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For contractors, paper blueprints have always been a staple of the construction business. Recently, a trend has emerged that would potentially replace paper blueprints with digital blueprints. The savings in reproduction and distribution costs alone would be substantial.
In the construction industry, most blueprints are still provided on paper. The general contractor or developer must take the original images provided by the architect and reproduce them into multiple sets of paper blueprints that are then distributed to subcontractors.
In the early 1990s, several companies tried to find a way to make the process more efficient. The idea was to distribute the plans to the contractor in a digital format, rather than on paper. Paper blueprints would be converted into digital images using large format scanners and then distributed over the Internet. It was determined that the technology at the time would not support the scope of the project.
By the late 90s technology had advanced greatly. Computers were much faster. Data was being shared on CD rather than floppy disk and most companies had high-speed Internet connections. With all the advances, there was still one large issue, how to collect blueprints for all of the major projects throughout the Untied States, scan them and then redistribute them to the contractors. Organizations like the Associated General Contractors and the Builders Exchange have recently begun offering digital blueprints to their members. Plans are submitted, scanned and then distributed by CD or they can be downloaded over the Internet.
Now that plans are begging to show up in digital format, the contractors are now struggling with how to measure the blueprints. Many software companies have developed CAD-like software applications that allow the contractor to measure directly from the digital image on the screen of their computer. Even with the development of such technology, most contractors take the digital images to their local blueprint shop and have them printed to paper where they can be measured by scale or digitizer. One problem solved, another created.
Within the next 10 years it is possible that digital blueprints will be the most common way to receive prints. The reduction in reproduction costs and the efficiency of distributing blueprints without leaving the office will eventually outweigh distributing plans on paper.
For the ?EUR??,,????'??old-school?EUR??,,????'?? estimator, paper, pencil and scale will remain the only acceptable thing. But for those ready to take advantage of the new technology, the future looks even brighter.
A blueprint is a type of paper-based reproduction usually of a technical drawing documenting an architecture or an engineering design. More generally, the term ?EUR??,,????'??blueprint?EUR??,,????'?? has come to be used to refer to any detailed plan.
The term ?EUR??,,????'??blueprint?EUR??,,????'?? was originally derived from the visual aspects of prints made using the contact printing process of cyanotype. It is cyanotype which produces the white lines on blue background which are characteristic of the traditional blueprint.
The blueprint process is essentially the cyanotype process developed by the British astronomer and photographer Sir John Herschel in 1842. In the traditional process, a photosensitive compound, a solution of ammonium ferric citrate and potassium ferricyanide, is coated onto paper. Areas of the compound exposed to strong light are converted to insoluble blue ferric ferrocyanide, or Prussian blue. The soluble chemicals are washed off with water leaving a light-stable print.
More recently, designs created using Computer-Aided Design techniques may be transferred as a digital file directly to a printer; in some applications paper is avoided altogether and work and analysis is done directly from digital displays.
As print and display technology has advanced, the traditional term ?EUR??,,????'??blueprint?EUR??,,????'?? has continued to be used informally to refer to each type of image. ?EUR??,,????'??+From wikipedia.org
Francisco Uviña, University of New Mexico
Hardscape Oasis in Litchfield Park
Ash Nochian, Ph.D. Landscape Architect
November 12th, 2025
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