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export vs "save as" issue

Discussion in 'CAD' started by Ray Taggart, Mar 4, 2024.

  1. Ray Taggart

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    I'm using Illustrator as my design software and recently ran into an export issue. Everytime I use export to save as .svg and then open the file in Openbuilds cam the scale is about 30% smaller. I ran a simple test and created a 30mm circle (in illustrator) then exported as .svg. Then opened it in Openbuilds cam and the circle is about 23mm. I did the same thing only this time i used "save as" to save the .svg file. I opened it in Openbuilds cam and the circle is exactly 30mm. Is this a concern? or should I just use "save as" and never use export?
    cheers....Ray
     
  2. Peter Van Der Walt

    Peter Van Der Walt OpenBuilds Team
    Staff Member Moderator Builder Resident Builder

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    SVGs are "unitless" - so check your DPI (pixels back to realworld dimensions) regardless of method / source etc.

    CAM tries to guess, based on whether the SVG declares where it came from, and uses OpenBuilds-CAM/js/svgparser.js at 2c88a262dbeeaf839908bef2d7d15509e1507c4e · OpenBuilds/OpenBuilds-CAM to go through the options (Inkscape vs Illustrator vs OpenType vs none of the above) and scales according to the DPIs you can see there.

    For Illustrator, it would assume 72dpi, for unknown it would assume 96dpi. Export vs Save - one might not include the ID
     
  3. Ray Taggart

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    Peter... Thanks for your response. You're exactly right. it looks like EXPORT does NOT put the Generator tag into the .svg file. And, "Save As" does include it. Here's the first couple lines of the .svg file from the "save as" file.
    <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
    <!-- Generator: Adobe Illustrator 28.2.0, SVG Export Plug-In . SVG Version: 6.00 Build 0

    So a 96dpi file is Export file is going to be 25% smaller than a 72dpi "save as" file.
     
    Peter Van Der Walt likes this.
  4. Peter Van Der Walt

    Peter Van Der Walt OpenBuilds Team
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    Yip, tricky. DXF is a unit aware filetype, but SVG was meant more for print industry than making parts. Accesible for making artwork though so doing best we can.
     

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