DWG import losing text

[joconnell]

Heya Folks,

Normally I'm a graphics and vfx guy so I don't deal with autocad files all that much but a friend that is doing the plans for an extension on my house needs a few visualisations done for his architetural work to sell certain ideas to his clients or even give them an idea of the end result. I've gotten a few dwg files from him but they are coming in missing the text. The text layer is there in my layer dialog but the actual text shapes aren't. I've got autodesks trueview and the text is in there fine so does anyone know of an export option from autocad similar to "create outlines from text" in illustrator? Or is there something else in the export dialog that may do this automatically?

Also what's people general workflow for this type of thing? Since I've got multiple levels of floor plans and all the various elevations I'm going to treat it almost like building a car model by aligning each floor on top of one another and using each of the elevationviews to trace from - is this exceptionally dumb? As I mentioned I've never really worked with dwg files or architecture on any professional level so any general workflow advices or pointers would be most appreciated.

Cheers!

john

[RErender]

To import the text it needs to be "exploded" to line segments in Autocad, then it will come in as splines. Do you really need them though? I normally just consult the cad in a viewer or print the areas I'm concerned with.

As far as your technique, your right on, that is how it is done. Normally the floor plans take precedence over the elevations as the elevations don't always match exactly.

Depending on what you plan to do with the models the quickest way to model is to trace the walls with splines, extrude them up and boolean out the doors and windows. If you need a cleaner mesh then you can poly model each wall using the elevations as a guide.

I'd stay away from the max doors and windows as the are created with overlapping faces. But they could be cleaned up or used as a guide.

As you get working feel free to ask more.

[joconnell]

Thanks for that Eric - always good to get reassurance from someone whos knows what they're doing so I'm not shooting myself in the foot