The Pain of Exporting to 2D

ok guys, i have been messing for a long time to find reasonable ways to get rhino files into illustrator without losing any vectors and also having picture frames included, meaning that created layouts in rhino get outputted correctly.

since printing (exporting as pdf) only offers vector while losing picture frames -> or rasterised which kills all further options to reprocess the data is neither sufficient the only option which you can get further with is to export as a dxf or dwg which unfortunately messes up the text but ok for now…

just and here starts the problem, if i use any kind of scale on the picture frame the plain converts into NURBS and from then on its not possible to get the data out of Rhino anymore. only option is to use the gumball for scaling which is not sufficient and precise at all. why would it create NURBS surfaces along with simple scalings?

is there any chance this can be improved?

another thing is when i convert anything to bezier the curves get broken up into several segments, if i do anything to rejoin them again they get exported as polylines… only way is to keep it exploded and join in illustrator which again can be quite a pain.

can this maybe also be improved?

@dan can you maybe check it out?
here the test files if needed.

Test.3dm (3.4 MB)

Test.dxf (171.5 KB)

1 Like

Big topic. Sorry for the delayed uptake.

Have you been testing the RhinoWIP for Windows? I ask because @stevebaer has been working on a really nice SVG export option over there that I believe will alleviate a lot of the pain experienced going to 2D vector softwares like Illustrator.

yes big and important i would say

i have noticed yes, but i have not used windows wip once yet. i am not even sure if i can install it with a mac licence only. but honestly i would love to play with it.

generally i am longing for an option to prepare one paged presentational 2d layouts including picture frames for print. picture frames are still a pain to get out of rhino as described which cant be scaled regularly without breaking the option to export them.

i have grown fond trying to make whole layouts in rhino because its very fast except the zoom which is still slightly laggy using a mouse but otherwise its very fast. i know this is a slight misusage for the software but with a few little options included, typographical kerning for example this would blissfully work out.

the main concern for this to work in the first instant is actually that picture frames should be included with the vector setting print, which would for most of the cases eliminate the need for a 3rd party tool.