Export to Studio

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.

Before You Export

The export is a snapshot of the sheet as it is set up, so getting the layout right first saves a round trip:

Layer states matter. Layers that are off, frozen or non-plotting are skipped, as are layers with no geometry on them. What you would plot is what you get.
Viewport scale and view matter. The viewport is exported with its scale, center and twist angle, so a rotated site plan comes across rotated the same way. A viewport clipped to a polyline or another object keeps that outline, and layer overrides set for one viewport (VP Color, VP Lineweight, VP Linetype, VP Transparency) apply to what is seen through it.
The plot style table matters. When the layout plots with a color-dependent table (.ctb), objects come across in the colors and lineweights they plot with: a monochrome sheet arrives monochrome, with its screened grays and heavy pens.
Linetype scale matters. Dashes keep the length they plot with, from LTSCALE, PSLTSCALE and each object's own linetype scale, so a legend swatch and a long boundary dash both come across as they plot.
Page setup matters. The Studio page size is the layout's plot paper size.
Units follow the drawing. Drawings set to millimeters, centimeters or meters export in millimeters; everything else exports in inches. Lineweights and text heights are converted to match.
Save the drawing so the project can record where it came from.

The Export Dialog

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.

Per-layer controls

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.

Block Treatment

The Block Treatment section lists every block name found in the sheet with how many instances there are, and a choice per name:

Explode: the block's linework is exported as ordinary geometry. Use this for title blocks, detail callouts, and anything whose exact drafting you want preserved.
Keep as Symbol: the block is exported as a named symbol at its insertion point, scale and rotation. Studio then resolves the name against its plan symbol library, so 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.

Capture paper space as background image

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.

Shade Civil 3D surface

Shown when the drawing has a Civil 3D TIN surface, in the drawing itself or in an xref (listed with the xref's name, since a civil base and the sheet can both hold an EG). Pick the one surface to bring into Studio as a terrain, or None. The list starts on the surface you picked the last time you exported this drawing; the first time, on one named like finished grade (FG, Finished, Proposed, Design). The other surfaces still export their contours and labels.

The chosen surface comes in as the triangles each viewport shows of it, with their true elevations, packed into the project on its own Hillshade: (surface name) layer at the bottom of the viewport. Studio draws the ground from them. It shades the slopes, exaggerated so gentle grading shows, and can color the ground by elevation; the settings are on the object's Terrain tab and change the drawing at once, with no trip back to CAD. Curbs, walls and pad edges keep the sharp breaklines the surface was built with.

The terrain multiplies under the plan at 70% opacity; bring it forward in the draw order to shade over fills as well. An Update brings in new triangles and keeps your terrain settings. Picking a different surface for an Update replaces the terrain, and a project exported before terrains existed carries grey shadings instead, which its next Update replaces with the chosen surface's terrain. The surface's contours and labels still export as before. Needs Civil 3D or the Civil 3D Object Enabler; without either the option does nothing and the command line says so.

What Gets Exported

Exported	Not exported
Lines, polylines (with bulges), arcs, circles, ellipses, splines, 2D solids, hatches (boundaries, with solid fills and patterns tight enough to plot solid filled in, and an open drafting pattern's own lines, so a line hatch such as parking striping can draw at the angle and spacing it plots at), wipeouts and text masks, text and MText, block references, and the geometry inside blocks and xrefs. Anything else that AutoCAD can explode comes across as its pieces: dimensions, multileaders, tables, and Civil 3D objects such as surfaces, labels and parcel tables. A Civil 3D parcel comes across as one closed path on its layer, named after the parcel, with its arcs kept and any inner loop as a hole, so it can be styled as an area straight away; its labels come with it. The boundary is found from the parcel segments around the parcel's label point, so the segments must be on exported layers and inside the viewport; a parcel whose boundary cannot be found keeps its labels only and the command line counts it. Raster images come across as images in their frames, cut to their clip, from their files (kept as they are, or re-saved at the size they print at). OLE objects, such as an Excel table or a pasted logo, come across as the picture Windows keeps of them for display, so Excel is never started; the export report says what each was read from.	PDF and DWF underlays, and objects that cannot be exploded. An image whose file cannot be found, or an OLE object with no picture kept (a link whose source is not loaded), is left out with the reason. A hatch AutoCAD fills with no pattern lines at all plots nothing, so it is left out too, with its handle. The command line lists what was left out.

Exported

Not exported

Lines, polylines (with bulges), arcs, circles, ellipses, splines, 2D solids, hatches (boundaries, with solid fills and patterns tight enough to plot solid filled in, and an open drafting pattern's own lines, so a line hatch such as parking striping can draw at the angle and spacing it plots at), wipeouts and text masks, text and MText, block references, and the geometry inside blocks and xrefs. Anything else that AutoCAD can explode comes across as its pieces: dimensions, multileaders, tables, and Civil 3D objects such as surfaces, labels and parcel tables. A Civil 3D parcel comes across as one closed path on its layer, named after the parcel, with its arcs kept and any inner loop as a hole, so it can be styled as an area straight away; its labels come with it. The boundary is found from the parcel segments around the parcel's label point, so the segments must be on exported layers and inside the viewport; a parcel whose boundary cannot be found keeps its labels only and the command line counts it. Raster images come across as images in their frames, cut to their clip, from their files (kept as they are, or re-saved at the size they print at). OLE objects, such as an Excel table or a pasted logo, come across as the picture Windows keeps of them for display, so Excel is never started; the export report says what each was read from.

PDF and DWF underlays, and objects that cannot be exploded. An image whose file cannot be found, or an OLE object with no picture kept (a link whose source is not loaded), is left out with the reason. A hatch AutoCAD fills with no pattern lines at all plots nothing, so it is left out too, with its handle. The command line lists what was left out.

Alongside the geometry, the export carries layer and object styling, text, and AutoCAD's draw order, so objects stack in Studio the way they stack on the sheet.

When the drawing has a coordinate system, set with GEOGRAPHICLOCATION or as a Civil 3D drawing zone, the export also records where the site is (the latitude and longitude at the center of the largest viewport) and where true north lies in the drawing. Studio uses them to place the sun by date and time. The command line says so when the drawing has no coordinate system.

After the export, the command line reports anything left out, by type and count, and anything that differs from the plot, such as a plot style table it could not apply. The full report (page size, units, and what each viewport exported and how) is saved with the project file. To see it in AutoCAD as well, run AUTOSTYLE_DIAGNOSTICS once before exporting; it stays on until you run it again or restart AutoCAD.

Saving the Project

You are prompted for a location and name. The default is the drawing's own name with an .asp extension, and .asp is the format to use.

Re-exporting after a drawing revision

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.

Opening the Result

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.