If you use the Notes Markup tool to minimize the clutter on your documents, you’ve likely noticed the small icon that appears as a small piece of paper with lines on it. It’s great when there are many markups in a small area on the document. What most of you haven’t noticed is the properties options in this tool.

Changing icons can provide a mini legend for types of notes. Take the time to create your own tool set or color code them for document reviews and you have another power tool in your tool chest. Stars, keys, triangles, circles, checkmarks, right arrow, up-left arrow and my favorite, the Cross (cause X marks the spot). You’ll have so much fun you might want to make a treasure map! Too bad there aren’t clovers since St Patty’s day is just around the corner.

Let’s see what readers have mastered Bluebeam Markups. What other Markup tool has an option to change the icon displayed? (post your answer in the comments)

You might also like to read:

Creating a Multi-colored Legend Tool

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There are a few Settings | Preferences (CTL+K) for the Snapshot Tool that you can tweak including the resolution, whether you want vector graphics when pasting to another program and including markups in your snapshots. Obviously for the punch process you’d want to include the markups but there are applications for not including the markups as well.

If you have questions you need answered about Bluebeam, reach out to me on LinkedIn, email me or add your question in the comments. Perhaps your question will appear in a future Bluebeam Revu Tip on this blog.

The post Bluebeam Revu Quick Tip: Spaces Snapshots appeared first on Hagen Business Systems.

Revu calls this Automark and it let’s you pull alpha numeric information from anywhere on a page and set that data as either the page label or bookmark. As a bonus, Revu version 12 can obtain the numbering from multiple regions so you can pull both the page number and the title block page description. Here’s the Automark 2.0 video to show you how it works:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UrvdAII7HjE#t=97

Automark is often the first step in creating a hyperlinked plan set, so you can navigate efficiently between pages and back to your sheet index.

Notes: If you are working with plan sets that are scanned images and are using Revu 11, Bluebeam could not identify the sheet page numbers as alpha numeric. To address this you could either use the OCR capabilities (requires Revu Extreme version) or upgrade to Revu 12 that enhanced the Automark function (called Automark 2.0) for this purpose.

To determine if you are working with scanned plans, you may want to review my prior blog post on searchable text.

If you need to upgrade Bluebeam Revu from a prior release or want to know the advantage of Bluebeam Extreme over Revu Standard, check to see if you have an annual maintenance subscription or Email Me Your Contact Info and I’ll help you get upgraded to the latest release (12.5 as of today 9/25/14).

The post Bluebeam Tips: Plan Set Page Numbers from Title Block Sheet Names appeared first on Hagen Business Systems.

This two minute video shows you how to accomplish just that:

If you or your company wants your team to get trained quickly and you can’t get them to watch videos in Bluebeam University, contact me to discuss web-based or on-site classroom training at your facilities. Just <a href=”mailto:carol@hagenbusiness.com”>Email Me</a> .

The post Slipsheeting Construction Plan Sets Electronically appeared first on Hagen Business Systems.

Bluebeam Revu has a back button to jump to your previous spot. This works great for Bluebeamers but when sharing construction plan sets with subcontractors and other team members that might not own Bluebeam Revu, they don’t have a back button available with Acrobat or other PDF viewers. Here’s a best practice tip that will make it easier for everyone using the plans.

As a General Contractor or Architect, when creating your interactive plan set, take the time to not only activate the table of contents with hyperlinks, but add a back button to every page in the set. Create it once to hyperlink to the Table of Contents page and add it to your custom tool chest, then apply it to every page. Remember to use relative paths and flatten so when you share it with others the hyperlink will work with any PDF program.

Common Best Practices include separating the pages into separate documents (improving load time and reducing risk of file corruption), adding navigation buttons and hyperlinking the table of contents and detail diagrams. There are creative and innovative ideas extending the value of Bluebeam being thought of everyday.

At the Bluebeam Extreme conference earlier this month, they discussed PDF best practices and on larger projects they took this one step further. Creating a composite of the project by using Stapler, Bluebeam and AutoCAD a General Contractor added a chart where each block in the chart’s grid hyperlinked to a specific level and discipline.

Construction Composite Plan Set Navigator Sample

This made it easier to navigate, reduced the number of pages from over 1000 to under 100 and saved more time for those involved in the project to see the context and update project completion visually.
While this is a “Not for Construction” composite, soon the AEC industry will adapt to the new electronic age and identify best PDF practices, and adjust to the advancements in technology with changes to the plan set requirements.

Architects today are required to split the project into manageable pages, needing to address the “Paper” world of the 20th century. Tablets, and other mobile devices along with tools like Bluebeam Revu will push the industry into more flexible slices with features like zoom, pan and hyperlinking. Perhaps the plan set of tomorrow is a layered view of each disciple with built-in clash detection. Oh wait, that’s what BIM level six promises. To collaborate and communicate, the PDF is here to stay for the forseeable future, it’s the common denominator in electronic documentation.

The post Bluebeam Tips: Interactive Plan Sets Best Practices appeared first on Hagen Business Systems.

Bluebeam is best way to share Construction Plan Markups with your team and the project owner, period. Let’s listen to what your construction peers are saying about Bluebeam: [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kDZMV665wes&w=560&h=315]

Construction Plan Markups for Revit and Navisworks®:
Create 3D PDFs with just one-click from Revit and Navisworks®, and markup 3D PDF views. Use Links to easily create and
update hyperlinked documents, and create zone awareness for markups with Spaces. Here’s how to create a 3D PDF out of Navisworks. [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6G1XP9Kiejc&w=560&h=315] In this video you can see the flexibility and power tools to add markups and comments into your 3D model that are easily noticed and opened by those who later view the model. [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XlfQcR3ixLY&w=560&h=315]

With Revu, you can achieve a paperless workflow with powerful PDF creation, markup, editing and collaboration features. Create high quality PDFs with one-click from MS Office, digitally redline PDF drawings with industry standard markups and measurements, and save custom markups in the Tool Chest™ for easy reuse. Automatically compare drawings, integrate with SharePoint® or ProjectWise®, go mobile on a tablet PC and collaborate in real time with Bluebeam Studio™. Take collaboration further with Studio projects, giving you more flexibility when sharing and storing files in the cloud.

View Your Construction Plan Markups on Your iPad:
For management on the go, mobility and access drives productivity Bluebeam Vu for the iPad

grants you access to your markups for review directly out of Dropbox cloud storage.

If you’ve ever used Bluebeam, share your experience with our readers in the comments. If you’d like to try Bluebeam Revu download a 30 day free trial, or just Email Me Here for a demo.

We’ve talked about PDF editing before (I am a reseller of Bluebeam) and you may also be in these posts:

Construction Collaboration: PDF Secrets Part 1 – Estimating Takeoff
Construction Collaboration: PDF Secrets Part 2 – On-line Meeting for PDF Changes Now or Later
Construction Collaboration: PDF Secrets Part 3 – Large Format Drawings and Markups

The post Construction Plan and 3D Model Markups will Never Be the Same appeared first on Hagen Business Systems.