Design Integration Laboratory

Design Tools - Connections

2D -> 3D by DXF

Objective

These notes are intended to help translate drawings previously made in almost any a 2D drawing/drafting application into DesignWorkshop® for 3D model layout and contruction, using the Autodesk DXF (Document EXchange) format.

In general, it usually makes sense to use DXF to go from 2D into DesignWorkshop, because precise scaling is relatively automatic. If a DXF translator is not available for your drawing application, then it is also possible to bring Object PICT format drawings into DesignWorkshop, using manual tricks to achieve accurate scaling.

2D --> 3D Drawing Translation Process using DXF

Create the DXF drawing in your 2D drawing/drafting application:

1. As for any 2D to 3D export, elimintate any unneccesary objects in the source drawing before exporting.
   • Be especially careful to eliminate text, and dashed or dotted lines. These line styles may appear in In DesignWorkshop as individual line segments for each dot or dash. Because of the high overhead for each 3D object, these many tiny things can use up a tremendous amount of memory for little reason.

2. Export the objects to DXF format. (In PowerCADD, use the Save As... command.)

   Then bring the DXF drawing you have prepared into DesignWorkshop:

   1. Open a new DesignWorkshop model file in DesignWorkshop.

   2. Import the DXF drawing file into DesignWorkshop, using the File menu Import > DXF command. The drawing will be loaded into the z=0 elevation plane.

   3. Save the new DesignWorkshop file, which now contains the imported DXF objects as scaled 2D entities in the 3D modeling world.

   4. The translation process is complete. Now you can proceed to build your model with reference to the imported drawing objects. Use the Snap-to-Handles setting tool if you want to draw 3D objects based precisely on the imported linework.

   Note Also...

   Alternatively, drawings made in most 2D drawing/drafting applications can be brought into DesignWorkshop using the PICT format. Be sure to follow the first step above (simplification before translation) and also see the nearby instructions on 2D to 3D Using Object PICT.

   Over the next several months, these multi-step procedures will probably be superceded by more elegant translations using the "QuickDraw 3D Metafile" (3DMF) standard recently introduced by Apple Computer, Inc. This format will be supported in DesignWorkshop 2.0, and by most other Macintosh modeling programs.

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   http://www.dil.uoregon.edu/computing/tools/2d_to_3d_by_dxf.html - Posted 96.02.10 KMM