1. Roman Telezhynskyi Avatar Roman Telezhynskyi
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  3. Valentina
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New feature: Export pattern to DXF-ASTM

Issue #391 resolved
Roman Telezhynskyi repo owner created an issue

DXF-AAMA is a file format developed by the American Apparel Manufacturers Association in an attempt to solve the difficulties of using DXF files. DXF is the most commonly used format for the exchange of drawing files. Unfortunately, since DXF does not contain neither scale or units, nor usually any method of reliably describing what needs to be cut, drawn, drilled, notched etc. in a pattern file, plain DXF files are normally not very useful.

But if the DXF-AAMA format is used, files can contain many patterns either nested, or non-nested, in a form which can be easily processed and used by plotter operators.

Properly used, DXF-AAMA is almost as good as the Vectorscript format that we mainly use. It is a format which is almost a standard, and if your customers can deliver files in DXF-AAMA format, you can be almost guaranteed a nestable pattern at the end of it which is a first for DXF!

Comments (49)

  3. Susan Spencer

    The DXF-AAMA standard is being replaced by ASTM D6673 - 10 "Standard Practice for Sewn Products Pattern Data Interchange-Data Format".
    I can send the developer of this feature the new DXF-ASTM standard because I bought an extra digital copy.
    If anyone wants to purchase their own copy, they can order it from this page: http://www.astm.org/Standards/D6673.htm

    I will post the older DXF-AAMA standard when I can locate it... It is very very old (1998?) and it's not very good for what it tries to do. Import/Export of DXF-AAMA patterns between patternmaking software tools doesn't always work properly, each company has it's own interpretation for certain details of the spec. So development will require special processing for each pattern making system, which means we need more information about each (Optitex, etc.) Perhaps we should only implement the new(ish) DXF-ASTM for now?

  11. claudia

    Est-il possible dans la version v.0.5.0 d'enregistrer le travail de construction (.val) en .Pdf après si c'est pas possible tanpis... sinon super le logiciel même s'il bug quelques fois !

  12. Susan Spencer

    The DXF-AAMA has been replaced by the DXF-ASTM format.

    Excerpt from VM_Section_6.pdf (downloaded from http://wwot.destcorp.com/documents/VM_Section_6.pdf)

    "NOTE: DXF IS A MULTI FORMAT CONFERSION SOFTWARE. THE FORMATS HAVE BEEN UPDATED OVER TIME TO ACCOMODATE MORE PATTERN INFORMATION. HERE IS A HISTORY OF DXF FORMATS: 1. DXF- was originally introduced in December 1982 as part of AutoCAD 1.0, and was intended to provide an exact representation of the data in the AutoCAD native file format 2. DXF-AAMA - This was the file format developed by the American Apparel Manufacturers Association in 1993 in an attempt to solve the difficulties of using DXF files. DXF is the most commonly used format for the exchange of drawing files. Unfortunately, since they contain neither scale or units, nor usually any method of reliably describing what needs to be cut, drawn, drilled, notched etc. in a pattern file, DXF files are normally not very useful. But if the DXFAAMA format is used, files can contain many patterns either nested, or non-nested, in a form which can be easily processed and used by plotter operators. 3. DXF-ASTM - This newest standard practice is designed to facilitate two-dimensional, sewn pattern piece data exchange between CAD systems at the level of pattern design. It also facilitates grade rule table data exchange for sewn products in the apparel industry. It uses the DXF file format for pattern piece data exchange and a specially formatted ASCII file format for grade rule tables. It is limited to the transfer of pattern pieces within a style and the associated pattern piece and style information. "

  22. Yiannis

    Exporting patterns from Valentina using AAMA-DXF or ASTM-DXF in order to import them to apparel CAD or 3d fashion software would a very useful feature.

    Although there seems to exist an option for exporting to AAMA-DXF format in Valentina at the moment, the content of the exported file is not that of an AAMA file. What we get from a Valentina exported AAMA file now is almost the same file as a simple DXF file but with additional layer information.

    However, the structure and content of AAMA or ASTM DXF files is quite different compared to simple DXF files. The majority of apparel cad systems can only import AAMA or ASTM DXF files, with the exception of just a few of them that can import all of them.

    As I am using AAMA files quite a lot, I was wondering if there would be any chance of implementing the export of this kind of files.

    Following, as an example I will attach a proper AAMA-DXF file that works with apparel CAD systems.

  24. Roman Telezhynskyi reporter

    Our AAMA is structured according to documentation and tested with Optitex. How exactly it is different from output you expect.

  25. Yiannis

    Optitex is one of the the few systems that can import simple DXF files as well.

    I have noticed in the files exported from valentina (opened with text editor) that the text lines are quite different (eg. $ORTHOMODE, $QTEXTMODE, $DISPSILH, $DIMDLE, AcDbSymbolTable, AcDbPolyline, 1e+020 etc) compared to the ones of an AAMA file (eg. SECTION, LTYPE, CONTINUOUS, VERTEX, POINT, TEXT, ENDSEC etc.)

    Please have a look at the attached file and compare to an AAMA file exported from Valentina (opened in a text editor).

  26. Yiannis

    I can also export the same patterns as ASTM file if needed. However it is very similar to the AAMA file.

  27. Roman Telezhynskyi reporter

    Do you know how DXF file works? I am sure that we export properly formed AAMA. Exactly what is not working? Which error do you get?

  28. Yiannis

    Yes , I am working very often with AAMA patterns. I am exporting from Investronica and Crea systems and I have imported to those systems , AAMA files exported from Assyst, Crea, Optitex Lectra, Polypattern and Gerber systems.

    I get error messages when trying to import to Investronica and Crea as AAMA files.

    I know that Crea can import simple DXF files when this function is enabled (as Optitex does, this is one of the few systems), but I don’t have this enabled in my system.

    Following you can see the error messages shown after trying to import.

  30. Roman Telezhynskyi reporter

    Okay. But it can be issue with DXF, and not with AAMA. Did you try with simple pattern, just a path?

  31. Yiannis

    I know also that there is a similar error when importing valentina AAMA in Clo3d. I am not using this software but I have seen this happening.

  37. Yiannis

    Following you can find a simple rectangle piece ( 40x15 cm) exported as AAMA-DXF from investronica (RECTANGLE4015.dxf) and valentina (rectangletest_1.dxf)

  39. Roman Telezhynskyi reporter

    Did you try with different DXF versions? You used pretty new one where recommanded version is dxf 12.

  43. Yiannis

    AAMA and ASTM are quite similar. Please check the same rectangle exported as AAMA and ASTM from my system.

  46. Aladdin

    Hey Roman, I am facing same problem as described here. I am using CLO3d for 3D garment prototyping and I am unable to use patterns exported from Valentina or seamly2d. Which is a shame since those allow for super precise grading. would you mind helping out here please? thanks a lot!!

  47. Roman Telezhynskyi reporter

    Hi Aladdin,

    I have added export to DXF-ASTM. You need to wait next test build. It will be soon. I tested as could, maybe implementation still has issues. Bug reports are welcome.

    seamly2d

    🤢

    ‌

    ‌

  48. Aladdin

    Hey Roman, pleased to read from you. thanks for your fast reply. I tried some trials files from an old thread from 2017 called “Looking people interested in AAMA and ASTM formats” and they imported well in CLO (the name of the file wastest_aama_3.dxf) so maybe that is something I am doing wrong with my valentina file? Or maybe that is also part of that new build your are talking about. anyway if you need help trying out file or making comments feel free to reach out. best of luck with the amazing ongoing work. Best. aladdin

  49. Roman Telezhynskyi reporter

    Yes, I remember this thread. I never tested AAMA produced by Valentina with CLO. Goes beyond my interest. But I have a positive experience with Optitex.

    so maybe that is something I am doing wrong with my valentina file?

    Which version do you use?

    Or maybe that is also part of that new build your are talking about.

    Impossible. I did not release this code yet.

    anyway if you need help trying out file or making comments feel free to reach out. best of luck with the amazing ongoing work.

    We can test your files. But better to create a new issue here. This is our new repo.

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Type
enhancement
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Status
resolved
Component
File Format, Export
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