cambam to illustrator (dxf , polylines, paths)

[jimmer]

Help / advice needed on this process please. I'm a beginner in Cambam and Adobe Illustrator.

I have this outline in cambam which looks smooth (the big curve), when I export dxf and load it into illustrator I get about 12 straights segments for the curve.

The other thing is that I would like the outline to appear as a closed path in illustrator so I can fill it. I have worked out how to slowly join each section together (about 30 operations) but I don't want to do that again.

If it's easier to create the path in Illustrator and then move that to cambam I could do it that way maybe, but at the moment I'm quite happy doing the design work in cambam.

[dh42]

Hello,

It seems that illustrator do not handle arcs in the DXF, they are converted to lines (maybe there is a setting to define the number of point used for the conversion in ai)

In CB, use Polyline/remove arcs (on your drawing I use tolerance =0.05), then export to DXF

The file without arcs has no problem and can be filled in ai without joining anything.

I attach a converted file.

++
David

[jimmer]

Thank you.

I knew it should be a simple task. A couple of weeks ago I spent 10minutes manually joining the segments up in AI to make a path, before I thought 'this isn't right' and stopped.

[dh42]

Re

I've a look in AI settings, but I can't find a way to define the accuracy (nb of segments) for conversion arcs->line (I've only a little knowledge of AI)

++
David

[pixelmaker]

If I export a arc or a circle from Cambam as DXF and open it in Illustrator CC I have still arcs and circle. I don´t get segments.
The circle has in Illu 4 nodes in CB only 3 nodes

From Illustrator  to Cambam I use the R13/LT95 DXF export version and arcs also are still arcs.

ralf

[dh42]

Hello Ralf

Yes but only for an arc or circle alone, but not if the arcs are in a polyline (or if the arc IS a polyline like on the picture)

++
David

[pixelmaker]

Hello David
if I convert the arc into a polyline it arrives also as a arc in Illustrator, with bezier handles. The arc in Cambam has two nodes at the ends, in Illustrator I get a third node in the middle. But it is still a arc.
I think you have a old CS2 version, I save the illu file as CS2 and the CB file and the DXF.
I get no segments, also not in the CS2 version

ralf

[dh42]

Re

It's CS3, but maybe there is a setting somewhere that I have not found ?

++
David

[pixelmaker]

There was a DXF/DWG Plugin Update for CS3. I don´t know what changes are in the update. Please read the french doc.

The settings for DXF/DWG import/export are only in the im/export menue.
This are my im/export options in the attachment

ralf

[jimmer]

pixelmaker,

my AI is CS4.  It supports layers which was the purpose of that update.

This is what I get when I open your bogen.dxf

There is an options box during input which look similar to the one you show, but none of the options seem relevant to how it handles arcs.

So I don't know what's special about your setup!