Distributing objects over a surface
Altair EmployeeI work in jewelry and I often need to distribute gems over a surface. The surface is not flat. Think for example to a ring. I don't want to position these gems manually. Does solidthinking offer some automatism for this?
Answers
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Allign to NURBS surface.
This distributes according to the Surface structure.
- So You should build a surface that supports the intended distribution.
Break the history of the Gem -objekt :
Orientation of the Gems is relativ to their Axis.
With the History broken (only gem) you can apply translate and rotate
to the axis of the base gem and interactively adjust position and orientation of the copies.
If you only need one or two rows you can also project or intersect
curves and use Allign to curve.
-- Also play with the options --
EDIT : Sorry I was talking about 'Replicate' not Allign tool.
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I agree with the suggested tool: Replicate.
Once you set the number of copies in U and V you can also play with the last 4 parameters about start point and end point. Just change them from 0 to 1 in order to reduce the area where to place the jems, or if the jem is one, you can use them in order to chose where to place it.
If you don't want to keep the perpendicular alignment to the surface just set 'No alignment'.
I suggest to try to keep the history because very often it is, and if you keep it, it will be quicker to edit the result or to replace the jem.
You can have a look also to the help on-line for more details on the Replicate tool and options.
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Yes I have to correct myself one more time.
- I had previously overlooked the small widget that appears on the
replication objekt in edit mode.
With this you can adjust the orientation and relative position of the
copies interactively while maintaining history.
And heres a tip : do the edits in Wireframe view mode (not shaded ).
That way it updates in real time . Shading slows it down.
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Hi to everyone!
I have had the same problem but I haven't resolved :-(
I have built the diamond as show here: http://www.solidthinking.com/online_learning/diamond_swf.html
but when I try to replicate on a surface it doesn't work fine... on the contrary if I try to make the same thing with a cilinder (for example) it works fine!
Replicate have some limitation or.....?
Thank you
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It is just the position of the local axis that on the cylinder is automatically placed at the base while if you build an object by yourself you can control its position and, by mistake you may place it in a point where it is not helpful when you replicate.
Just to do a quick test you may callapse the C.Tree of the object to replicate and use the translation tool by enabling the 'Axis' option inside its Modeling Tool panel in order to move not the object but only the axis.
Put it at the base of the jem and try to replicate again.
This is just a quick test because for sure it is not good to collapse the C.Tree!
In order to do a better job you should look at how the object is build and correct what you did wrong (without removing the history) in order to get the same result.
Usually, if you start from one base curve, you must pay attention to the position of the local axis on that curve so that the next object you will produce from it will have the same local axis positioning as well as the final one.
Just let me know if you need more help on this.
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