Why does nobody talk about the old blueprint cabinets at the county records office?

I had to pull some as-builts for a job in Tacoma last week, and the clerk showed me their original linen drawings from the 1950s. The detail on those hand-drafted elevations is just gone now with everything being CAD. Has anyone tried to bring that kind of line weight and clarity back into their digital work?

3 comments

3 Comments

tylerg303mo ago

Could you scan those old drawings to use as a reference layer?

willow6723mo ago

Those sketches are too faded to scan well.

jakeperry14d ago

Holy crap, you actually got to see the original linens? Most of those are locked away in climate controlled storage now because people keep trying to scan them wrong. The line weight thing is a real problem too. Modern CAD makes everything look flat and soulless compared to the old hand drawn stuff where you could see the pressure of the pen in the curves. You cant fake that kind of detail with a digital pen no matter how much you zoom in. The best Ive seen anyone do is overlay a scanned linen as a background layer and trace over it by hand with a tablet. But even that loses the character.