Import or Insert Geo PDF

[jrafferty]

Good Morning!

Isn't there a way to import or insert a geo-referenced pdf (Geo PDF) into Civil 3D using the Planning and Analysis tools?

Thanks in advance!  --jrafferty

[pmascaro]

Interested in seeing how this progresses....

Being able to clip the large quoads to smaller files so you can 1. Only bring in the area that you need and 2. Discard the orginal Quad to reduce the file size on the network....

[mbainbridge]

Which Dotsoft tool peforms this action?

[pmascaro]

Hi Terry,

I don't recall for sure. I believe it was an option that came with mapworks.  They will let you test it, but it did not work out well for me. It made a mess of the line work. I purchased global mapper instead. It allowed me to import the PDF layers as raster images, manipulate them, set transparent backgrounds and re-export them as true GeoTiffs with the coordinate system embedded so I could bring them into Map 3D.

We just upgraded to Global Mapper 18 which allows you to import all of the GeoPDF layers at once and keep them separated on their respective layers. It also maintains the vector line work as vectors in Global Mapper 18. I have not received the licensing info yet so I've yet to test it out, but if it works as described, it will be the only program on the market that I've found that can do this and maintain and/or reproject the coordinate system.

Global Mapper has been a great tool and their support team is great.

[TerryDotson]

After careful consideration, we have abandoned the concept of GeoPDFs, here's why.

The PDF content stream coordinates are typically rounded to 2 decimal places.  This is more than adequate to describe points on a sheet of paper, even up to 36x48.  However as you can imagine, if the coordinates were Lat/Long and you were projecting to state plane, it's less than optimal to say the least.  In short we don't have confidence in GeoPDF's and won't support it.

[pmascaro]

That makes sense from an engineering standpoint and thanks for following up that this is no longer available. 

For a GeoSpacial Solution, there is still a market for underlying and/or importing GeoPDFs. We use USGS Maps for our Site Location Maps and Vicinity maps which scale at 1" = 2000' and 1" =500' respectively so for these types of maps, the property line width alone is 20'+ wide... Having an easy way to import USGS Maps spatially and within a reasonable time-frame is important, but I definitely understand how this does not fit into the dotsoft market, but it does fit in for Global Mapper as they are a GeoSpacial Solution.

Global Mapper has worked with me on this solution for GeoPDFs and they continued to pursue it so I do not foresee them dropping it from their product.

Kind Regards,

Paul

[TerryDotson]

"Global Mapper" ... "allowed me to import the PDF layers as raster images".

That's reasonable as people don't expect the level of precision from vectors rasterized to an image.  As opposed to ID'ing an imported polyline vertex and reporting it's value to 8 decimal places, creating a false sense of precision.