Hi,

I'm new to Inkscape, until now have been using Illustrator. I am trying to figure out how to separate objects in a PDF file i have exported from clothing pattern making software CLO3D (I have attached the file as an example). 

When I have done this in Illustrator, every object seems to have a clipping mask, so I have to release each object's clipping mask and am then able to separate them and edit them as needed. 

So far in inkscape, after opening the document I have tried selecting Object - Clip - Release Clip many times, never saw any change to indicate objects were being released. I've also done the same with Object - Mask - Release Mask. I have also tried Object - Pop Selected Objects Out of Group, simply Ungrouping and right-click: Extract Image. Nothing has worked so far... 

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated! 

Thanks in advance.

Your attachment is a bitmap embedded in an svg. Inkscape's bitmap tracing functions can generate a vector drawing from this. You will lose some fidelity but it may be close enough.

It may be possible to skip the tracing step. Can attach the AI/PDF file export for us to examine?  https://support.clo3d.com/hc/en-us/sections/115000628387-FILE-IMPORT-EXPORT

Hi,

Apologies for my very late reply, my family and I were sick so I haven't been working. 

Thanks for the suggestion of the bitmap trace. I've tried a few of the different tracing options- centreline tracing gives single stroke path, but only of the outer line of both objects (the seamline) and a hell of a lot of nodes, even after simplifying. Brightness cutoff traced all of the lines, but as strokes, which I haven't been able to convert to lines. I also haven't been able to find how to separate the objects after the bitmap trace, other than cut & paste an entire pattern piece, but doesn't allow me to separate the inner object (the main pattern) from the outer (the seam line).

For my purposes it seems like it'd be simpler to trace the pattern by hand, which I'd like to avoid as this is when you can start messing with very specific shaping. And while this pattern is quite simple, they can get very complex and tracing would take ages. So if there is another option to quickly extract the image as simple paths that would be fantastic. I've attached a PDF that has fewer images as the other file was too large to upload in PDF format. 

Thank you again,

Erika

I opened the pdf in Inkscape (internal import) and ungrouped until there were just paths. There were some dimension line elements to clean up, but otherwise a clean vector result.

Feel free to link to the larger file shared on a service like Google drive, dropbox, etc.

The internal import worked a treat, thanks so much! Oh man I am so relieved there was a simple solution 😅 Thank you both for your help!