The post Bluebeam Revu Dimmer and Printing appeared first on Hagen Business Systems.

As a Bluebeam Gold Partner we’re here to help. Our customers enjoy extended phone support hours til 7pm PT weekdays plus Saturday mornings. We’d love to earn your Bluebeam business.

We also offer Bluebeam Revu and Studio Prime sales, along with on sight and web-based training throughout the United States. Carol Hagen is a certified Bluebeam instructor. You can learn more about Carol, Bluebeam and other construction technology by connecting with her on LinkedIn or following her Bluebeam Revu Tips and Tricks page on LinkedIn.

The post Bluebeam Support Christmas Eve appeared first on Hagen Business Systems.

As you know, we have upgraded our BB licenses to 2017. All of my PM’s are complaining since the upgrade that BB has run INCREDIBLY slow on their machines. Have you heard this from anyone else? Do you know of any settings that we can change to adjust the way the program renders documents? Currently, when switching between pages, BB will draw each line on the document individually and it takes a very long time to navigate. Is there anything we can change to make that work better?

The solution to these problems is found in the Rendering Settings. Revu’s default is “Iterative Draw” but in some situations (especially with high resolution and 4K displays) the time to display the PDF page can become unbearably slow, so disabling partial redraws will speed things up.

Here are the steps to change the settings:
1. Settings | Preferences (CTRL+K)
2. Choose Rendering
3. Change the Rendering Style to “Wait for Completion”
4. Click the “OK” button.

By changing this setting, the screen will not update until the full page is ready to display. Hopefully, this will accelerate your speed.

If this doesn’t resolve your speed issues, you may want to try a few other Tips for Improving Performance in Revu

Now go get ’em Bluebeamers!

The post Is Bluebeam Revu 2017 Slow? appeared first on Hagen Business Systems.

Why a Podcast for the AEC Industry?

We know there’s just not enough time to read emails, newsletters or blog posts for many construction pros. You’re always on the go, commuting to project sites. When you’re behind the wheel the BluePrints podcast is there to keep you learning. It’s sure to entertainment, and hopefully, make you more productive. Tune in when you’re in your truck or on the beach (I actually had a listener tweet me that that’s where they listened to the first episode).

Listen on iTunes, subscribe to the BluePrints Podcast and please rate us there too. It’s the feedback that keeps us recording new episodes.

For my blog readers, don’t worry, I’ll still blog Bluebeam Revu Tips. Hope you subscribe to my Construction Tech Blog, so you don’t miss a post. You never know what’s coming next!

The post BluePrints Podcast is Live! appeared first on Hagen Business Systems.

Setting a default markup layer

Open the Layers Tab (either thru Tab Access or using the shortcut ALT+Y) and hover over the layer you want your markups to be applied to.

Right Click on the Layer of your choice and choose Markup Layer

You will get a dialogue box prompt confirming the layer you just assigned.

You can click OK or if you don’t want to see this prompt again, check the box before clicking OK.

The markups icon appears to the right of the default markup layer.

The markups you add will appear on this layer of the document. You can change the markups layer by repeating the above process. Note that if you are going to use Studio Sessions and collaborate on this PDF, you may want to remove the default markup layer before uploading it.

Please share this Bluebeam Revu tip with your team and improve their productivity. If you like this article and want to receive new tips via email automatically, I invite you to subscribe to our blog here.

The post Default Markup Layer in Bluebeam Revu appeared first on Hagen Business Systems.

New in Bluebeam Revu 2017 is the ability to make custom count markups from your custom symbols.  As the top enhancement request by estimators, count tools can be any shape or symbol. Break out of the box and go beyond different colored check marks, triangles, squares, diamonds, and circles.  With custom count tools your take-off information will be clearer and your legends easier to understand.

How to Create Custom Count Tools

1. Right Click on any tool in your Tool Chest
2. Choose Create Count from the context choices (your new tool will display with a 123 beside it)
3. Click on the new tool to select it, and set additional customizations in Steps 4 and 5
4. On the Measurements Tab in the Measurements section, customize the tool Subject, Label, and if applicable a Depth, Height, Width. (see left)
5. On the Properties Tab in the Appearance section (see right), set the Caption option by checking the Show Caption Box and click Edit to select what to display (Label, Area, Volume, Depth, Width or Height).
6. Drag and Drop your new count tool into the appropriate Tool Set

Height, Width and Depth

The custom count markups now have their own values for height, depth, and width.   This caption information can be displayed in the markup label and is searchable and sortable in the markups list. You can Split the counts to specify individual attributes. This is perfect for doors and windows and will help later to stage the right door in the correct space during installation.  Why not use takeoff for more than just estimates?   Using the height, depth and width allow you to calculate the total area or total volume across multiple counts too.

Multi-Level Floor Plans

When dealing with multiple floors, Revu 2017 adds copy and paste between both pages and files to make the counting process faster. There are also split and merge options along with an automatic split across spaces (aka rooms). Drop a legend on the floor plan to show counts by room by floor. The custom count markups blow the socks off standard count tools found in typical take-off programs.

Watch this video to see the custom count tools in action:

What else can Bluebeam Revu 2017 do? See how Revu 2017 makes area take-off feel like Estimating on Steroids with Dynamic Fill.

If you don’t have Revu 2017, contact me to purchase it at a discounted price, just
Email me your contact info. Hagen Business Systems is the largest Bluebeam Gold Partner in the world.

Looking for Bluebeam Revu Training?,
Email me to schedule training in your office or remotely using GoToMeeting. Carol Hagen is a Certified Bluebeam Instructor

The post Custom Count Markups Make Take-off Takeoff! appeared first on Hagen Business Systems.

Carol Hagen, Bluebeam Training at J. D. Eckman, Inc.

Bluebeam Revu Tips are a great way for your team to get training.  Like toolbox talks with safety, they help remind your field team the best ways to make their PDF work easier.  Bluebeam training is found in many places but the short tips seem to be what’s in most demand.  It keeps everyone learning and moving toward greater productivity. I noticed that Bluebeam started tweeting short and concise tips recently.  Here are a few of my favorites:

Delete the last control point while drawing polygonal shapes by hitting BACKSPACE. #RevuShortcut https://t.co/qA7n9BHxbx pic.twitter.com/RuA1RsQ132

— Bluebeam, Inc. (@Bluebeam) December 13, 2016

ALT+click and drag a call out to move the entire markup (not just leader line or text box portion) #RevuShortcut https://t.co/zggEov21vD pic.twitter.com/2emp73CEk1

— Bluebeam, Inc. (@Bluebeam) November 21, 2016

Right-click a markup in the Tool Chest, select Paint Format, then select one or more markups to apply its properties to them. #Revushortcut pic.twitter.com/iEN0sX6rVd

— Bluebeam, Inc. (@Bluebeam) December 27, 2016

To add an action to any markup in the Tool Chest, right-click & select Action > Define. You can also save it for future use! #RevuShortcut pic.twitter.com/qAahHq8uAN

— Bluebeam, Inc. (@Bluebeam) January 24, 2017

Best Practices

Good Bluebeam Revu training teaches much more than how to use each feature.  It ensures your team masters the tools with specific class exercises that reinforce what they learned.  Ideally, best practices are incorporated into the teaching along with shortcuts and how-tos.  These include:

• Customizing Toolbars and Toolsets
• Leveraging Profiles for Fast Onboarding
• Sharing PDFs with non-Bluebeam Users
• Extracting Data for further manipulation
• How to identify PDF problems that make documents difficult to hyperlink
• Customizing your settings for superpowers

There’s more to training than learning Bluebeam Revu features and functions.  It’s putting it all together and to know when to use each function, workflow or tool.  For management, it’s finding the best methods to deploy Revu to the field and getting buy-in throughout the entire team. Your Bluebeam training will be customized to the role of your employee or the task they need to complete.

Watch for my Twitter designed Bluebeam Training Tips, especially showcasing the new Revu 2017  features coming in March of 2017.  They’ll be incorporated into this blog so you don’t have to go to Twitter to view them. Feel free to suggest tip topics in the comments.

Carol Hagen is a Bluebeam Certified Instructor and serves clients throughout the entire United States. I guarantee you’ll be happy with our training rates and the performance improvement of your team. <a href=”mailto:carol@hagenbusiness.com”>Email Me</a>  to schedule Bluebeam instructor-led on-line training or  On-Site training at your facility.

The post Bluebeam Training Tips appeared first on Hagen Business Systems.

Either turn the Navigation Menu on using the F4 function key (on some laptops you’ll need to press the Fn key as well), or do what I do and use the shortcuts for Previous View (Alt+Left Arrow) or Next View (Alt+Right Arrow). Those arrow keys sure are handy!

Other Navigation menu items that are often overlooked are scrolling pages and one full page. Most construction pros spend a ton of time in plan sets that are large format documents. Use the one full page to get out of a zoomed mode, then use the Page Up and Page Down to move through pages quickly. The One Full Page icon is 4th from the left, and Scrolling pages is the next icon over. Since it doesn’t have a shortcut key, you can also add these icons to a custom toolbar.

Of course if you want to navigate quickly through plans, you should learn more about Bluebeam Revu’s Batch Link, Sets and Drawing Log so that everyone’s navigation is fast and efficient when working with plans. You may also want to hyperlink details by using the visual search and hyperlink places. Navigation is one of the benefits of digital documents. If your plans aren’t linked you’re working too hard.

The post Bluebeam Tip: When the Navigation Bar is Hidden appeared first on Hagen Business Systems.

Bluebeam Revu has helped many AEC professionals project a professional business image on PDFs. Adding markups can be a bit tricky especially when it comes to text. Bluebeam Revu’s Text Box, Callout and Cloud+ Markups all use a text box that you can drag out to size. If you have a line width greater than zero set in the properties you’ll often have a box larger than the text you’ve typed (see left image above). This appears a bit messy and is easy and quick to fix. Here’s how you can have Bluebeam Revu auto size markups for you.

Using the new Revu 2016 shortcut Alt-Z, Revu will tidy them up by resizing them to fit tightly around the text. Rather than applying Auto-Size Text Box Alt+Z on each markup as you place them, just use Ctl+A to select them all and then Alt-Z to tidy them up all at once (as shown in the right image above).

When you want your text to automatically auto size, based upon the size of the text box you drag out, Revu has a setting for that too. In the textbox, callout and cloud+ markups properties tab, there’s a check box option next to the font (found under the appearance section) that will auto size fonts. This works great for those of us with bifocals, but if you aren’t careful, this may still leave you with text boxes that are longer than they need to be.

Using the auto font size in your markups and applying the auto size text box will cleanup all your text markups for that crisp, professional image in your construction, architecture and engineering firm’s PDF documents. This is perfect for redlining, collaborating in Studio Sessions and improving your communications with your team. That’s it. Two Bluebeam Revu Tips in one post. Now go get ’em Bluebeamers!

You may also be interested in these other Bluebeam Revu Tips:

Take a Photo and Mark It Up
Why is My Markup Text Sideways in Bluebeam Revu?

Need Bluebeam Training? We provide web-based and on-site training throughout the United States and Carol Hagen is a Bluebeam Certified Instructor. To arrange for web-based Bluebeam Training using GoToMeeting, Email Me Your Contact Info. To make on-site training arrangements, please call.

The post Bluebeam Revu Auto Size MarkUps appeared first on Hagen Business Systems.

Have you ever come across a term or abbreviation while reading specifications that you just aren’t familiar with?  Believe it or not, Bluebeam Revu has a lookup function that returns the results from Wikipedia.  Position your mouse next to the word or term and right click.  You’ll see the “Look Up” option followed by the term it is about to look up.  If it’s in Wikipedia you have your answer immediately.  This of course works on any PDF, not just specifications.  And just in case Wikipedia doesn’t have an entry, it will suggest other sister Wiki sites like Wiktionary, Wikibooks, Wikisource, etc.  Now there’s no excuse for not knowing the meaning of a legal, finance or construction term in your contracts.  Revu is an well connected encyclopedia and dictionary.

I’ve also used this to lookup tech companies too, like FieldLens, a mobile communication platform that provides project management tools for the construction industry to maximize efficiency on the job site.   They also just happen to have an API with Bluebeam Studio Prime (coming soon).  We’re hosting a free FieldLens webinar on November 12, 2015 from Noon-1pm MST and you’re all invited. Register Here to see how they handle project photos, work with drawings and generate daily reports.

The post Bluebeam Tips: Definition of Terms in Specifications and Contracts appeared first on Hagen Business Systems.