Ron Anthony has had technical problems in sending the following to the
Sundial Mailing List.
Hopefully this will bypass the logjam.
Tony M.
*********************************************
Subject: Re: Adobe Illustrator vs. Delta Cad
Sent: 19/9/20 8:23 pm
Received: 21/9/00 9:56 pm
From: Ron Anthony, [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: Tony Moss, [EMAIL PROTECTED]
John Carmichael, [EMAIL PROTECTED]
CC: Sundial Mail List, [email protected]
John,
> It seems that the principal "defect" of Delta Cad is that plotting and
> engraving machines cannot reproduce DC drawings without distorting the
> drawings. As Steve Lelievre pointed out, this makes it difficult to
turn a
> drawing into the "real thing".
No I don't think that's correct. The Madjet Dials were drawn in
DeltaCad, and I think you will agree there is no distortion. The
central problem is that DeltaCad exports the R12 version DXF file, and
version 12 does poorly in the follow area:
. Text attributes.
. Line Attributes such as thickness.
. Complex Shapes.
All of the high level vector type programs such as Corel Draw, AI,
Designer, and most of the CAD programs such as AutoCad, DesignCad, or
TurboCad, do much better in this area. DeltaCad can't touch any of
these in terms of drawing and import/exporting ability.
> Apparently, according to Tony Moss, Adobe Illustrator can completely
replace
> Delta Cad. For example, you can import a Zonwlak DXF file into A.I.
and
> then manipulate the drawing adding text and artwork just like you do
with
> Delta Cad.
Having a programing language under the hood is what is missing from some
of the programs mentioned above. Some such as Corel Draw, AutoCad and
TurboCad (professional) have full blown Visual Basic environments, but
if you learn to draw dials in them you will be a very good programmer.
I thing the best over-all enviroment is CorelDraw. If I were writting
dial programs and turning them into dials professionally I would use
it, but is has the following draw backs from an hobbist persepective:
. It cost from $120 to $250.
. The programinng environment is very difficult to learn and use, even
though it is very powerful.
. I could only share my code with other CorelDraw users.
I use DeltaCad because it fills the following requirements:
. It's cheap. $40
. The programming environment is fairly simple. A stripped down Visual
Basic. If you can't code in DeltaCad, don't even think about any of
the others except DesignCad.
. It supports DXF, Version R14 will be supported in the next release.
. It's easier to use.
. We can share source code instead of drawings.
> My important question is this: For those of us who need to engrave or
plot
> sundial drawings, should we export Delta Cad drawings into Adobe
Illustrator
> as some of you suggest, or should we abandon Delta Cad completely and
just
> use Adobe Illustrator?
This depends on the source of the drawing. If the drawing is from
ZonVwalk or some program that produces a DXF file, then Corel Draw, AI,
or a similar program should be used. Often this depends on what the
engraver can accept and what the programs can produce. It is best to
use the programs native format thru-out if possible. For example, If the
shop will accept AI use AI, if they can use Corel use Corel. The use of
DXF (or any format) as an intermediary is fraught with problems that
will require cleanup and/or hardcopy verifications before commiting to
metal.
If your goal is to programattically draw a dial of your own design and
then have it engraved I would suggest using DeltaCad to do the
programing. (Stealing heavily from the body of source code already
produced,) Then use one of the higher end progams to clean things up
before sending the file to the engaver.
> I asked Tony Moss about A. I. My question and his answer follows:
> >You say (Tony) that you use Adobe illustrator instead of Delta Cad.
Are you
> saying that A.I. can completely replace Delta Cad? Is A.I. able to
accept Zonwlak dxf
> >files? I'm wondering if A.I. is as easy to learn and use as Delta
Cad.
I don't know about AI, but AutoCad, CorelDraw, TurboCad, DesignCad, etc
can replace DeltaCad in the programming and manual aspects of drawing
dials. All have many more features, cost more, and are more difficult
to learn to program. Drawing manually in most of these are more
intuitive and feature rich than DeltaCad. All have better import/export
capabilites as well.
> To switch or not to switch, that is the question!
I don't think there is a single solution that covers all of the aspects
of designing, progamming, and physically making the dial.
++ron
