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About Archicad's documenting tools, views, model filtering, layouts, publishing, etc.

PDF layers

Anonymous
Not applicable
So I wanted to share this with other people maybe wanting to do the same thing.

Ive noticed for a while that when you create a PDF with AC, the PDF retains hidden layers so that when you open up the PDF often I can see the hidden elements being drawn before the final top layers are drawn, covering everything up. I dont understand why the PDF does this as its not needed for printing a flat drawing.

I hope that one day GS find a way to be able to print flat PDFS.

If you have Acrobat Pro you can remove these elements yourself
Open the PDF, then under VIEW then OPTIMIZE AND SECURE, select SECURE DOCUMENT. select REMOVE HIDDEN INFORMATION, let it scan the document for hidden content. Deselect everything so that the only option selected is REMOVE HIDDEN CONTENT Click on REMOVE button.

I've found that If you remove other options you risk having problems with background 2D bitmap trees being clipped. If you only select Remove Hidden Content, it should be OK.

After saving the PDF I find that these background layers have been removed and the PDF opens instantly.
2 REPLIES 2
Barry Kelly
Moderator
strawbale wrote:
I hope that one day GS find a way to be able to print flat PDFS.
In 18 it is a new feature that allows you to turn on or off the layers when viewing the PDF just like you can in Archicad itself.
So I think Graphisoft is going in a different direction.

http://www.youtube.com/embed/x2Fpwu-cbQQ?hd=1&autoplay=1

It does have the option not to include the layers but I still think your PDF will be built up from all the original layers just as the have done in the past.
I am not aware of any option to save just a flat screen shot as a PDF (apart from maybe making an actual screen shot and saving as a PDF).

Barry.
One of the forum moderators.
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Anonymous
Not applicable
Thanks Barry, i didn't know that was possible.