Converting PDF to dwg

[rholtz]

Is there a way to convert a PDF such as a scanned drawing into a dwg file so it can be manipulated? We have a bunch of tile drawings to do and have magazine line drawings that we would like to scan into the computer and open in ADT 2006 for editing.

Thanks.

[Anonymous]

No, not directly.

The round-about way is converting to tiff, then running the tiff through a
raster-to-vector conversion program (free ones won't be enough, and
expensive ones are, well, expensive), and you'd still spend more time fixing
things to make them the least bit workable.

Just resign yourself into having to redraw from scratch.

[rholtz]

Thanks Joel....not what I wanted to hear but at least I can tell my cohort what is involved and he will ease up some. Ha ha.

[bt-arch]

You are talking about scanned pdfs, but it is possible to open pdf's that have been generated from vector programs and to get them into a DWG so that they can be edited. Most pdf's have vector based data in them. If your pdf's do have raster stuff in them, well you're stuck with that.

The trick is you need to use Adobe Illustrator to open the PDF, then export to DWG from inside Illustrator. Vector linework will come in with a surprisingly high level of accuracy.

My understanding is that the native pdf file is more or less the same as an Illustrator file, which is a form of EPS. So they are very interchangeable as far as Adobe software goes.