9 Signs You Need Help With PDF Manipulation

It’s always deadlines, isn’t it? Seems like the worst possible things that can happen with project drawings will happen just hours (or minutes!) before a deadline.

Here are the 9 signs you need help:

1. If last minute calamities make drops of sweat form on your brow;
2. If it’s an office-wide scramble to change an entire set of drawings quickly;
3. If you’re spending time poring over revised documents to see what changed;
4. If you have pivotal comments to make during the review process;
5. If you want to cut down on re-work;
6. If your team and the customer need a succinct explanation on a key issue;
7. If you need to keep parts of your drawings secure during collaboration;
8. If a change is needed to your portion of the drawings while you’re on vacation;
9. If you need a summary of all the markups on the job . . .

If orchestrating changes makes you a little crazy, you need help with PDF manipulation.

If you do a search on PDF editors, do you know why Bluebeam doesn’t come up in that search? Because it’s NOT just a PDF editor. It’s so much more, it jams up the search! Well don’t let the challenges of manipulating PDFs jam you up and make you crazy.

Bluebeam can empower you in these situations

• You need to redact portions of a PDF document.  Even if you’re not a secret agent, blacking out sensitive text can come in handy. And Revu has true redacting, not just a black “highlight” that can be removed during the next edit to reveal the text.
• You want to go green and save paper.  Hey, are you still printing out documents and redlining them BY HAND? Ugh. Even if you don’t want to save paper, this process went out with the woolly mammoths. Revu will even give you a summary report of all the markups on the job.
• You want to edit text.  If you have one of the best proofreaders in the world (aka. me), things can still be missed in a set of drawings. If that last glance over catches an error, fix it before the seeds of discontent are sown with the next team down the line, or even worse, with the customer. If the customer ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy.
• You want to add images, resize and move them.  Who hasn’t heard that a picture paints a thousand words? Besides being a line from a sappy song by Bread, it’s so true. Snap a photo of a problem at the project location, embed it in the document, and your picture will eliminate the need for a written explanation.
• You want to annotate.  If you want to add notes to a document, don’t hand write them. There’s too much room for error, and maybe your handwriting is hard to read. I’m not just pointing a finger at architects and engineers here, but my brother is an engineer, and his handwriting looks like a language from outer space.
• You want to sign your PDFs.  If it needs a signature, why not sign the entire set of drawings at once? Maybe you have an extra three hours to sit at your desk and do that, but probably NOT. Do it in three minutes using Revu, and you could actually go home early.
• You want to append.  Do the appendices mess up your page count? Not with Revu. Your biggest decision will be whether to number them or use letters. Rearrange and label pages in a PDF document easily.
• You need to update a file but don’t have the original.  I know, this NEVER happens. You know what else never happens? The original is in one of those piles on your desk, and it will be at the bottom of the last pile you search. Beyond the original, what if you’re on revision 6? How can you tell what changed from version 5 or version 1? Revu can compare the documents or even overlay them.
• You want to transform a variety of file types to PDF.  In a way, this is a good problem to have. It means you have access to a plethora of software and tools that help you express your creative side and work more efficiently – not that you need that, goodness no. Revu will convert many file types you work with. Bam, whoomp. One beautiful PDF. Sure, in a perfect design world, Revu would convert every file type known in the universe, even stuff your purchasing department made up, but, alas, entropy is still king.
• You need to edit a PDF using security features.  With the groundswell toward collaboration, this becomes more important every day. Some of us don’t like to share everything. And that’s ok. Collaborating is one thing, but maybe we were traumatized by having other students copying our test answers in high school. Yeah, it takes 40 years to get over it.   
• You’re mobile.  We used to look forward to getting out of the office for a seminar or workshop so we could take a break from “real” work. Nowadays, your job follows you around via your mobile device – even into the bathroom. Ugh. The nice thing is, you can use Revu to revise a project drawing no matter where you are (however, please don’t do this while driving a car or snowboarding).

Bluebeam Revu is award-winning PDF creation, markup, editing and collaboration software designed specifically for AEC industry design and construction workflows.  Boost your firm’s productivity by leveraging markup data across the entire project lifecycle, and streamline processes to get more done in less time.

The older we get the less hair we have to begin with, so don’t tear yours out trying to get a handle on PDF changes. Contact Alan Westbrooks for a demonstration of the ways Bluebeam Revu will help you achieve your PDF manipulation Zen. Download a 30-day trial of Revu and try it today.