space styles graying out in layout

[jdig]

I'm a new user to ACA 2015 and I'm having a problem getting my space styles to print in the colors assigned to them. These are styles with a solid color hatch in Medium Detail. When I switch over to Layout some of the spaces retain their color and others change to gray or black. If I explode the space, thereby converting it to a hatch inside a block, the colors appear and print normally. Is there some setting in the individual space style I'm missing?

[David_W_Koch]

The colors assigned to different Space Styles are likely there as a style-level display override.  Are you using named plot styles when you print?  If so, the override on some of the Space Styles may have a plot style assigned that tells the hatch component to plot Black, screened black, or some color (gray?) other than the color assigned to the component.  Edit the style-level display override and change the plot style to Normal.

If you are using color-dependent plot styles, then you will need to check your color-dependent plot style file for the colors that are plotting black or gray.  In the plot style, those colors may be set to plot Black, screened Black or some other color (gray?).  If that is your office standard and it cannot be changed, you will need to choose a different color for the hatch component in the style-level display override, picking a color that plots in color.

[jdig]

HI David and thanks for your help.

The colors are indeed assigned as style level display overrides. I checked the ones that are working as well as the ones that are graying out and they both have 'By Block' as the plot style. I've attached the display override window for a style that is graying out in Layout. It will not allow me to change the plot style from 'By Block' to 'Normal'. It seems that 'By Block' is the only option. Is there a setting that might be locking this?

It did occur to me that it might be a problem with the color dependent plot style. But then I discovered that if I exploded the space and reduced it to a hatch color, the color appeared in Layout as expected and printed that way as well. This leads me to believe it's not related to the ctb file. Do you agree?

Thanks again.

[David_W_Koch]

If you are using a color-dependent plot style, then the Plot Style Display Setting is irrelevant.  I will confess to not having a lot of experience with plotting True Colors (as opposed to AutoCAD Index colors), but I thought that True Colors were supposed to plot in that color, independent of plot style settings.  (I could be wrong about that.)

I did a quick test here in ACA 2015, using the out-of-the-box CTB template for model files (imperial), and added several of the out-of-the-box Spaces.  I changed one to use your specific true color value (251,233,184), and both the plot preview and a PDF plot showed the expected color.

Can you post a sample file that exhibits the problem, along with your CTB file?  (The file need not be your actual work file, it could be a new file that has several of your Spaces and which has the problem.  It would be helpful to include Spaces that plot correctly in color also.

[jdig]

Hi David-

I'm attaching a sample file which includes space styles, some of which appear properly in Layout and some which do not. I'm also attaching a pdf of what I see in Layout. 

For some reason when I try to attach the ctb file here I get an error message saying it's not a valid extension for an attachment. So I've zipped it. Apparently .zip is vaid but .ctb is not. Let me know if it doesn't work.

Thanks,

jdig

[David_W_Koch]

The only Space Hatch component which appears to not be plotting in color is the Net Hatch component (ANSI37, scale 800).  This component's color is red.  In the JDIG.ctb file you attached, the Color 1 pen (aka, "red") is assigned the Color property of Black and a lineweight of 0.0020".  This is why this hatch is plotting as thin black lines.  I changed the color assigned to the Net Hatch component to 255,0,0 so that it is still "red" but treated as a True Color, which plots in the True Color, rather than with the Color 1 pen in your plot style.  The result is a red hatch in the PDF.

[jdig · Accepted solution]

Hi David-

Your last post left me thinking it wasn't an autocad problem at all but a system problem, since you were using the same space styles and ctb file and it was appearing/printing properly for you. But after a while I came back to thinking it had to be autocad, since the hatch colors were printing okay but the space colors weren't.

It occured to me to check for Service Pack updates to ACA 2015, found and applied service pack 1, and lo and behold, the problem disappeared. The space styles are now appearing correctly in Layout and printing correctly.

Thank you for helping me figure this out.

Best,

jdig