delorie.com/archives/browse.cgi   search  
Mail Archives: geda-help/2012/04/07/12:52:57

X-Authentication-Warning: delorie.com: mail set sender to geda-help-bounces using -f
X-Recipient: geda-help AT delorie DOT com
Message-ID: <4F806D9E.1090700@innocent.com>
Date: Sat, 07 Apr 2012 12:38:54 -0400
From: Gus Fantanas <fantanas AT innocent DOT com>
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux i686; rv:11.0) Gecko/20120310 Thunderbird/11.0
MIME-Version: 1.0
To: geda-help AT delorie DOT com
CC: rickman <gnuarm DOT geda AT arius DOT com>
Subject: Re: [geda-help] Translate DXF to Gerber
References: <4F805C78 DOT 6030508 AT arius DOT com>
In-Reply-To: <4F805C78.6030508@arius.com>
Reply-To: geda-help AT delorie DOT com

On 04/07/2012 11:25 AM, rickman wrote:
> I have a need to generate a Gerber file for a logo.  I can't find 
> anything to do this with other than a few expensive commercial 
> programs.  Since this is a one shot deal I don't want to pay big bucks 
> for it.  Are there any tools in the GEDA suite that would allow me to 
> input a DXF file and produce a Gerber file.  The logo can also be 
> output as any of several vector graphic formats as well as standard 
> image formats.  But how to get it into a Gerber file?
>
> Rick
>
I have been using the following well-known procedure to import a DXF 
file onto a PCB layer (credits to Peter Clifton, DJ Delorie, and several 
others):

Import the DXF file to qCAD; print it as ps (observe the difference 
between printing and exporting); convert it to encapsulated ps with 
'ps2epsi'; convert it to pcb using 'pstoedit' with the '-usbbfrominput' 
and '-f pcb' options; import it to PCB and move it to the appropriate 
layer if necessary.

 From PCB, then, you can generate a Gerber file.  I use the above 
procedure to import weird board outlines and fancy fonts and graphics 
into PCB.  One caveat, though: The "vectorness" of the original is lost; 
curves are split into short line segments.   At least this has been my 
experience with the gEDA I've been using; it is the one that came with 
stock Ubuntu 11.11.

You should be able to generate a vector graphics file in Inkscape and 
then export it as epsi, skipping the first three steps above.  This 
opens up a lot of possibilities, like better fonts, logos, etc.

Hope this helps.


- Raw text -


  webmaster     delorie software   privacy  
  Copyright © 2019   by DJ Delorie     Updated Jul 2019