Importing drawings

[Carla Lange]

Hi everyone, help is needed again.
I received some jpeg files of some drawings/plans of a part. This drawing has degree markings and several different shaped parts to it. My question is: How in the world to I duplicate it so I can put it in Coral Draw? Do I have to redraw the whole thing, or is there a different way to go about it? As you can tell, I'm so new at this it's scary. The plans say scale 1:1, but when I measured the exact print from my printer it was no way 1:1. They want the engravings perfect, and in the right place. Yipes, what have I gotten myself into? H_E_L_P! :D

Thank you again for any information

Carla

[Shaddy Dedmore]

Breathe Carla, breathe :D

Printing out pictures sometimes scales it and causes the original dimensions to be off. Depends on the printing the software.

Corel is good because you can keep an eye on the actual dimensions. If you can use the jpg to raster engrave, then maybe pic a reference on your jpg. For examle, if you have a circle that has to be 2" in diameter, then in corel, create a circle that's 2", then adjust the jpg size until your reference circle that you chose matches the new circle that is the correct size. Or choose a line or a rectangle etc...

If you need to get it into vector, then you have to use Corel Trace and convert it from Raster to Vector (or have Pete (http://home.wi.rr.com/bertrandart/vector_art.html)do it, looks like he charges 12 instead of 9 now, but still worth it).

Without seeing the picture, I can't really give any more advice. Also, is it something your cutting out and engraving?

Shaddy

[Rodne Gold]

It was most likely created with a vector based cad package unless its a hand drawn plan (dunno who does that anymore these days)
Ask the person that supplied it to send the stuff in vector format like DXF or DWG or EPS , most cad packages will export this and corel will import it (the problem you might have is with text and fonts)
Otherwise , do as shaddy says

[Dave Jones]

Is there a title block in the corner of the drawing, with the company name and title of the drawing? If so, is there a spot in there that says "Size" with a letter in it? (like "A", "B", "C", etc...)

If so, then that defines the sheet size of the original drawing. The 1:1 scale is going to be when the drawing is printed on the correct sheet size. To confuse things even more, there are ANSI sizes for engineering and Architectural sizes for, uh... architecture.

ANSI A = 8.5" x 11"
ANSI B = 11" x 17"
ANSI C = 17" x 22"
ANSI D = 22" x 34"
ANSI E = 34" x 44"

Architectural A = 9" x 12"
Architectural B = 12" x 18"
Architectural C = 18" x 24"
Architectural D = 24" x 36"
Architectural E = 36" x 48"

[Hale Reider]

If you want if perfect, see if they have it as a CAD file and drop that directly into your laser. with Epilog, you will need their CAD driver (download). I don't know what brand of machine you have, but most allow you to work with CAD files. If they don't have it as a CAD file, it still might be easier to recreate it in a 2d CAD file that will output DWG file. There are some free ones on the internet. I know, another learning curve. But, CAD files create a much more precise vector cut part.

Otherwise, you will need to bump the scale on Corel Draw to compensate. If the drawing was done by hand or if it was generated by something besides a CAD program, any error the draftsman made is going to go uncorrected. My humble opinion.

Hale Reider
http://tobecherished.com

[Joe Pelonio]

Sometimes you have to tell the customer that you need better artwork or even a hand drawn on paper drawing with all dimensions marked for accurate work like this. I get the same kind of jobs and most are giving me cad files, but with some it's hand drawn way off scale with dimensions or even a cardboard cutout where they traced, transferred the trace and hand cut. For those I have to measure everything and create it in Corel. Normally then I'll rastor/cut on card stock to verify that it fits the customer's pattern before doing it on the final material.

Jpeg is about the worst quality you can start with, and they lose resolution each time the file is saved. I'd tell your customer that you need at least a 300dpi tif, better yet a cad, ai or eps, and at least the dimensions of the outside so you can make it to scale or verify that it's to scale in their file.

[Carla Lange]

Thank you for all of your ideas. I guess the first step is to take a step backwards and take a deep breath!
I'm going to have to request a file format like ai or eps. I've tried to figure this thing out, and all of you are right in the fact that I just can't do it without the dimensions. This is only engraving, no vector cuts, so if I can import the file, all I would need to do is input what they want engraved, and erase the extra stuff......right?:D


Carla

[Michael McDuffie]

I've done a few cardboard traced items and I first scan them at 100% then use Shaddy's method to check scale. I then lighten the bitmap up. Sorry, I don't remember how I did that but I used bitmaps/edit bitmap which opens Photo-Paint.

After it light enough to still see detail, I put it on the guide layer and draw on top of it on layer 1. That way, I can see what it should look like but also see my attempts to match it.