converting pdf files to autocad dwg. ?? 1

[masterchief]

Hi, I was wondering if it was possible to convert a scanned image to an editable dwg. format. I have heard that Adobe Illustrator allows this to be done for pdf files.
I need to convert a large number of printed images to autocad documents and have no idea how to.
Thanks for any advice!

 

[borgunit]

First, understand the difference between the two, raster and vector files that is. Raster files are what photos, scans, tif, etc are. A raster file is somewhat like having a whole gridwork of dots (ie pixels) on a page. You give a certain dot a color and when the dots are numerous enough and you are zoomed back far enough, you see a picture (drawing). To make a straight line in a raster image, you just make sure the dots are colored (black usually) and then are directly next to each other and inline. Well an AutoCAD drawing is a vector format file. Vectors are defined points (ie your line is drawn from point 0,0,0 to 100,0,0 and you now have a 100 unit long line). AutoCAD works by defining the vectors and then to represent a line on screen, it generates a colored straight line between those two points. To convert from raster to vector, you have to turn the lined up dots into a line defined by vectors. There are programs that will try to figure this out for you but it is not an exact science, and you will still need to "assist" the program to get a complete and final drawing. As an example, if you insert a raster image into AutoCAD and then try to "trace" lines over the raster lines, you will get what the raster-to-vector converters try to do. I know this is long winded but it might help to understand why converting from vector to raster is possible, but raster to vector is not quite so easily possible.

"Everybody is ignorant, only on different subjects." — Will Rogers

 

[MarauderX]

http://www.trixsystems.com/pdf2vector.html?source=google&campaign=convert_PDF_to_CAD  

Converts PDFs to DXF or other format, though it's rough. Price is $395.

 

[CADSTUDENT]

Masterchief
Many scanning programs can create a DXB (drawing interchange binary) file after scanning. The file created is in binary code. The DXBIN command converts this code into drawing data. To import a DXB file into Autocad, pick Drawing Exchange binary from the Insert pull-down menu, or type DXBIN at the command prompt. The Select DXB File dailog box appears. Select the scanned file and pick the Open button. You can then edit and save the drawing using typical Autocad commands. Hope this helps - John

 

[Beggar]

You can convert raster files (.jpg, etc) to vector files (.dwg) using WinTopo (

http://www.wintopo.com).

If you're starting with a PDF then you'll need to first convert it to raster by means of Acrobat or Photoshop (likely Illustrator,too, but dunno for sure).

 

[IFRs]

In Adobe 6 you can SaveAs to a JPEG file ( and many others ) so that gets you half way.

 

[panelman]

does saving as a postscript (ps or eps) help? I think that is vector

 

[masterchief]

Heya,
Thanks for the tips. In the end, it proved to be easiest to scan the files in .tif format, then convert them using the wintopo freeware on wintopo.com.
The text needs to be retyped after scanning, but the rest of the drawing is usually fine. It saves a lot of time.