Takeoff Studio help
See what changed between drawing issues, and which markups changed since a baseline (Pro).
Replace Drawing, which checks a new issue page by page, is free. The overlay and markup baselines are part of Takeoff Studio Pro.
When a new issue of a drawing arrives, open the PDF tab and choose Overlay New Issue (Pro), then pick the new PDF, JPG or PNG. The page you are on (old) shows in red, the new issue in green and linework on both in grey. Use Both, Old only and New only to switch between them, and Overlay strength to fade back to the drawing. Colours can be changed in the panel. Overlay Another Page compares two pages of the same drawing instead.
Drawings on the same paper size are laid on top of each other as they are. A different paper size is fitted to the page or to the drawing's extents, whichever lines up better; the panel says how much of the linework matches. If it doesn't line up, choose Align by 2 points: click a point on the old (red) drawing, then the same point on the new (green) one, twice. 3 points also corrects a stretched scan. The arrow buttons nudge the new drawing a screen pixel at a time.
Changed areas are boxed and listed in the overlay panel as added, removed or changed. Click a change to zoom to it. Detail sets how small a difference counts: Fine finds small text changes, Coarse ignores them. Cloud adds a revision cloud note round a change (Cloud all changes does every one); clouds are ordinary notes, so they stay on the drawing and in marked-up PDFs, even without Pro.
The overlay follows the page you are on. With a multi-page new issue it compares the same page number; pick another page in the panel if the sheets are in a different order.
When you have checked the changes, Replace drawing with this revision swaps the new issue in as the project's drawing using Replace Drawing, so your markups carry across, changed pages are reported and markups on removed pages are parked. Capture a markup baseline first if you want to compare quantities after you update them.
Capture a baseline in the PDF tab before a drawing or takeoff revision. Baselines are lightweight snapshots of markup identity, geometry, and metadata for comparison.
Select a baseline from the PDF tab list to inspect its date, page count, markup count, and current difference totals. Rename, delete selected, or clear all when they are no longer useful.
The selected baseline drives the revision overlay and comparison counts. Use Select New or Select Changed to focus the current drawing on changed work.
Show the overlay to highlight new and changed current markups against the selected baseline before updating quantities.
Use the Checks tab and Workflow tab to review calibration, standards, classification, costs, and export readiness.
Feature overview with screenshots: Drawing overlay.
