Wireframe line width too thin

[John L]

i usually do a wireframe print of our signs with dims to help us with graphic placement, etc. in the shop.

I upgraded to flexi 8 (from 7.6) and discovered that, when I select a vector and then click the wireframe box (in the little fill/stroke editor window), the lines are so small that I can barely see them when I print the layout with our printer.

I can see the lines on screen fine, just like always. But the prints are too fine to see easily. Is this an adjustable feature?

Thanks.

 

[John L]

I should have said.. in my previous version of flexi, 7.6, it printed out fine with the same printer.

thanks

 

[Gordy Saunders]

Do you convert all of your lines to black before you print?

 

[John L]

Yep. select a design, drag copy it, make it all black, then hit wireframe. It used to print bolder lines in 7.6. Any ideas?

 

[grafxxx]

instead of wire frame just clear the fill and then you can adjust the outline thickness.

 

[John L]

I can do that. But when I get an acceptable thickness for printing, it looks goofy on screen. I guess it's just something they fixed that wasn't broke.

 

[imaSIGNr]

You should be able to adjust the line width in your fill/stroke editor box.

 

[iSign]

sounds like another of many uses for a screen capture program. Sure, it still sucks when expensive "upgrades" foul up what was working fine the old way... but if you can get a good looking screen display with little to no effirt... maybe a good workaround now would be a quick couple mouse clicks that allow you to drag a window around just the right section of your display & then print out of the capture program instead.

 

[John L]

I had been dealing with this for the last 6 months. I just bought "print screen deluxe" yesterday and started doing that this morning. It is working, but a little more hassle (not a lot). I just logged in and saw your post. Thanks!

It was easier before because in Flexi you can just select that part of your drawing and Cntrl-P will print just that selection anyway. If you selected the wireframed elements, you got a print of a real nice line drawing for the shop guys to work from. I haven't changed anything, I'm sure it is a change that came about with the new version.

I have resisited calling amiable to be placed on indefinite hold. I will try them sometime soon.

 

[Matthew Scher]

I just gave it a try and the wireframed objects print with a thick enough line that it is clear to see. Can you send me the file to take a look at? I can forward it onto engineering to get it corrected if we can duplicate it.

Another thing to try is to print to a PDF file and see if you see the same results in Acrobat.

 

[John L]

On the screen you can see the wireframe lines fine. The screen view looks fine in Flexi. I also did what you said.. I printed it to .pdf (both using Flexi and using pdf995. The screen versions of the ,pdfs look fine also.

When I print it out to either of our desktop printers, the lines are too fine to see. This is true of both our HP Color Laser 2600N and another Canon Black and White Laser Printer. This is whether I print right from Flexi... or print the .pdf that Flexi created.. or the ,pdf that pdf995 created. It also doesn't seem to be related to drawing element size either.. I tried it with a wireframed box 2" sq.. and also a box 20' sq. and got the same results when printed to fit paper.

 

[Matthew Scher]

Send me a copy of that PDF file and the FS file and I will take a look.

 

[bob]

On the screen you can see the wireframe lines fine. The screen view looks fine in Flexi. I also did what you said.. I printed it to .pdf (both using Flexi and using pdf995. The screen versions of the ,pdfs look fine also.

When I print it out to either of our desktop printers, the lines are too fine to see. This is true of both our HP Color Laser 2600N and another Canon Black and White Laser Printer. This is whether I print right from Flexi... or print the .pdf that Flexi created.. or the ,pdf that pdf995 created. It also doesn't seem to be related to drawing element size either.. I tried it with a wireframed box 2" sq.. and also a box 20' sq. and got the same results when printed to fit paper.

The wire frame is, if memory serves, one pixel wide. As it should be. If you want the illusion of wire frame but a taste bolder, set a suitable stroke on all of your objects and set all of their fills to empty.

Printing a single pixel width object on a printer with, say, 600 or 1200 dpi resolution yield a rather thin object. Can you visualy distinguish 1/1200 of an inch? Probably not in any meaningful way.

If you're trying to use a screen capture utility, often when you move an image from point A to point B, like from your screen to your printer, the existence of each pixel in the image is inferred and not explicit. Thus a single pixel-wide line may or may or may not transfer properly. It may be fattened up or it may disappear entirely, depending. Digitial artifacts are inherent in the process.