I'm still using Illustrator 10 and I need to import AutoCAD files from a user on a PC. The only files he can give me that open are .dxf's. But when I open them all the arrows have converted to circles and all corner radiuses have disappeared. Also, all lines are filled instead of stroked. This guys AutoCAD files have become editing nightmares once that hit my Mac in Illustrator. Any suggestions?

wade_zimmerman

Tell them to dumb down the files and also send you it as an .eps.

But chances are they are messing it up on purpose. I work with some of these guys and they think AutoCAD is so special that they make it almost impossible to open.

They keep talking about it not being the architectural or AutoCAD way of doing things I had their boss tell them to forget about that and just send the file so I can open it. Now I have no problems opening them. And I only have the info I need.

Monkey, I'm not sure what you're talking about! You need to explain.

proudest_monkey

Smitty...im with Wade...the autocad guys didnt want to help until a new guy was hired...his solution was to copy and paste the existing files, onto a new file and save them as .dwg's...it is a lowball version of stripping information out...since then I have had no problems!

My AutoCAD guy says he can't export an .eps file? Is this true?

proudest_monkey

Okay, what I have the auto-cad guy do is open the file, select the image, copy it, open a new blank file and paste...then save it as a .dwg...

The new guy had been using this trick for years and said that auto-cad files carry a lot of information that is unecessary for Illustrator, and that all that junk can also wreak havoc when you try to open them out of auto-cad.

You can also work around this if you have Hijack pro...open up your auto-cad file and then save as an .eps.

proudest_monkey

smitty...I really dont know squat about Auto-cad, but the guys here say the same thing...the easiest format to use is .dwg...but if it closes or locks your Illy, it's because there is too much garbage coming thru with the file...I have had great success with the copy and paste method...worse thing that happened is one file that had to be copied and pasted into a new file about 4 times before I could open it up *this file was just horrible to begin with on the Auto-cad side*

proudest_monkey

DING-DING-DING...that is it...when the file has too much info in it, your Illy will barf it back up...all the bells and whistles that make auto-cad what it is are being sent over with the .dwg, and Illy just cant handle it...I had about 300 images that were causing that issue, but after dumbing them down, they all worked great!

Hijack Pro also works pretty well...that is what I used to use when I had a PC, but once I learned the old copy/paste trick I just quit using it.

Hope it works out for you! :-)

I'm going to talk to my AutoCAD guy about your copy paste method. The thing is I don't seem to be able to open the .dwg file at all. It starts to, but gets half way across the progress bar and just quits out of Illustrator (like it can't handle the file). Also, I noticed when opening the .dxf file if I change the default open settings it won't work. I am now communicating with a guy at Kandu Software and he says he has software to make this conversion painless. He had me send him one of my AutoCAD guy's .dwg files and said he would send it back to me as an Illustrator file to show me how well it works. I'm waiting...