Solidworks Watermark for Drawings 1

[BodyBagger]

Hello all,
Does anyone know if SW has a feature for adding a watermark to a drawing? We have a problem with purchasing sending out drawings that are not "released" yet and if I can add a watermark across the drawings it should be the same as a slap in the face.

Keep in mind I am not in a position to change the processes of how we do things here or the file structure of the PDM vault regarding who has access to what. Yes, purchasing has full access to all the files released and not yet released. Is this bad, yes, but also out of my hands.

Thanks for any input,
BB

 

[JMirisola]

How about creating a block that says 'NOT RELEASED' that you can insert into the drawing until it is released.

It's good that you realize how bad things are...

Jeff Mirisola, CSWP
Design Manager/Senior Designer
M9 Defense
My Blog

 

[Updraft]

BB,

At one place I worked we set our drawing templates to have a watermark "Not Released for Production" in big letters at about a 30 degree angle just above the titleblock. We did this by editing the sheet format so it was behind the views and notes on the top of the drawing. We just inserted an annotation and from there made the text bold, angled, and colored a light grey.

When we promoted the drawing to released status we simply edited the sheet format and deleted this annotation.

- - -Updraft

 

[BodyBagger]

Hi JMirisola,
Thank you and I did consider that as a good option but I wanted to check with the community for other ideas as well. Every so often I find out that SW has a feature that I never knew was there.

Regards,
BB

 

[fcsuper]

SolidWorks doesn't have a watermark function at all. The difficulty in faking a watermark comes from SolidWorks limited ability to handle the order of objects on a drawing, and the need to not interfer with the content of the drawing. There are a couple of ways to fake it.

If you don't need to edit the content of your watermark (e.g., change the wording, remove it, or add it back), you can add an OLE image object that can be ordered to show up under the drawing objects (this is about the only type of object that can be ordered in SolidWorks). Using OLE solutions is always a last resort for me, since relying on Windows to get objects right on your drawing can be dangerous (increases the likelihood of crashes). The other draw back to this method is that you have to directly place and remove the watermark if you need to add it and remove it based on release status. Also, the content cannot be edited. The OLE solution can be a hassle if you want to keep the watermark locations consistant across sheets and across drawings. (Actually, another drawback is that an OLE object will register as an image when the drawing is printed or saved as a PDF, which will make it inaccessable Adobe Acrobat Professional)

The other method is to use a custom property, block and layers on the sheet format. This is a bit more complex, so check out this article I wrote when I developed this technique: Adding linked value watermarks to drawings It's not 100% fool proof since SolidWorks still has some strange object ordering that cannot be changed, but it works fine in most cases. (If printing or saving to a PDF, this type of watermark can be accessed by Adobe Acrobat Professional.)



Matt Lorono
Lorono's SolidWorks Resources & SolidWorks Legion

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/solidworks & http://twitter.com/fcsuper

 

[fcsuper]

Updraft,

At one place I worked we set our drawing templates to have a watermark "Not Released for Production" in big letters at about a 30 degree angle just above the titleblock. We did this by editing the sheet format so it was behind the views and notes on the top of the drawing. We just inserted an annotation and from there made the text bold, angled, and colored a light grey.

You may wish to re-check your drawings that have that kind of "watermark". Placing text on your sheet format does not force it under drawing views and elements on the drawing iteself. Text (regardless of where it is) will always appear over a drawing view.

Also, please see the link I posted above, as it has a solution that doesn't require directly editing the sheet format once the watermark exists.

Matt Lorono
Lorono's SolidWorks Resources & SolidWorks Legion

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/solidworks & http://twitter.com/fcsuper

 

[rgrayclamps]

Hi, BodyBagger:

At the place where I work, we do not add anything to SW documents. We add "PRELIMINARY" stamp (30 degree angle) on pdf version which is considered "official" document.

Best regards,

Alex

 

[Updraft]

Matt,

My reference to being under the views meant that it isn't in the way of working on that level. It exists literally in the background. Whether it prints on top or not we didn't care since it was gray text anyway. It is a simple thing for the designers to edit the sheet format to delete this when the drawing gets promoted, yet it is a bit more difficult to defeat for those that can only open the drawings for viewing/printing. This was a simple technique that proved to be very effective for us.

- - -Updraft

 

[fcsuper]

Alex,

You add a "PRELIMINARY" stamp on the "official" PDF? I'm guessing this is only for the preliminary stage, and that the stampe is removed later for release?

We used to do this at my company too. However, the Stamp function in PDF is treated as a Comment element in Acrobat, which means that the user can choose to (or accidentally) print the document without the Stamp. I would recommend using Acrobat Professional's Watermark and Header functions instead of Stamps, if is the approach you are taking. Watermarks and headers are easier to handle too, since batches of files can be updated at one time, and you can standardize the look and location.

Also, I think the problem that the OP has is that Purchasing as direct access to the actual SolidWorks files themselves.

Matt Lorono
Lorono's SolidWorks Resources & SolidWorks Legion

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/solidworks & http://twitter.com/fcsuper

 

[rgrayclamps]

Hi, Matt:

When I said "STAMP", I meant water marks in pdf. We do use Acrobat Professional.

To Updraft:

Sheet format command is supposed to be used for designing sheet formats. It is not supposed to be used when one uses the sheet formats.

Best regards,

Alex

 

[SteveMartin]

Just hope your purchasing department and/or vendors pay attention to whatever type of watermark/warning you want to use. I've seen parts made to drawings that had big red bold notes stating 'PRELIMINARY - DO NOT MANUFACTURE'. Was a hell of a puzzle why the parts were so far off the print (looking at the later, released print, not realizing they'd been made to a preliminary copy).

 

[Updraft]

Alex,

Using the sheet format the way we did worked very well for us in that situation. Engineering had control of the pseudo watermark and we did it in such a way that it was reliable and unobtrusive. Where I am now the purchasing guys only get access to a released pdf.

The only time we send out anything preliminary comes from Engineering with the drawing clearly marked. We only do this for picking the vendors' brains.

I agree with the others that Purchasing needs to only have access to certain things and clearly respect and know how to use what they have access to.

- - -Updraft