Plot styles

[bobsy852]

Hi everyone,

I've been trying to edit the way some of our jobs print, we need them in black and white, with the exception of 4 colours. Using the plot styles manager I have managed to do this by turning all other colours to grayscale, while keeping the colours we want to print in colour assigned to their object colour.

HOWEVER,

when we printed it like this, our company logo on the paper space also printed in black (this made it come out as think black box on the page)

The logo is made up of the following colours:

134,148,175

101,121,154

46,91,130

205,205,205

I tried to add these colours as individual styles in the "plot style table editor" however the buttons for "add style" and "delete style" are blanked out so cannot use them.

I just wondered why this is, and if anyone can help me add these colours?

The only way around it I've found so far is to change the colour of one of the 'standard' colours to the specific colours above:

e.g; Change colour 2 in the Plot Style Table Editor, to have a colour of 134,148,175 and then turn the grayscaling off for that plot style.

Although then if I have a layer with this colour assigned, they all print the wrong colour!

Hoping someone could help me out here!

Thanks a lot

 

Rob

[daft vader]

I use to have a drawing print solid black in a title it was because I had print colour as black ticked please check if this is your problem m8

[SLW210]

What exactly is your company logo, raster, OLE, linework? I have mine as a raster image. If I plot with monochrome.ctb All is black except the logo.

[bobsy852]

Erm, the logo is just a hatch patterns as far as I can tell, although it was created a while ago

If we print in monochrome.ctb the logo will be the only bit thats stays in colour!

However, we have some layers (about 4) on the drawing which we need to print in colour, while the rest print in black and white

 

What we're trying to do is set up a plot style which we can select which will print everything in black and white except the logo and the 4 layers we need to print in colour. We thought we could do this by changing the status of all the plot styles in the "plot style table editor" to print in greyscale EXCEPT the colours we used in the layers we want to print in colour. However, as the logo is set up with none-standard colours, this prints in black too, and it doesn't allow me to add any new plot styles which I could set to these individual colours

[tzframpton]

It's because you're using a CTB plot style. CTB plot styles cannot use "True Colors", it uses the default 255 color palette. Only STB plot styles can use True Color assignments. Since your logo is using True Colors, it'll always plot the color you assigned to it and never black unless you convert to using a STB plot style and assign a style to it.

[bobsy852]

ok! Thanks StykFacE, now, how do i convert to STB plot style?

[tzframpton]

type CONVERTPSTYLES at the command line. I will advise that it will take some experience to fully gasp how to use an STB plot style vs a CTB, it can be much more confusing since STB files utilize objects along with colors, not just colors like CTB files do. Jump into the Help file and start reading up on the differences to start understanding the differences.

 

http://docs.autodesk.com/ACD/2011/ENU/filesAUG/WS1a9193826455f5ffa23ce210c4a30acaf-5f9b.htm

[bobsy852]

Thanks for the help! I'll read up about it and see if I can think of another way around it!

I guess I can't have both and STB and a CTB plot style in the same job? I guess it's the whole CAD file that's either STB or CTB?

[tzframpton]

No, you can't have both. Honestly, to easily fix what you're trying to do just use one of the standard 256 colors. The logo needs to be plotted correctly is all, so why are you so worried about it looking exactly how you want on your monitor?

[bobsy852]

That's a good point StykFacE, I just used the choice of 256 colours in the end using the closest colour matches possible for the logo and got it to work wonders!

Saves me having to try learn STB files! Thanks for the help, I feel I've gained a bit more knowledge after this topic!