WHAT IS THE BEST RASTER TO VECTOR CONVERTOR?

[mitcham]

HI.
IN OUR COMPANY I HAVE BEEN ASKED TO FIND OUT ABOUT THE BEST AVAILABEL RASTER TO VECTOR PRODUCT AVAILABEL IN MARKET, SO A PURCHSE DECISION CAN BE MADE.
WOULD ANYONE PLEASE GIVE COMMENTS ON THIS ISSUE. YOUR KNOWLEDGABLE COMMENTS WILL HELP ME NARROW DOWN MY CHOICES.

THANK YOU ALL IN ADVANCE.

 

[CadDraftee]

Hi,

I have been using VP Studio for this kind of work. It is supposadly the best on the market - I am not sure as it is the only one I have used so I have nothing to compare to. It is quite pricy as far as the licence goes. Full version cost around $AUS8,000 per licence. There are other veriations that you can get to do individual tasks like VP RastorEdit which only alows editing of the restor no vector conversion. The convertion process differs from drawing to drawing dpending on quality of existing originals or the scanned images that you may have used. I found the some convertions could take anywhere beteeen 3 to 8 hours. We also used the same software for editing the images and using them as overlays in Autocad and adding autocad enties. Similar to using Xrefs. There website for further info is

http://www.softelec.com.

Another package I have heard of is CADOVerlay.

 

[ParticlePointer]

I too am in the market for raster to vector software. I recently saw an advertisement for a program named Scan2CAD that prices out at $249-$399US. They claim to have a better algorhythm. Does anyone have experience with this software?

 

[leanIE]

Here's a freebie you can try from autodesk (Autodesk Raster Design).....go down to 'Data & Downloads' .

cheers

http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/index?siteID=123112&id=2600114

 

[ParticlePointer]

leanIE

There doesn't seem to be any "Free" related software at the AutoDesk site link you gave. Are you refering to the "Trial Software" CD?

 

[leanIE]

ParticlePointer....yes, I was referring the trial CD.

 

[Rich2001]

For 2-d work for a cnc cutting system I have been using rastervect. It can be found at

http://www.rastervect.com/

 

[ParticlePointer]

At $80US this looks like a good deal. Still wonder if anyone has had experience with Scan2CAD.

 

[PeterCharles]

I compared Scan2CAD with Rasterex some years ago and there wasn't much in it, except the price!!
We did not persue conversion as the quality of the scanned images we were using was poor and it's difficult to make a silk purse out of a sows ear.

A demo of Scan2CAD can be downloaded from

http://www.softcover.com

 

[mitcham]

Hi again
Thanks for all feedbacks. I am still shopping around. For those who are looking for a freebie there is one called wintopo. you can download it from

http://www.wintopo.com.

Of course a demo of its pro version is also available, but I have not tried yet.

Thanks again