You can create and publish
DWF or DWFx files of your 3D models and view them with Autodesk
Design Review.
You can generate DWF or DWFx files of your 3D
models with nearly the same visual fidelity as your original DWG
files. You can create a single or multi-sheet DWF or DWFx file with
2D and 3D model space objects. To access single sheet 3D DWF publishing,
use the 3DDWF, EXPORT. To access multi-sheet
publishing with 2D and 3D model space objects use the PUBLISH command.
Recipients of 3D DWF
or 3D DWFx files can view and print them using Autodesk Design Review.
For product information
and a download link for the Autodesk Design Review, refer to the
Products page on the Autodesk website.
For more information
about using the Autodesk Design Review, see the Autodesk Design
Review Help system.
Publish
Single and Multiple 3D DWF or 3D DWFx Files
To publish a single 3D DWF or 3D DWFx file, use
the EXPORT or 3DDWF commands. With either of those commands running,
the model you are currently working on is saved as a 3D DWF or 3D
DWFx file.
To publish multiple 3D
DWF or 3D DWFx files at one time, you use the PUBLISH command. The
Publish dialog box displays a list of all the sheet names of the
drawing files that are currently open. You can determine which sheets are
published to a 3D DWF or 3D DWFx file by adding or removing sheets
on the Sheet Name list.
Publishing
Materials
If
you assigned texture mapped materials to your models, those materials
can be published with the 3D DWF or 3D DWFx file. Texture map orientation and
scaling that is set in the drawing editor is retained in the published
3D DWF or 3D DWFx file.
There are some limitations
to materials publishing.
- The Diffuse Map channel is the only mapping
that gets published. If you use Opacity, Reflection, or Bump maps
in your material, they do not get published.
- Procedural materials such as Wood or
Marble do not get published.
NoteBecause the DWF Viewer
and the rendering engine are different, you may encounter some deviation
in how the texture maps appear in the DWF Viewer.
Increase
the Smoothness of 3D DWF or 3D DWFx Models
The smoothness of 3D DWF or 3D DWFx models
is improved by changing the value of the 3DDWFPREC system variable.
The setting for 3DDWFPREC ranges from 1 to 6. Higher settings greatly
improve the appearance of objects in the DWF Viewer.
Note3DDWFPREC
is a global setting that affects all objects in the 3D model. Therefore,
higher values can result in very large file sizes.
Improve
Performance with Large Models
Every
object in your model gets processed when a DWF or DWFx file is published.
When working with large models, you can greatly improve publishing
performance by using blocks. For instance, your office model contains
a basic cubicle arrangement of eight partition walls, a desk, and
a chair. Those ten objects do not take much time to process by themselves.
However, if that basic cubicle arrangement is used 100 times, it
means that 1000 objects must be processed and the publishing time
increases accordingly. If the basic cubicle arrangement is inserted
into the model as a single block, those ten objects are processed
once for each insertion.
You
can improve publishing performance even more by grouping miscellaneous
objects into temporary blocks. Once the publishing is complete,
you can explode those blocks and continue working on those objects.
As
a design gets closer to completion, you can create blocks comprised
of portions of the model that are less likely to need further editing.
If the first floor of the office model is not going to change much,
create a block containing all of its components. During publishing,
that block is processed as one object instead of each individual
object on that floor.
3D DWF
or 3D DWFx Unsupported Content
When
publishing a 3D DWF or 3D DWFx file, some drawing content may not
appear in the DWF Viewer. The content listed in the following table
is not supported when you output a 3D DWF or 3D DWFx file.
Unsupported Content
|
Details
|
Animations and Walkthroughs
|
|
Block attributes
|
|
Font types (Various)
|
See the “Supported
Text Fonts” table
|
Gradient fills (Hatches)
|
|
Hidden edges
|
|
Hyperlinks
|
|
Images
|
|
Layer information
|
|
Lights and Shadows
|
|
Material components
|
- Bump, Opacity, and Specular texture maps
- Procedural materials (for example, wood
& marble)
- Reflection and refraction
- Self-Illumination
- Shininess
- Translucency
|
Mtext (partial)
|
Bold and Italic text
|
Named views and cameras
|
|
OLE objects
|
|
Rays and X-lines
|
|
Section clipping and
XClipping
|
|
Text thickness
|
|
Visual styles
|
|
Supported Text Fonts
Many
text fonts are not supported when you publish a 3D DWF or 3D DWFx file.
The following table lists the fonts that are published.
Supported Text Fonts
|
Arial
|
Arial Black
|
Comic Sans MS
|
Courier New
|
Impact
|
Lucinda Console
|
Lucinda Sans Unicode
|
Martlett
|
Tahoma
|
Times New Roman
|
Verdana
|
Verdana Italic
|
Webdings
|
Wingdings
|
To publish a single 3D
DWF file
- In the Export Data
dialog box, specify a name and location of the DWF file. Click Save.
By default, all model space objects are published
to the 3D DWF file and, if your drawing contains xrefs, the Group
By Xref Hierarchy option is active.
- (Optional) Click Yes
to open the Autodesk Design Review and view the published 3D DWF
file.
To publish a single 3D
DWFx file
- In the Export Data dialog box, specify
a name and location of the DWFx file.
- In the Files of type drop-down list box,
click 3D DWFx.
- Click Save.
By default, all model
space objects are published to the 3D DWFx file, and if your drawing
contains xrefs, the Group By Xref Hierarchy option is active.
- (Optional) Click Yes to open the Autodesk
Design Review and view the published 3D DWFx file.
To export a 3D DWF file
- In the Export 3D DWF
dialog box, specify the name and location of the DWF file.
- If necessary, select
3D DWF (*.dwf) from the Files Of Type list. Click Save.
By default, all model space objects are exported
to the 3D DWF file and if your drawing contains xrefs, the Group
By Xref Hierarchy option is active.
- (Optional) Click Yes
to open the Autodesk Design Review and view the published 3D DWF
file.
To export a 3D DWFx file
- In the Export Data
dialog box, specify the name and location of the DWFx file.
- Select 3D DWFx (*.dwfx)
from the Files Of Type list. Click Save.
By default, all model
space objects are exported to the 3D DWFx file, and if your drawing
contains xrefs, the Group By Xref Hierarchy option is active.
- (Optional) Click Yes
to open the Autodesk Design Review and view the published 3D DWFx
file.
To publish multiple 3D
or combined 2D and 3D DWF files
- In the Publish dialog
box, under Sheets to Publish, select the sheets you want to publish
and set their Page Setup / 3D DWF setting to 3D DWF.
The sheets that are displayed in the Sheets
to Publish group are controlled by the PUBLISHALLSHEETS system variable.
- In Publish To group,
click to select DWF Format.
- Select DWF File from
the drop-down list.
NoteThe Status of the
selected sheet will show, “3D DWF cannot be published to
a “Plotter Named in Paget Setup”, until you change
the Publish to option to DWF Format.
- Click Publish Options.
In General DWF Options, set the DWF Type to Multi-sheet DWF.
- Select the Publish Output options.
NoteThe
Precision Override setting does not affect models sheets that are converted
to 3D DWF.
- In 3D DWF options group,
click Yes to publish materials. Click OK.
- Click Publish.
To publish multiple 3D
or combined 2D and 3D DWFx files
- In the Publish dialog
box, under Sheets to Publish, select the sheets you want to publish
and set their Page Setup / 3D DWF setting to 3D DWF.
The sheets that are displayed
in the Sheets to Publish group are controlled by the PUBLISHALLSHEETS system variable.
NoteThe Status of the
selected sheet will show, “3D DWF cannot be published to
a “Plotter Named in Paget Setup”, until you change
the Publish to option to DWF Format.
- In Publish To group,
click to select DWF Format.
- Select DWFx File from
the drop-down list.
- Click Publish Options.
In General DWF Options, set the DWF Type to Multi-sheet DWF.
- Select the Publish Output options.
NoteThe
Precision Override setting does not affect models sheets that are converted
to 3D DWF.
- In 3D DWF options group,
click Yes to publish materials. Click OK.
- Click Publish.
To publish selected objects
in your model to a 3D DWF or 3D DWFx file
- In the Export Data
dialog box, specify a name and location for the DWF or DWFx file.
- Click the Tools button at the upper right.
- In the 3D DWF Publish
dialog box, Objects To Publish, click Selected Model Space Objects
and then click the Select Objects button.
- In the model, select the objects that
you want to publish.
- Press Enter or the Spacebar when you’re
done selecting objects.
- Click OK.
- In the Export Data
dialog box, click Save.
- (Optional) Click Yes
to open the Autodesk Design Review and view the published 3D DWF
or 3D DWFx file.
To view and print a published
3D DWF file or 3D DWFx file
- If you want to view a 3D DWF or 3D DWFx
file, do either of the following:
- If you want to print
a 3D DWF or 3D DWFx file, in Autodesk Design Review, click File
menu
Print.
For more information,
see the Autodesk Design Review Help system.
Commands3DDWF
Creates
a 3D DWF or 3D DWFx file of your 3D model and displays it in the DWF
Viewer.
EXPORT
Saves the objects in
a drawing to a different file format.
PUBLISH
Publishes drawings to
DWF, DWFx, and PDF files, or to plotters.
System Variables3DDWFPREC
Controls the precision
of 3D DWF or 3D DWFx publishing.
PUBLISHALLSHEETS
Specifies whether to
load the contents of the active document or of all open documents
in the Publish dialog box.
