Export to Studio is how a drawing becomes a presentation project. It reads
the layout you are looking at, including paper space and everything visible through each
viewport, and writes a .asp project that AutoStyle Studio opens.
Run it from the AutoStyle Pro panel on the BDL ribbon tab,
or type EXPORT_TO_STUDIO at the command line.
Layouts only. The command must be run from a layout tab. Run from model space it reports "EXPORT_TO_STUDIO must be run from a LAYOUT tab" and stops.
The export is a snapshot of the sheet as it is set up, so getting the layout right first saves a round trip:
The dialog opens on Configure Layers for Export. It shows every visible layer that has geometry, listed under Main Drawing, with each attached xref in its own group below. Xref layer names are shown without the xref prefix so the list stays readable.
| Control | What it does |
|---|---|
| Include checkbox | Clear it to leave the layer out of the project entirely. All layers start checked. |
| Color swatch | Shows the layer's resolved color. Click it to pick a different color for the export. The drawing is not modified. |
| Transparency slider | 0–100%. Starts at the layer's own transparency if one is set. |
Layer lineweight and linetype come across automatically. The linetype name is what Studio's auto-mapping reads to choose a stroke style, so leaving standard linetypes assigned in CAD pays off later.
The Block Treatment section lists every block name found in the sheet with how many instances there are, and a choice per name:
SSMH becomes a manhole and TREE-OAK-24
becomes an oak. This is what makes a CAD planting plan come out looking like a rendered
one.A block kept as a symbol whose name Studio cannot resolve is drawn as a placeholder marker; you can then add a rule for that name in CAD Mappings, or re-export it exploded.
Check Capture paper space as background image to plot the sheet's paper space to an image and embed it as a background layer in the project. This is the easy way to keep a title block, sheet border and revision block exactly as drafted while the drawing itself gets rendered. The background can be toggled in Studio from VIEW ▸ Background.
| Exported | Not exported |
|---|---|
| Lines, polylines (with bulges), arcs, circles, ellipses, splines, hatch boundaries, text and MText, block references, and the geometry inside blocks and xrefs. | Dimensions, multileaders, tables and other annotation objects. |
Alongside the geometry, the export carries the properties Studio needs to style intelligently: layer color, lineweight, transparency and linetype; per-entity color, lineweight and linetype overrides; hatch pattern names; block names; text content, height, rotation and alignment; and AutoCAD's draw order, so objects stack in Studio the way they stack on the sheet.
After the export, the command line reports the page size, the units used, and a summary of anything skipped, by type and count.
You are prompted for a location and name. The default is the drawing's own name with an
.asp extension. Plain .json is also offered, which produces the same
content unpacked. That is useful for inspection, but .asp is the normal choice.
Export over the same .asp file. The geometry is refreshed while the
document keeps its identity, so the styling you have already done is not thrown away.
Because layer styling is keyed to layer names, layers that survived the revision come back
styled. This is the intended workflow: style once, re-export as often as the drawing
changes.
Double-click the .asp file, or open it from Studio with
FILE ▸ Open Project. Studio does not need AutoCAD, so the project can
be styled on any machine. Hand the .asp to whoever does the graphics.
On a fresh import Studio offers to apply remembered layer styles and CAD auto-mapping. Both are worth accepting; both are a single undo step if you change your mind.