11 comments

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  Kyle Mason

  1 year ago

  You could printscreen to get the pdf to a jpeg format.
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  Adrian Dunevein

  1 year ago

  Great tutorial Josh;
  
  I have acrobat professional and never thought to try converting a pdf to jpg, this is very useful.
  
  In a previous project I modelled a duct layout using a jpeg screen capture from a Google Earth satellite photo. The photo gave me a guide to the walls and topography that would interfere with the duct run.
  
  http://aaadrafting.blogspot.com/2008/04/new-pag...
  
  I ended up using the google earth image as a background for the models in my presentation to management.
  
  Your technique has a lot more applications where only pdf scanned hand drawings are available.
  
  It's wise to have a reference object whose size is known so you can scale the jpeg image properly. In my google earth image, I knew the column spacing to be 25 feet, so it was just necessary to adjust the image scaling to match 2 columns drawn at this distance apart.
  
  Keep up the great work!
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• 

  Josh

  1 year ago

  Right on! Print Screen for a screen capture works really good too. Having some accurate dims on the image is a real time saver too or like Adrian says, having reference for an object.
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  marijn

  1 year ago

  You can do the same technix with your own sketches here an example of a car I designed:
  http://img521.imageshack.us/img521/7135/sketchp...
  reply
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  Jason Raak

  1 year ago

  GREAT TUTORIAL JOSH! I love how you broke it down step by step. Like Adrian I never thought about doing this using pdf to jpg. Awesome stuff and keep up the great work!
  reply
• 

  MasterJack

  1 year ago

  Good stuff. I tried Print Screen but the resolution is not that great. Try this - open the PDF file, select the Snapshot tool, ZOOM IN (important) into one of the the corners of the drawing, click on the corner to start the snapshot tool then drag to the opposite corner - the screen will pan automatically. This will grab the image to the clipboard at a much higher resolution. You can then paste it into your favorite bitmap program and save as a JPG.
  
  MasterJack
  reply
• 

  marijn

  1 year ago

  if you want quality use png always use png if you do not have to put it on the internet ;)
  reply
• 

  Dave9T5

  1 year ago

  Some more direct ways to convert:
  
  1. VECTOR-TO-VECTOR: Open the PDF with Adobe Illustrator, then re-save as DXF.
  
  2. RASTER-TO-VECTOR: ProgeCAD 2008 Professional has an AUTOMATIC Raster-to-Vector conversion engine. (http://www.progecad.com/compra/index.asp?left=p...)
  
  SWX could do with native implementation of both ways. Method 1. would seem a no-brainer for a vector software such as SWX. Method 2. well, ProgeCAD is based on IntelliCAD engine (same as the crummy DWGEditor).
  
  Dave
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• 

  dbaLindsey

  2 months ago

  We use truck chassis in our drawings that we send to customers. The mfg. send .step files for us to use but they come in on a DVD and the files are huge. Can I use this method to take the 3 views of a chassis and convert it to a 3D that looks ABOUT LIKE a chassis?
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• 

  Josh M

  2 months ago

  hmmm, i think i see what your talking about. You could use this to create a model of a simplified chassis. I've had to do something similar with airframe models. What I typically do is create different SolidWorks asemblies from the data and simplify it for my needs. In your case, it may just be the front section of the chassis without anything else around it.
  
  Whatever you do, I'd try to simplify the parts that are just being referenced.
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  Sheldon Booth

  2 months ago

  i have been looking for a way to do this since i got started on sw 08,many thanks
  keep up the good work
  reply