Exporting to a vector file that Illustrator can use

I have tried to export as a SWF vector, but Illustrator can't open that file type. Does anyone know how I can get the vector 3D design out of Xara3D and into another graphics program without rasterizing it? I'm pretty sure I've done it before, but can't for the life of me figure out how...

TIA
Becky

Hi Becky, welcome to TalkGraphics.

Xara3D does not create a vector but rather a bitmap extrusion simulating a 3D object. Xara's own applications will only copy and paste from Xara3D into Designer Pro (or older) as a .png.

Welcome to TalkGraphics Becky.

I don't think you can export a vector image. You might be able to export a Flash image but a lot of the 3D formatting is lost.

I would export to PNG, either in True Color or with transparency, (True Color + Alpha channel transprency).

You will need to increase the size of the image so that it exports at the right size and in the right resoltion.

I found an interesting workaround. I printed to a PDF then opened the PDF in Illustrator and it was still vector. Not as smooth looking, but vector at least.

Hmm? I wonder if the shape was not a bitmap clipped inside a vector mask.

Hello Becky, if you export it out as a "swf" file, I guess Adobe Flash would be more suited to open it, than Illustrator. However, you may still not be able to edit it, as Flash needs "fla" files to be able to edit those.