Formz to illustrator pipeline woes.

[sjj]

Hi,

I have a pipeline that involves firstly importing outline from illustrator in to Formz to create panels for arcade cabinets. I then edit and manipulate in Formz until I have the cabinet designed. I then have to layout all the panels on the ground plane and derive a face that represents the outline of the said panel, when all parts are layed and derived I then export as a flat object as dxf or dwg to import into illustrator where its tweaked and then exported for CNC.

It's a tedious and long winded process.

I've been trying to use Draft layout to get workable vectors into illustrator but what I get is pain! As you can see from the attached images, the image looks fine in draft.

Once the export is opened in illustrator it's a mess!

Does anyone have any idea how I can fix/workaround to get it to work?

Thanks in advance

[sjj]

oh and another point is export image to illustrator is always greyed out.

[Justin Montoya]

I may be missing a critical step of your workflow, but can I ask why not just use FormZ for the whole process?  FormZ to CNC works well by itself with DXF export I've been told.  I also don't see why you would need to do anything with Draft when you can setup the same scenario in FormZ.

I'm probably just missing an important step in your workflow, so maybe you can clarify a bit and we can brainstorm an easier solution.

[sjj]

I find 2d drafting in illustrator much easier than I do in Formz, plus I also have to create artwork that is later applied to the cabinets that I also do in illustrator. As for the CNC end everything used on that front is essentially 2D and in general the exports have facetted curves that I convert to smooth curves in illustrator and remove the mass of unneeded points as anyone who uses a cnc will know close together point steps can cause speed and feed issues which can lead to a pattern of burns on the material.

In regard to DXF/DWG everything is exported as a 3D object so even if an object is flat to the top projection and is exported and opened in a 2D environment, there are lines on top of lines and therefore require clean up. I know that people who use autocad have used the FLATSHOT command but i don't have ACAD.

Basically my issue is why the export from draft as seen in my images is not replicated when opened in another package (Surface lines and triangles etc)?

Yet another workaround is to create a hidden line render in Formz, export as an illustrator file then open and try to resize to the correct scale and cross my fingers in regard to size tolerances.

I've had several years of these kinds of issues and even though it pains me to have to learn to use yet another app I just started to use Shaper3d to circumvent these issues/woes.

[Tech]

Hi sjj,

We recommend exporting your parts from formZ, not Draft Layout, for this type of workflow. As a check, we created some basic 2D entity types in formZ 10, exported as DWG, and imported into Illustrator 2024. There are no overlapping lines or meshed faces in the resulting Illustrator import. (See screen captures, below.)

Please exporting a 2D shape on the XY plane in formZ and see if that works for you. If not, please send a description of the problem and small project file that exhibits the problem you are having to support@formz.com so we can assign a case number and see what the problem might be.

 

 

 

[sjj]

Seriously I could kick myself over this! To get what i wanted is so utterly simple. On export as dxf i simply add a rotation transformation to get the view I need (head slap!)

[Justin Montoya]

So it's the Export from FormZ or from Illustrator that you are performing the rotation transformation?