After 15 years of hand drafting, I finally get why the old-timers loved vellum

I always thought digital layers beat paper for revisions, but last month a client asked for a full set of as-built changes on a 1987 warehouse in Cleveland and I had to pull out the originals. Seeing how the faded pencil lines still showed every rework mark made me realize my CAD history is invisible, and that actually matters when you're tracing someone else's mistakes. Has anyone else gone back to physical records for an old job and changed their mind about keeping scans?

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1 Comment

daniel_martinez921mo ago

Vellum is just paper with a fancy finish, and paper dies. That CAD history you’re worried about is still there, just buried in file metadata and revision clouds. Scans get lost, fade, or get coffee spilled on them. A digital file you can actually search and copy beats squinting at someone’s old pencil marks every time. Nostalgia’s nice, but working on a 1987 building is the exception, not the rule.