How to use the Snapshot tool to compare drawing sections

Before working out in the field, some Revu users find it helpful to overlay sections of a drawing rather than comparing entire PDFs. For example, electrical drawings for a unit in an apartment building can be superimposed over the architectural drawings to provide more useful details such as wall size, depth, length, and etc. This method is also helpful for comparing markups on different drawing revisions.

In this article, we'll go over how to compare & overlay areas of drawings with the Snapshot tool.

Overlay drawing sections

1. In Revu, open the two PDFs with the areas you'd like to compare.
   
   For best results, only use black and white drawings when completing this process.
2. From the document tab, navigate to the drawing with the section that you want to overlay on top of the second version (architectural, revised, etc.).
3. Go to Edit > Snapshot (G).
4. Click-and-drag a rectangle around the specific area you'd like to compare.
5. Press Ctrl+C to copy the snapshot to your clipboard.
6. From the document tab, navigate to the second drawing and press Ctrl+Shift+V to paste-in-place the snapshot over the same area.
   
   If the areas aren't perfectly aligned after pasting in place, select the snapshot and drag it to change its position. You can also resize it using the yellow control points.

Highlight differences between drawing sections

If you'd like to color code content from the snapshot of the source drawing, follow these steps:

1. With the snapshot selected, navigate to the Properties panel from the right sidebar menu.
2. Under Appearance, select Change Colors...
   
3. In the Color Processing dialog box, select the Source Color you'd like to change (usually black for black and white drawings).
4. Then select the second box and choose the color you'd like to change the source content to.
5. In the second row that appears under Process, select white for the Source Color and choose No Color for the second option. This will make the snapshot's background transparent.
   
6. The Color Processing dialog box will display a preview of your color changes. When finished modifying colors, select OK.
7. From the Properties panel, adjust the opacity to less than 100 to better view overlapping content.

Now you can compare the area at a glance with unique details from each drawing color coded according to your specifications. For more quick drawing management tips, see How to create an enlarged drawing with the Snapshot tool.

How-To

Revu 20

Markup

PDF Management