Topic: Color lineweight settings for ctb

[Jeff H]

Wondering if anyone wanted to share what lineweights you use and ask a couple of questions.
 
How many different lineweights do you put in a single drawing?

When you use a architects floorplan for the background do you put it on a very thin lineweight and or screening(usually see 8 used)?
 
 
 
As for setting one up and trying to keep it simple was wanting some suggestions.
 
I might of got the idea from here but could not find the post.
Looking at the pic below

The color number increases by 10 left to right in each row.

The numbers to left are the last number in each color for that row.
 
So to use 4 four basic groups Fine, Thin, Medium, Thick
 
Then do something like all colors that ends with 0 is a Fine, The row that ends with 2 is Thin, 4 is medium etc....
And maybe for a range of each group - Let all colors that end in 1 be Fine at the smallest value and all numbers that end in 0 be Fine at the heaviest value
 
0=.18, 1=.15
2=.25, 3=.20
4=.35, 5=.30
etc......
 
 
 
 
 

[dgorsman]

I try to use three lineweights for reduced size prints (thin, medium, thick), and four to five lineweights for full-size prints (thin, medium-thin, medium thick, thick).

There isn't much organization for now, in the past it was almost like somebody threw a handful of darts at the color table but I've moved that forward a bit.  For 3D models and derived elevation/plan drawings named colors (e.g. GREEN RED MAGENTA) for annotations and general lines, and numbered colors (e.g. 9 - 249) for 3D objects/object lines which all plot the same weight (different disciplines can choose pretty much any colors they want and still get the same result).  Numbered colors 250 - 254 plot a progressive combination of half/quarter tone at thin/thick weight.  For schematic type drawings (e.g. P&IDs) its named colors for everything.

Trying to group colors gets a little difficult, as the colors at the outside edges are too dark for common use plus many of the colors are too close together to pick out differences.  The way I figure it there's around a dozen "unique" colors that can be pulled out of the numbered colors area if you don't duplicate the ACI hard-equivalent of the named colors.

I'm slowly walking everybody towards a few basic concepts e.g. text being a separate color from lines, colors from the same grouping behaving in similar ways, etc.  Due to tight scheduling, multiple projects having different schedules, and different supervisors wanting different things making *any* changes is like herding cats through a catnip farm.

[CAB]

OMG quit using ctb 

[Jeff H]

OMG I never thought you were the type that would say OMG!
 
 
No problem with stb but do you ever find difficult to tell what your plot will look like by just looking at the drawing?

[CAB]

I just do a plot preview. 

It's just the fact that you're tied to colors for line weights except for overrides & pline widths.
Just easy to assign a plot style to a layer and forget it.
Play style names line VeryFine Fine Light Medium Heavy VeryHeavy or maybe you like Med30 Med35 Med40.

Sorry to be so abrupt but I have a thing about color styles.

[Jeff H]

I think we might try stb's,
but was more wondering for example what weight do you use for 1/8" text, or new devices vs existing devices?
For floorplan background?

[danallen]

OMG quit using ctb 

I like to know the colors on the screen match the lineweight (WYSIWYG). I could use STBs, but then I have to check both the color and lineweight setting are in sync.

Dan

[hmspe]

100% CTB here.  Magenta is .70mm.  Everything else from color 1 to 14 is .35mm.  15 to 239 and 250 to 255 are .25mm.  239 uses object line weight (for title blocks that don't work well with my standard pens).  240 and 241 are .13mm.  242 through 249 are .09mm.  8, 9, and 250 to 255 print by the color number.  Everything else from 1 to 14 and 240 to 249 prints black.  From 15 to 239 print 55% screened.

Less than 5% of my clients use STB.  I convert everything I get to my color scheme.  The colors I use are to make it easy for me -- walls are color 82, ceiling grid 142, FF&E 54.  My symbols are cyan and magenta. 

Works well for me.  YMMV.

[StykFacE]

CTB's.... ugh, man it's things like this that make me discourage AutoCAD more and more and reminds me of how great Revit can be. BTW, STB's are the shiznits and I love them. I wiiiiiish my company would adopt them as our standard.

I like having a "copied" Profile with my PSpace set to White. I have a few extra templates that have the PSpace Layouts set to "Display Plot Styles" then I turn LWT to ON. This gives me a nice feel when I'm touching up the sheets file. Almost makes you feel like you're in Revit. NOT!!! But still, I notice myself leaving these settings on more and more nowadays. I guess Revit has rubbed off on me. But if you're worried about Lineweights, this is a good tip IMHO.

[Kerry]

Works well for me.  YMMV.

Doesn't vary much ...

I use the colour numbers above 11 mainly for modelling ..

Unless details are complicated I use colour numbers under 11 for details ... but I'm NOT an architect

This block has been on my titleblocks for more years than I really care to remember ...

added to translate:
the listing is [colour no.] and the OLD METRIC Rotring Pen size used on an A1 drawing
... the actual line weights I use are slightly less when printing to A3 paper ( which is normally the case )

[BlackBox]

See and I can't stand layouts that have a page setup that shows the plot... I work in CAD, while in cad I want to see my drawings in color. I work in paper space through viewports (once a drawing is setup), and if I want to see it in BW, either plot preview or send to PDF. Lemon squeezy.

Oh, and long live CTB, let the holy war continue!


FWIW - we are testing STB, I'm just not won over yet; still getting used to NCS mallarchy. LoL

[jonesy]

Our pen tables typically mimic the old drawing pens... eg white = 0.25mm pen width

As we often have to use client standards, we find that it does seem to vary from client to client.

[StykFacE]

FWIW - we are testing STB, I'm just not won over yet; still getting used to NCS mallarchy. LoL

RenderMan, take a second to think about STB's. Instead of keeping track of 256 colors and what lineweights are associated with that "color", you just apply a lineweight to whatever color you want. In other words, color no longer matters. You like dim layers in green, someone else in red... Who cares with STB but man... Heaven forbid a CTB gets in on that mix and you'll see a world of hurt if the lineweights differ by a large margin between green and red.

Also, masking is phenomenal with STB's. Just create a style and name it "Mask" or whatever, then set the screening to 0%. Now you have instant masking - no more wipeouts, no more locked into True Color 255,255,255. There are huge benefits to STB's and personally, I wish Autodesk would get rid of CTB's. Sure, some old schooler's would be biznatching for a while but they'll soon realize how much better and more powerful STB's are.

Oh and another thing, I think STB's get embedded into the file so when you send files to outside parties they're still there, correct? I've never attempted it but I have purged STB styles from outside CAD files so I assume. If this is confirmed then that's another benefit.

Just my $0.02 is all.  :kewl:

[BlackBox]

FWIW - we are testing STB, I'm just not won over yet; still getting used to NCS mallarchy. LoL

RenderMan, take a second to think about STB's. Instead of keeping track of 256 colors and what lineweights are associated with that "color", you just apply a lineweight to whatever color you want. In other words, color no longer matters. You like dim layers in green, someone else in red... Who cares with STB but man... Heaven forbid a CTB gets in on that mix and you'll see a world of hurt if the lineweights differ by a large margin between green and red.

Also, masking is phenomenal with STB's. Just create a style and name it "Mask" or whatever, then set the screening to 0%. Now you have instant masking - no more wipeouts, no more locked into True Color 255,255,255. There are huge benefits to STB's and personally, I wish Autodesk would get rid of CTB's. Sure, some old schooler's would be biznatching for a while but they'll soon realize how much better and more powerful STB's are.

Oh and another thing, I think STB's get embedded into the file so when you send files to outside parties they're still there, correct? I've never attempted it but I have purged STB styles from outside CAD files so I assume. If this is confirmed then that's another benefit.

Just my $0.02 is all.  :kewl:

I agree with you, and in a world where only what we wanted to do internally mattered STB's would be the way to go....

However, you neglect to consider those of us whom work predominantly using client-specific CAD Standards, as we do (in my new group). Most municipalities, have their own CAD Standards which... well... aren't exactly on the cutting edge, thus I must consider how best to leverage the technology with which I work, to meet or exceed my client's requirements.

Just in the past 60 days, I've received 5 client's CAD Standards, all of which vary in completeness, and consistency which prompted this thread... Now, consider not just STB, but having to setup Civil 3D Styles (all of them), for each_and_every_client on the fly. 

[CAB]

Not likely that you are going to change your client's old habits but I thought the question was about setting up your "In House" standards.
Why not move to the modern method? 

[Jeff H]

What lineweights do you guys/gals normally use for new vs existing objects?

[BlackBox]

Not likely that you are going to change your client's old habits but I thought the question was about setting up your "In House" standards.
Why not move to the modern method? 

... Fair enough. *tips hat*

What lineweights do you guys/gals normally use for new vs existing objects?

Our existing pen weights are typically 0.12 mm or smaller, and proposed range from 0.25 mm  -> 1.00 mm

[Jeff H]

Not likely that you are going to change your client's old habits but I thought the question was about setting up your "In House" standards.
Why not move to the modern method? 

... Fair enough. *tips hat*

What lineweights do you guys/gals normally use for new vs existing objects?

Our existing pen weights are typically 0.12 mm or smaller, and proposed range from 0.25 mm  -> 1.00 mm

Your pen is small compared to other weight settings

[CAB]

I don't make them narrower but add screening to the line weights. (40 to 60)

[Jeff H]

I don't make them narrower but add screening to the line weights. (40 to 60)

Here they use thinner lineweights to make them look lighter.
I need to try that out to see how it looks.

[BlackBox]

Not likely that you are going to change your client's old habits but I thought the question was about setting up your "In House" standards.
Why not move to the modern method? 

... Fair enough. *tips hat*

What lineweights do you guys/gals normally use for new vs existing objects?

Our existing pen weights are typically 0.12 mm or smaller, and proposed range from 0.25 mm  -> 1.00 mm

Your pen is small compared to other weight settings

Tell me about it.. 

Being serious though, we also use a pen weight of 0.00 mm (which can vary, depending on the minimum of a given printing device), with 0% screening... This produces the lightest black line possible, so-to-speak.

We had difficulty dealing with recipients not being able to print the same hardcopy plans we did, when using screen colors throughout our existing line work, hence the 0.00 mm mentioned above.

[StykFacE]

@Render, I know the client-specific Standards game all to well. 90% of my company does design that has to follow someone else Standards. Such a pain....

[BlackBox]

@Render, I know the client-specific Standards game all to well. 90% of my company does design that has to follow someone else Standards. Such a pain....

Certainly; I know this dynamic is not isolated to our group, and is something which many face.

Since transferring from a Transportation group into a Utility-based group, this seems to be significantly more demonstrative of our utility clients, much to our misfortune. Now, I am forced to implement new ways of expediting our process, given the need for Civil 3D Styles, and AMEP's, what is it, Display View Representations... I digress.

/offtopic

[Chris]

To answer the original question, we use several different colors, many with the same lineweight, mostly because we can then see it on the screen and know what we are looking at.
Red = .5
Yellow = .7
Green = .35
Blue, Cyan, White = .25
Magenta = .18
Several other colors, mostly using .25, and a couple that use 1.

I looked at switching to STB a while back.  I couldnt find a reason to make the switch.  I found more cons than pros.  Our dim text needing to be heavier than our dim lines was one of them.  If they are all on the same layer, and the lineweight is controlled by the layer, you cant do it.  I think there is a poll I posted on it somewhere around here.  Nobody was heavily in favor of one way or the other.

[CAB]

mostly because we can then see it on the screen and know what we are looking at.

This only works if you stay with your standards.

Our dim text needing to be heavier than our dim lines was one of them.  If they are all on the same layer, and the lineweight is controlled by the layer, you cant do it. 

You need to use a heaver font. 
 

[dgorsman]

Clients getting half the P&IDs in all Magenta, a third all in white, and the remainder in a mixed bag of colors just doesn't look good for whoever produced them.  It gets worse in 3D, where a pipe run passes through multiple models.  If it suddenly changes from sky-blue to dark green everybody from the checkers to the client is going to be wondering what the reason is, and "Because I like that color better" just isn't a good enough reason.

If we are therefore going to standardize colors then it's easy enough to use that for plot weights as well.  Less for users to remember, less to set up, and less conditioning work prior to sending back to client (who has everything in CTB to start with) which reduces possible errors ("Ooops, left that one drawing in Magenta, now clients complaining they can't print properly").

[StykFacE]

Well lets talk about object coloring for a sec.... sometimes I want an additional annotation layer to be yellow instead of green because of "notes". They are still on a plot layer, but in the model I want them to stand out. Now what if green is .25mm but yellow is 1.5mm - it's simply not going to work. So now, I have to open the CTB file, go to the Table tab and scroll down to see if I can see a "yellowish" color that's .25mm lineweight.

Or, I could simply apply that plot style right to whatever layer I want and call it a day.

On a side note, CTB's can technically work like STB's to a point. Just set all the colors to "Use Object Lineweight" in the CTB file and set the lineweights in the layer itself (obviously Templates come into play good in this scenario).

[dgorsman]

On a side note, CTB's can technically work like STB's to a point. Just set all the colors to "Use Object Lineweight" in the CTB file and set the lineweights in the layer itself (obviously Templates come into play good in this scenario).

We have a couple of clients which do this, and it works quite well provided the line weight is set properly (either on the layer or on the object).  We've had a few users try to add their own layers but use "Default" line weight and wonder "It looks the same on screen, why do they plot differently?".  I can see the same problem with STB's: it's one more setting to manage, either manually or automatically.  They have their advantages, but there are drawbacks as well.

[StykFacE]

I don't see STB's as much of a draw back to be honest when compared to CTB's. The only drawback would be if someone decided to get all crazy and name each style in pig latin or something. Keeping a good naming convention for each Lineweight is the best protocol. Or even if you use the "Extra Bold, Bold, Medium, Thin, Extra Thin" naming convention then that works too.

Take layer control for example. When you have an existing drawing that you've been cruising along in for awhile and want to add a new layer, you automatically choose a color. Most often this is because you correlate the color with the lineweight thickness you want that layer to be. Well with STB's you have an extra step of selecting whatever named style you want. If you don't, it uses the Default (you can't delete the Default) and it inherits the global lineweight that was decided when the STB file was created. So in a sense there's no drawback, only a different routine.

*EDIT* Just to add: The big drawback for CTB's in my opinion is (1) having to "hunt" for the lineweight selected for whatever color you're after and (2) no ability to override single objects unless "By Object" is chosen on the CTB. Certainly the limitations of CTB far exceed the limitations of STB.

[Jeff H]

I don't see STB's as much of a draw back to be honest when compared to CTB's. The only drawback would be if someone decided to get all crazy and name each style in pig latin or something. Keeping a good naming convention for each Lineweight is the best protocol. Or even if you use the "Extra Bold, Bold, Medium, Thin, Extra Thin" naming convention then that works too.

Thats how we name ours
 
Extraway Oldbay
Oldbay
Ediummay
Inthay
Extraway Inthay

[alanjt]

I have 1-7 at various thicker widths; a few randoms in the 8-15 (15 is really thick for titleblock border), then it's all x0 is thickest, x1 is thicker, x2 is thick, x3-x9 thin.

[Jeff H]

Do any of you perfer screening and/or using thinner lineweights to accent different objects?
 
For example
New objects = 0.35 - 0.5
Existing objects = 0.15 - 0.25
 
or
New objects = 0.35 - 0.5
Existing objects = 0.35 - 0.5 @ 75% screening

[StykFacE]

I don't see STB's as much of a draw back to be honest when compared to CTB's. The only drawback would be if someone decided to get all crazy and name each style in pig latin or something. Keeping a good naming convention for each Lineweight is the best protocol. Or even if you use the "Extra Bold, Bold, Medium, Thin, Extra Thin" naming convention then that works too.

Thats how we name ours
 
Extraway Oldbay
Oldbay
Ediummay
Inthay
Extraway Inthay

Ouyay on'tday avehay away airhay onway ouryay assway. Atthay
ouldway ebay ootay unnyfay!!

[alanjt]

I don't see STB's as much of a draw back to be honest when compared to CTB's. The only drawback would be if someone decided to get all crazy and name each style in pig latin or something. Keeping a good naming convention for each Lineweight is the best protocol. Or even if you use the "Extra Bold, Bold, Medium, Thin, Extra Thin" naming convention then that works too.

Thats how we name ours
 
Extraway Oldbay
Oldbay
Ediummay
Inthay
Extraway Inthay

Ouyay on'tday avehay away airhay onway ouryay assway. Atthay
ouldway ebay ootay unnyfay!!

Sweet, you got your standards off ebay?!

[dgorsman]

Do any of you perfer screening and/or using thinner lineweights to accent different objects?
 
For example
New objects = 0.35 - 0.5
Existing objects = 0.15 - 0.25
 
or
New objects = 0.35 - 0.5
Existing objects = 0.35 - 0.5 @ 75% screening

Yup.  We do half-tone and full lineweight for existing and vendor-supplied objects which are dark grey and orange in the model, respectively.  Thin lines and half-tone don't always print properly, especially when printing to photocopiers.

[TimSpangler]

I prefer thinner lineweights over shading only because the old 755 is terrible at shading.  The 1055 on the other hand is great.