Some fonts invisible in layout

[5stringb]

I have the same issue.  I tried the steps you listed but they had no apparent effect.  Still looking for an answer on this one.

[This post has been split from another thread for clarity by cheryl.buck. Original post: Text invisible in layout]

[5stringb]

A moderator moved this from an older post, so I'll recap the issue as it was lost in the transfer...

In a viewport, some text and small objects become invisible.  They show up in the plot preview, and they do plot, but when you're looking at your viewport, they're not there unless you hover over them.  So you have to go searching for your text to edit prior to plotting.  If you miss one (of the invisible text fields), then you end up with nonsense on your print, or some misleading boilerplate from the template.

This seems to happen at various stages of zoom (farther out), and also only with certain fonts.  I was initially using the default "txt" font, which is basically made up of very thin line segments.  When I changed the font to Arial Black, which is a thicker font (of the same size), the text was then visible from any zoom distance.  There were small line segment objects in the same viewport (same layout) that had the same issue - invisible until zoomed in upon.  This was not just one viewport.  It was all of them, in every file.

I had to eventually choose not to use the "txt" default font.  I have not found another solution yet.

[cheryl.buck]

Hi @5stringb,

Thank you for the clarification on your issue. That does sound frustrating. A little extra information would help me narrow down the cause of the issue:

Which version of AutoCAD Mechanical are you using?

When did this start occurring?

Can you provide a sample file that this is occurring in? 

All the best,

[cheryl.buck]

Hi 5stringb,

I am checking back to see if you still need help with this issue.

All the best,

Please select the Accept as Solution button if my post solves your issue or answers your question.

[5stringb]

During this process I was using AutoCAD Civil 3D 2018.  No one ever came up with a useful solution.  I did not have time to wait for a proper solution as this was hindering my work.  Therefore I had to go with a different font, Arial Black, which is thicker than txt.  That is the only thing that actually worked, and I did this on my own.  Beyond changing fonts, no one has suggested anything else that worked, but thanks for trying.

[cheryl.buck]

Hi @5stringb,

I would like to help figure this out for you. I did test this on my install but did not see the same issue you have described. If you would like me to troubleshoot it, some additional information will help:

Can you type ABOUT in the command line and post a screen shot of the dialog box? 

Do you have any 3rd party add-ons installed? 

When did this start occurring?

Can you provide a sample file that this is occurring in?

A ScreenCast of the issue would also be helpful. 

All the best,  

[5stringb]

I have attached a sample dwg file with invisible text in the "Normal" layout.  There are some diagonal dashed lines, and some text in txt font that says "REVISION #".  Both the lines and the text are invisible until zoomed way in.  They are both located just under the title info at the top left of the layout, in paper space.

Here is my About info for reference:

[cheryl.buck]

Hi 5stringb,

Thank you for providing the file for testing. While I do not have Civil 3D to test this file in, I did test it in AutoCAD Mechanical and core AutoCAD. The text and object are visible in both products, so this may be a Civil 3D specific issue. 

I will go ahead and move this thread to the Civil 3D forums in hopes that someone there will be able to reproduce the issue and help you resolve it. 

All the best,

[rl_jackson]

First off you should probably not set the 0 layer as NO PLOT in the layer settings that's probably 99% of your issues. Look at your layer settings and adjust the text  to its appropriate layer, that does plot

Let me add as an additional note, that you never freeze layer 0 either.

[5stringb · Accepted solution]

Thanks for the reply, but I never draw anything but scratch / temp items on the "0" layer.  Also, none of the text / objects that were disappearing were actually on the "0" layer ("Revision #" and dashed lines).  So the plot setting of the "0" layer would have no effect on text from other layers.  Roughly 90% of the text is on the "AA-VP TEXT" layer.  Due to a mistake that was later corrected, the actual job number was in fact on the "0" layer, but I never had any issues with that disappearing at any zoom level, plus it used an Arial family font.  These are the reasons I believed it to be related to the specific "txt" font or possibly just thin lines in general.

Interesting note though - I just finished upgrading to Civil 3D 2019, and I'm now on a new PC.  I downloaded the demo file attached above, and the disappearing text now works properly on my 2019 system - same file.  So it seems this may have been an issue with the previous install, or simply a 2018 issue, or even just file corruption.  The old PC crashed occasionally and I learned not to trust files that had crashed due to random corruption from the crash.  I appreciate your insights though, and thanks for responding. 🙂