If PDF could do this same mark-up and link into Revit capability, I would probably stick with PDF.

[trombe]

Amyuni PDF Converter is awsome. Concatenate drawings and docs etc from any program, automatically.


http://www.amyuni.com/en/products/docum_converter/features.html

thanks for the link ecbulic.
thanks also to other contributors.
cheers
trombe.

[alan.smith]

On the subject of dwf versus pdf, as statde by Trombe earlier "I am sick of trying to explain to people about DWF and try and convince them about its use.
I am not happy about being a defacto employee of AutoDesk and really unhappy about not being able to supply clients with 3D PDF,"

DITTO.
I don't use 3d dwf, but for 2D I think PRIMO is fantastic. and FREE.