ADR 2012 Convert PDF to DWF best practices

[JonathanBurke7415]

We are trying to find the best way to convert PDF files to DWF files so that we can utilize them inside QTO 2011.  We've been having substaintial amounts of problems with QTO crashing and were told the files we were using were too large.  We tried using the DWF Writer 4.0 & ADR 2012.  We've adjusted the dpi to 200x200 and set it to grey scale.  This makes the file size smaller, but creates a few problems:

1. The DWF sheet names have been renamed to the size of the drawing with a numaric number in front of them, ie. "1 6300x4500x1", even though the PDF had the page named as the drawing name. "A101 - First Floor Plan". 

2.  Some files will not allow for the compare function to be used even though they are DWF files.

3.  If the compare function does work, the changes to the drawings are highlighted, however the Red and Green colors cover the text and changes so you can't read any of the details on the drawing without opening it in another program or looking at it on a hard copy.

If anyone knows how to solve any of these problems, it would be greatly appreciated.

Jon Burke

BIM Manager

Forrester Construction

[whtank · Accepted solution]

Thank you for your question.

There is a way to convert PDF to DWF as vector which can produce DWF as smaller size. Please follow these steps to produce a DWF.

1. Open your system registry editor with command ‘regedit’
2. Expand ‘HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\AppDataLow\Software\Autodesk\Design Review\Preferences’ or ‘HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Autodesk\Design Review\Preferences’
3. If there is not a key called ‘PDFImport’ please create it.
4. Create a DWORD value whose name is ‘PDF Conversion Method’ and set its value as 2.
5. Close your registry editor.
6. Open your PDF files with ADR2012
7. PDF will be converted to DWF as vector; you can save this DWF file by then.

Please let me know if this can be of help.

[JonathanBurke7415]

Thanks Tank!... This definitely made the DWF files smaller which will help out a lot. 

Do you know a way to maintain a PDF drawing sheet name when it's imported into ADR?  For example, the attached file has the Drawing Names as bookmarks for each page in the PDF.  When this is imported into ADR, or if we Print as a DWF using DWF writer 4.0, it renames the pages in a numerical order starting at "1", or it names each sheet after the name of the PDF file; In this case, "HVAC Combined".  We often have projects that have 200+ pages of drawings and renaming each drawing in QTO takes a considerable amount of time if we are not lucky enough to get DWF files directly from the A/E.

Also, I'm still unable to compare documents after converting to a DWF.  Any ideas?

Thanks again for your help,

Jon

[whtank]

At present bookmarks of PDF cannot be imported into DWF/x. The section name of DWF is consisting with the page name of PDF. Here the page name of PDF is numerical so the section name of DWF is also numerical.

With regard to the comparing, I converted the two PDF files you uploaded to DWF then I compared the two DWF. We did not find any differences.

[JonathanBurke7415]

Using the process you mention above works great.  One thing I noticed though is that the paper scale defaults to "Published" for all sheets that are imported into ADR 2012.  (The Published Scale is not correct.)  Then in order to set the scale, you have to change the Sheet Scale to "Custom", then change the Scale Style to "Architectural" and the drawing units to "Feet & Inches" then change the Sheet Scale again to "1/4" or whatever the scale for that page is.  Is there anything that can be done to reduce this process?  (It's not a huge problem, but it's tough when you have 30 Estimators and hundereds of drawings for each project that is being taken-off.)

Any ideas or help would be benificial.

Thanks,

Jon

[NLTim]

WOW,

Thanks for sharing the vector information. I am surprised that ADR is not set to automatically retain the vector information of pdf's.

The reason that compare does not normally work between 2 'pdf' documents is the rasterisation issue. ADR works well when comparing 2 vector documents. When pdf's get rasterised (i.e. being opened in ADR) then this comparison ability is removed.

[peterwalll]

I wonder do you have any experience concerned? Any good suggestion about pdf conversion will be appreciated. Thanks in advance. 

[krishnaakkaram]

Followed the procedure above method, but still, the result is the same. the sheet name comes out as size of the sheet. 

Attached is the screenshot here, any help is appreciated.