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Render to viewport print takes forever

16 REPLIES 16
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Message 1 of 17
SteveMSILLC
984 Views, 16 Replies

Render to viewport print takes forever

Greetings!

 

I have a fairly simple 3D model in ACAD ARCH 2011.  I am rendering it to a viewport on a layout that contains the company border / title block.  If I render the model (presentation quality) to model space and send that to the printer (color laser) the print comes out in about 60 seconds or less.  However, if I render the same image and quality to the viewport on the layout and send that to the printer, it takes between 10 and 15 minutes for the image to print.  The layout is simple - just line workd border and title block.  The images are identicla when finally printed.

 

Why does it take SOOOO much longer to print when with a layout as opposed to not with a layout?  The rendering to screen takes the smae amount of time either way - it's just the printing procvess that is bogged down by using a layout.

Steve Jones
Designer
Morgan Smith Industries
www.morgansmithllc.com
16 REPLIES 16
Message 2 of 17
pendean
in reply to: SteveMSILLC

Post the DWG file for a review.
Message 3 of 17
SteveMSILLC
in reply to: pendean

The drawing is attached.

 

Steve

 

Steve Jones
Designer
Morgan Smith Industries
www.morgansmithllc.com
Message 4 of 17
SteveMSILLC
in reply to: pendean

On a related note - when I atempt to plot/print the rendered model in a viewport on the layout using the DWG to PDF.pc3 driver, the image shows up OK in the Preview window, but when it does the final send to a PDF file, only part of the image file shows up - see attached for the PDF file that printed even though the preview window showed the whole render.

 

Steve Jones
Designer
Morgan Smith Industries
www.morgansmithllc.com
Message 5 of 17
pendean
in reply to: SteveMSILLC

What did you try and print to in your first post? what driver are you using? The problem may be as simple as your printer has no RAM to handle the volume.

A quick test here on our laser printer with 384MB RAM and your layout printed in about 2-minutes.
Message 6 of 17
SteveMSILLC
in reply to: pendean

If I am in Model space and render either the front or rear of the nurses station to the screen and then print that screen to the laser printer, the image prints in less than 60 seconds.  If I switch to either layout "11x17 Front Render" or "11x17 Rear Render" and render the exact same image to a viewport on that layer, then when I send to printer it takes up to 15 minutes to print all the while the print progress dialogue sits on my screen.  Once the progress bar goes away, the print comes out within 30 seconds - so it sounds like the print file creation/spooling mis what is taking the extra time - but I don't know why.  So by just putting the render into a viewport on the layout the print time has increased by 10X or more.  The RAM requirement can't be more than a few K more between these two images allowing for the extra data of the border/titleblock in addition to the render being sent to the printer as well in the latter scenario.

 

I could understand the long print time if it were due to low RAM or slow CPU time IF it happened in both scenarios.  But that's a HUGE change in print time for such a small change in what is printing.

 

I couldn't tell you the print driver other than it's the one we use for all our drawings and I've only run into this time issue in this scenario.  Everything else prints fine and fast.  I can print a 300+MB file from Photoshop just fine and quickly as well as an ACAD render from model space.  But this ACAD render in a viewport on a layout chokes things off.

Steve Jones
Designer
Morgan Smith Industries
www.morgansmithllc.com
Message 7 of 17
vavalexus
in reply to: SteveMSILLC

I am having the same issue in AutoCad 2012, 2014. In a model space it takes 30 sec for a render. If I render to Adobe PDF printer in a viewport it takes forever! Meanwhile AutoCad 2006 handles the same job in a layout just fine in the 40 sec.

Message 8 of 17
ntellery
in reply to: SteveMSILLC

I do render to screen but then use SAVEIMG to save as a jpg and then drag and drop back onto a page.  Then I only have to render once (unless rerendering of course) but also doesn't your practise mean you don't get to review the image before printing?

I also open in phtosumthing and jig the colour and brightness a little as I find the renders a little flat.

I'd rather treat the rendering process as something seperate and be able to edit/check the image and then not rerender it just because I want to print the drawing set but maybe you have reasons for your process.

www.ausaca.blogspot.com
Do you know all about the Roof Object? Learn it's secrets
http://ausaca.blogspot.com.au/p/roof-object-video-links.html
Message 9 of 17
vavalexus
in reply to: ntellery

Hello,

 

Thank you for your post. I know that it is possible to insert a xref rendered file or past it as OLE object. But I am not in favor of such approach. Autocad has possibility to make everything in a single layout and combine a set of views including rendered ones. My technological process doesn't allow me spending time on playing around with rendering model, cropping, resizing etc and xref-ing. I need to get a pdf in less then 1 minute and I do 20-30 of them a day. I am used to work this way in Autocad 2006 and wish to continue on in Autocad 2012 and above. The issue is solved though, you may check it here.

Message 10 of 17
SteveMSILLC
in reply to: ntellery

That's a lot of extra steps to do a simple render on a layout.  Someting which AutoCad *should* be handling with no issue, especially since it prints just fine in model space.

 

Our renders aren't meant to be photo-releastiv quality - just enough to confirm back to the client we understand the intent.  If the renders were more important, we'd export the file to an external render program, such as Maya or other package.

 

By using the PREVIEW feaure in the print procss, we are able to see th final image before printing.

Steve Jones
Designer
Morgan Smith Industries
www.morgansmithllc.com
Message 11 of 17
vavalexus
in reply to: SteveMSILLC

Yes, I agree. Just to get the idea to a client and not be ashamed how it looks. I do not use preview since I use my own drawing templates, so I always get what I want from the first time.

Message 12 of 17
ntellery
in reply to: vavalexus

ok I can get what you are saying.  My renders have a decent amount of prep and contain trees etc and take about 20mins but the drawing set may be revised several times with or without the street front render having to be re-rendered because of changes so to have the jpg just inserted makes it quick for me. I don't want all the entourage there generally and is frozen, hidden or in an unloaded x-ref.

And I don't want to re-render everytime I want to print off pdf set for small change. The whole cropping, gimping up image only takes a minute or 2.

 

But your process is in and out quicker than mine and it is great that you can do it in a viewport. 

www.ausaca.blogspot.com
Do you know all about the Roof Object? Learn it's secrets
http://ausaca.blogspot.com.au/p/roof-object-video-links.html
Message 13 of 17
vavalexus
in reply to: ntellery

In situations like yours I would do the same. But my workflow is a bit easier but, say, more frequent, so I am better off rendering entire layout. I put x-ref or OLE in some rare occasions only.

Thanks for sharing your experience! 

Message 14 of 17
ntellery
in reply to: vavalexus

Yes true.  As a matter of interest, you say OLE and i notice sometimes objects dragged and dropped become OLE but a jpg gets listed under the X-ref pallete.  Is there a difference?  There has been rare occassions when I wanted to drop something in and got an unhelpful little OLE tag in the drawing instead of the picture file I intended. maybe they were incompatible picture file types?

www.ausaca.blogspot.com
Do you know all about the Roof Object? Learn it's secrets
http://ausaca.blogspot.com.au/p/roof-object-video-links.html
Message 15 of 17
vavalexus
in reply to: ntellery

Not sure. If I drag&drop I get x-ref, if I copy&past it I get OLE. Maybe it is possible to unlink x-refference and get OLE but I don't know how. Cut it and past it will do anyway.

Message 16 of 17
ntellery
in reply to: vavalexus

ok.  I mean drag and drop a jpg file from windows explorer (after saving in gimp after editing). (perhaps this one is what you mean as well).

I've only found OLE a dead end but I don't understand it's use.

www.ausaca.blogspot.com
Do you know all about the Roof Object? Learn it's secrets
http://ausaca.blogspot.com.au/p/roof-object-video-links.html
Message 17 of 17
vavalexus
in reply to: ntellery

Yes, it is what I meant. If you save img to HDD and drag&drop it it will insert x-ref. And if you rename this wile afterwards or move it to different location x-ref will drop dead. So I prefer OLE, it is an image (object) that is implemented in the drawing, so it stores in it. The only issue in increased drawing file size.

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