Tiff Images come out to lite
Tiff Images come out to lite
(OP)
When a SW file is issued here, a tiff image gets magically (API) created for viewing and printing purposes. The same goes for our AutoCAD drawings.
The problem lies in the line weight in the SW Tiff. I hate to say it but the AutoCAD tiffs come out fine. I have tried manually saving out a file as a tiff in SW, messing with all the options and received the same results. Very lite lines.
The only way that I am able to get a half way descent tiff is to change the line weight in the document settings to Thick2 which now makes the drawing look pretty ugly.
I talk to our API guru and asked if he could switch the line thickness before the tiff is generated and he said yes. Now I am thinking that I am going to have to test out all border sizes and scales before I can tell him what to set the thicknesses to.
Has anybody run into this? Any suggestions?
I know there is E-drawings and a free SW viewer. I think creating a E-drawing of a 3000 component assembly would probably bring E-drawings to its knees. Any way they are not an option, at this time, for us.
The problem lies in the line weight in the SW Tiff. I hate to say it but the AutoCAD tiffs come out fine. I have tried manually saving out a file as a tiff in SW, messing with all the options and received the same results. Very lite lines.
The only way that I am able to get a half way descent tiff is to change the line weight in the document settings to Thick2 which now makes the drawing look pretty ugly.
I talk to our API guru and asked if he could switch the line thickness before the tiff is generated and he said yes. Now I am thinking that I am going to have to test out all border sizes and scales before I can tell him what to set the thicknesses to.
Has anybody run into this? Any suggestions?
I know there is E-drawings and a free SW viewer. I think creating a E-drawing of a 3000 component assembly would probably bring E-drawings to its knees. Any way they are not an option, at this time, for us.
BBJT CSWP






RE: Tiff Images come out to lite
"Happy the Hare at morning for she is ignorant to the Hunter's waking thoughts."
RE: Tiff Images come out to lite
Thanks
BBJT CSWP
RE: Tiff Images come out to lite
DimensionalSolutions@Core.com
While I welcome e-mail messages, please post all thread activity in these forums for the benefit of all members.
RE: Tiff Images come out to lite
Regards,
Jon
jgbena@yahoo.com
RE: Tiff Images come out to lite
Regards,
Kevin
RE: Tiff Images come out to lite
Would your VAR be willing to talk to me? I would like to know what they added to fix the problem. They may be doing what we are going to try. That is changing the lineweight behind the scenes through the API. If this is the way thay are doing it, it would be helpful to know what settings they chose.
Thanks for replying. It helps to know that we are not "the only ones" that are doing this with SolidWorks. It also gives me hope that there may be an easier way, of correcting this problem, than what I drummed up.
BBJT CSWP
RE: Tiff Images come out to lite
What settings are you using in your TIFF output? I've used these for years with excellent results
Image Type: Black & White (bilevel)
Compression Scheme: Group 4 Fax
Print Capture
DPI:600
Paper Size: A-Landscape
I use these images for inserting into Word documents for manuals and such and they work wonderfully. The files are small (100k or less), have good resolution and look great when printed.
RE: Tiff Images come out to lite
BBJT CSWP
RE: Tiff Images come out to lite
I spoke with our VAR. They have no problem in talking with you on this topic.
How do we hook up in this forum?
Kevin
RE: Tiff Images come out to lite
My hotmail account is BBJT_7@hotmail.com. If you or your VAR could send me an email with your VARS number it would be greatly appreciated. If they prefer to contact me I will reply with my phone number.
I will post back here to let everyone know if this was a successful fix. If for some reason it is not Keven still gets a star for the effort.
Thanks Keven!
BBJT CSWP
RE: Tiff Images come out to lite
When we issue a SW file a Tiff gets created behind the scenes. The service that we wrote pulls up the DRW and saves it as a TIFF useing the print capture option. After digging into this, and almost giving up, I stumbled across the answer. In 2001Plus when you go to File, Print there is a button in the dialog box called Line Weights. This is where you can set the specific value for the Thin, Normal, Thick, Thick1, etc. This not only affects printing to printer/plotters but it also affects saving as tiffs using the Print Capture option.
I would also like to thank you, Kevin, for hooking me up with your VAR. Your effort was greatly appreciated. However the VAR seemed a little reluctant to help me with out a work order. Who knows, maybe they were not aware of the above. You might want to share it with them.
BBJT CSWP
RE: Tiff Images come out to lite
RE: Tiff Images come out to lite
BBJT CSWP
RE: Tiff Images come out to lite
I just got this in my email because I belong to the topica newsgroup concerning Solidworks. www.topica.com This group is well worth your time to check out. There are a lot of helpful folks out there. You guys should check it out and www.solidmag.com and get there newsletter...very helpful as well.
Anyways, I thought this may help those of you dealing with Tiff files
I subscride SolidMag's Solid Digital Digest and with permission have reprinted a SW tip below. It is a nice feature SW has when creating tif files for sending drawings to customers without any CAD software or CAD viewers:
SolidMag Q & A:
Q.: We have a customer with no CAD software and what we do is take a .tif-formatted SolidWorks model and convert it to a .pdf file or .jpg with good results. That may help with better documents than straight .tifs, which are very poor and lose a lot of tolerance and dimensional info. -- Wayne
Utz, Flowdesine, Atlanta, Ga.
A.:
When saving your SolidWorks drawing as a .tif file, check to be sure you have the following settings:
Black & White
Group 4 fax
Print capture
600 DPI
These settings will create a small file that has excellent resolution and will work well when inserted into another document. -- M. T. (Merry) Owen, MAKO Engineering (WA) Pty Ltd
As featured in SOLID Digital Digest. Subscribe to this free, email newsletter at:
www.D-Digest.com and received weekly SolidWorks tips, tricks and user news.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I tried it and it works great. The tif file is very small and can be opened & printed by Windows default imaging programs very well.
I hope this helps,
Dan Bovinich
~~~~~~~~Working with Solids~~~~~~~~
Owner of list: Dan Bovinich dan@bovinich.net
SolidWorks links: http://mywebpages.comcast.net/swuser/links.htm
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Best Regards,
Scott Baugh, CSWP

credence69@REMOVEhotmail.com
http://www.3dmca.com
http://home.insightbb.com/~scott.baugh/
*When in doubt always check the help first*