te some cut sheets, but not to optmize material, rather define some cut lines. Everything that I am cutting is made of planar wood elements, but there are very specific geometries (mostly straight lines) and I have to put tolerances and radiasas at the corners in order to cut on the cnc mill. Spending time to figure out how to automate is necessary, but I am stuck!
One thing the definition is doing is taking my brep modeled components in rhino and makking them into 2d close curves and laying them side by side. It works...not ideal as its not layed out in a sheet, but that is not the most important part.
Another particular problem is that you will see some notches in the curves, which other pieces will slip into, so different slots need different specific offsets (making them larger) as a toelrance to allow for material play. This I don't even know how to set up so maybe it will just have to wait.
THE MAIN QUESTION, and super important would be, LIFESAVER:
At all 'inward' corners...which I think will always mean concave corners (most are 90 degrees, but are within to sides, instead of a corner sticking out). I'm sure its obviousy, but the reason being the outward corners a circular dril bit can cut, but inward ones need an arc profile extended beyond where the corner of the other piece will fit into. The drill bit i am using is 6mm, so 6mm diamters arcs is what i'm working with.
I have managed to put such an arc at every vertices of each cut piece. The problem being some stick outward isntead of cutting into the piece. So each one needs to be orieneted correctly. Ideally they would also only draw into inward corners, but I can always delete them out. I think maybe I am missing a more logical mathematical way of defining?
For these geometries it is not very important which side the half circle arc in on in the inward corners, but I also have some geometries that I will have to control where the circles face according to the rest of the cut piece.
The cutouts in the middle of the pieces that are curves do not need such corners obviously.
The picture is an example drawn
I hope this isn't too specific and long. in general though automating fabrication, and controling pracitcal math and orientation problems like this is itnersting to me!
THANKS…
try now to integrate Geco in an interdisciplinary architectural engineering studio: hoping we can show you some nice applications of your tool, I'll keep you update and sending now details by e-mail. Here the file (very welcome to be shared). It most probably contais trivial errors by me, thanks for helping and giving some tip! Gr. Michela
FILE:
Ok, right, I see the outputs update correctly. Origin of problems must be in some different mistake I do:
- Incident radiation: I am not sure I understand what is going on: why I get so many 'not a number' ? (The Galapagos report is full of NaNs).
Bio-Diversity: 0.887 Genome[0], Fitness=NaN, Genes [89% · 44%] { Record: Too many fitness values supplied } ...
Genome[7], Fitness=NaN, Genes [74%] { Record: No fitness value was supplied } ....
Genome[9], Fitness=NaN, Genes [37% · 11%] { Record: Genome was mutated to avoid collision Record: Too many fitness values supplied }
- Daylight calculations: the geometry accumulates withouth deleting the previous models. As a consequance, results almost do not change after few varations (so, outputs get updated but do not vary). In current daylight definition: the first object being imported is the one where the grid has to fit; its setting makes it cancelling all the other objects during import. All the others, do not delete anything when imported. When running loops (manual or GA) that vary parameters, the entire geometry do not get cancelled - so I guess the loop does not pass back by the cancelling step, but imports only the geometry which has been varied by the parameters using the setting of that import component only? I will then try again by changing the order of the operations, but if you have specfic tips, let me know.
THANKS!
…
next level.
This Parametric Design course will provide the participants with the necessary knowledge and ability to use Grasshopper, a free visual programming plugin in Rhinoceros; you will be guided through a series of hands-on exercises that highlight NURBS modeling and its concepts. We will introduce Grasshopper as a graphical algorithm editor tightly integrated with Rhino’s 3D modeling tools. You will also learn how Rhino is used to render models for visualization, translate 3D models for prototyping, and export 3D models into 2D CAD or graphics programs.
English is the course main language.
Location: Düsseldorf city center
Registration and buying Tickets
www.digitalparametrics.eventbrite.de
Course Calendar:
4 Days 6 hours each
Total duration 24h
2 weekends
Date:
Sat. 17 - Sun. 18 June
Sat. 24 - Sun. 25 June
10:00 - 17:00
Getting Started in Rhino. 2 days (17 - 18 June)
Getting Started in Grasshopper. 2 days (24 - 25 June)
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Participants will be given a certificate of participation at the end of the course.
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Course fees:
Professionals: 600€ (excl. MwSt.) Students: 500€ (excl. MwSt.) Students need to provide: Copy of current student ID or proof of student enrollment at University/School.
Group discounts:
Group of 3 professionals: 3x500 = 1500€ (excl. MwSt.)
Group of 3 Students: 3x400 = 1200€ (excl. MwSt.)
Participants are kindly asked to bring their own laptops and have pre-installed Rhino + Grasshopper.
Useful Resources:
Rhinoceros Installation (90 days full version trial available): http://www.rhino3d.com/download
Rhinoceros for Mac (includes Grasshopper) http://www.rhino3d.com/download/rhino-for-mac/5/wip
Grasshopper Free Installation: http://www.grasshopper3d.com/page/download-1
Grasshopper Free Plugins: http://www.food4rhino.com/app/lunchbox http://www.giuliopiacentino.com/weaverbird
Main Tutor:
Rihan
M.A. Dipl.Ing. Architect
Architect at RKW Architektur + Düsseldorf
For any questions about the course, please email: info@immersive-studio.com…
ll geometry.
The difference with programs like Inventor is that they are made for production, regardless of the fabrication method. I won't go into detail about that, and instead focus on the modeling process.
In this little model, the starting point actually is a bit obvious, the foundation.
The only contents in the 3dm file are 27 lines. These indicate the location of each footing, and the direction of the tilt of each column. Everything else is defined in GH with the use of numbers as input parameters.
Needless to say, instead of those lines you could obviously generate lines and control the number of columns and panels, hence establish their layout, with any algorithmic or non-algorithmic criteria you please. That marks a major difference between GH and Inventor.
You can generate geometry with Inventor via scripting/customization (beyond iLogic), with transient graphics for visual feedback similar to GH's red-default previews. However Inventor's modeling functions are not set to input and output data trees. I won't go into detail on that, but suffice to say that the data tree associativity of GH was for me the first major difference I noticed. I've used other apps with node diagram interfaces like digital fusion for non-linear video editing since the late 90's, so the canvas did not call my attention when I first started using GH.
Anyways, here's a screen capture of the foundational lines:
In the first group of components, the centerlines of the rear columns are modeled:
And the locations in elevation for connection points are set. Those elevations were just numbers I copied from Excel, but you can obviously control that any way you please. I was just trying to model this quickly.
The same was done for the rear columns:
The above, believe it or not, took me the first 5 hours to get.
Here's a screen capture of what the model and definition looked like after 4 hours, not much:
If you're interested, next post I can get into the sketching part you mentioned, which is a bit cumbersome with GH, but not really.
I wouldn't say that using GH to do this little model was cumbersome, it just needed some thinking at the beginning. You do similar initial thinking when working with a feature-based modeler.…
Added by Santiago Diaz at 12:44am on February 24, 2011
akes the linear regression of the Schroeder integral over 30 dB worth of decay. Whether it is T-15 or T-30, they all seek to estimate the RT, which is always always the time it takes for sound to decay 60 decibels.
The website has benchmarks, for your reference. You can find them under the 'Pachyderm' drop down menu, under 'Benchmarks'.
Your model may well require millions of rays to be accurate. It sounds like a very large space. I'm sorry if that is an unpleasant answer. Sometimes it does help to have a computer with more cores to help with this. I have gotten up to 90% processor usage on a 12 core machine before.
Arthur…
hat differ in shapes, sizes and height the facade would be a mess. Some spaces need some light while other can't have any. I would like to have full freedom of creation inside the building, to make it as functional as possible. Thats why i decided the parametric "skin" solution would be best. Since the location has industrial past (factories made of brick) i decided that brick would give interesting result.
I tried creating the definition on my own but since i lack skill in GH i got some problems (especially multiplication of bricks and the diffrence between each "level" (half a brick on y axis) caused problems for me.
I post my simple sketch explaining the idea of definition i would like to create (sorry about quality):
1 - Brep - I would like to use 25x12x6cm (classic brick) but as well experiment with diffrent shapes - like the one on the right with hole inside - that would give more light. Thats why i think the best solution would be using brep for this definition.
2- Multiplication - biggest problem for me - I don't know how tall the wall would be, what will be the final shape of Brep (brick) and that's why i would like to manipulate this with sliders as well. All the walls are flat (maybe it would be easier to use surface?). As i managed to multiply the bricks easy way i don't know how to gain control over height of the wall - for example that it is 30 bricks high, but has each second row moved on x axis by the distance of 1/2 brick. I tried using Series but with no success. Could you help me with that please?
3 - Rotation - i would like to use image sampler for that so i can "paint" where i want more sun and where i dont need it at all (black and white). The rotation has to be limited to 180 degrees as well. Obviously i didn't get here yet, but i never used image sampler so if you could give me some advice how to use component and how to create such images i would be really grateful.
4 - More of a concept thing - since the connection angles differ from 90 degrees i will have to figure out how to connect the parts of the wall at sides ;).
I would like to ask you for help with the defintion, since i am totally stuck at step 2. I post what i came up with so far. Thank you for your time and help!
PS. I post an image that is pretty similar to one of options i would like to check for my building.
…
bi-directional link, the link is unidirectional (downflow only), because of the use of proxies.
Matrix transforms and persistent constraints: I don't think this is true. The parts can have mates to other parts that preserve geometric relationships like 'coincident' , 'aligned' etc. These are essentially bi-directional. GH's algorithmic approach does not do relationships in the same / flexible way. In GH, the 'relationship' has to be part of the generation method that dependent on the creation sequence. I.e. draw line 2 perpendicularly from the end of point of line 1. If you are thinking about parts or assemblies sharing, or referencing parameters as part of the regen process, this is also possible. iLogic does this, and adds scripting. So does Catia. Inventor/iLogic can also access Excel and have all the parameter processing done centrally, if required.
Consequently, scripting the placement of components is irrelevant in GH, unless you decide that each component needs to be contained in its own separate file.
I wouldn't be too hasty here. Yes, you are right about compartmentalisation. I think this needs to happen with GH, in order to deal with scalability/everyday interoperability requirements. Confining projects to one script is not sustainable. MCAD apps have been doing this for ages with 'Relational Modeling'.The Adaptive Components placement example illustrates that it is beneficial to be able to script some 'hints' that can be used on placement of the component. Say, if your component requires points as inputs, then its should be able to find the nearest points to the cursor as it moves around. I think Aish's D# / DesignScript demo'd this kind of behaviour a few years ago. Similarly, Modo Toolpipe reminds me how a lot of UI based transactions can be captured as scripts (macro recorder etc). Allowing this input to be mixed in and/or extended by GH I think will yield a lot of 'modeling efficiency' around the edges. This is a (mis)using GH as an user-programmable 'jig' for placing/manipulating 'dumb' elements in Rhino. It may even give the 'dumb elements' a bit more 'intelligence' by leaving behind embedded attributes, like links to particular construction planes etc.Even if we confine ourselves to scripting. GH is a visual or graphic programming interface. A lot of 'insert and connect' tasks can be done more easily using graphic methods. If we need to select certain vertices on a mesh as inputs for, say, a facade panel, its going to be quicker to do this 'graphically' (like the AC example), then ferreting out the relevant indices in the data tree et al. The 'facade panel' script would then have some coding to filter/prompt the user as to what inputs were acceptable, and so on.
This also brings up the point that generating components and assemblies in MCAD is not as straightforward. In iParts and iAssemblies, each configuration needs to be generated as a "child" (the individual file needs to be created for each child) before those children can be used elsewhere.
Not sure what you mean here. If the i-parts are built up using sketches /profiles or other more rudimentary features (like Revits' profile/face etc family templates) then reuse should be fairly straight forward. I suppose you could make it like GH scripting, if you cut and paste or include script snippets that generate the desired Inventor features.
One of the reasons why the distributed file approach makes perfect sense in MCAD, is that in industry you deal with a finite set of objects. Generative tools are usually not a requirement. Most mechanical engineers, product engineers and machinists would never have any use for that.
I don't think this is true. Look at the automotive body design apps, which are mostly Catia based. All of the body parts are pretty much 'generative' and generated from splines, in a procedural way, using very similar approaches to GH. Or sheet metal design. It's not always about configuration of off-the-shelf items like bolts. And, the constraints manager is available to arbitrate which bit of script fires first, and your mundane workaday associative dimensions etc can update without getting run over by the DAG(s) :-)
…
mplex the models are. If we are running multi-room E+ studies, that will take far longer to calculate.
Rhino/Grasshopper = <1%
Generating Radiance .ill files = 88%
Processing .ill files into DA, etc. = ~2%
E+ = 10%
Parallelizing Grasshopper:
My first instinct is to avoid this problem by running GH on one computer only. Creating the batch files is very fast. The trick will be sending the radiance and E+ batch files to multiple computers. Perhaps a “round-robin” approach could send each iteration to another node on the network until all iterations are assigned. I have no idea how to do that but hope that it is something that can be executed within grasshopper, perhaps a custom code module. I think GH can set a directory for Radiance and E+ to save all final files to. We can set this to a local server location so all runs output to the same location. It will likely run slower than it would on the C:drive, but those losses are acceptable if we can get parallelization to work.
I’m concerned about post-processing of the Radiance/E+ runs. For starters, Honeybee calculates DA after it runs the .ill files. This doesn’t take very long, but it is a separate process that is not included in the original Radiance batch file. Any other data manipulation we intend to automatically run in GH will be left out of the batch file as well. Consolidating the results into a format that Design Explorer or Pollination can read also takes a bit of post-processing. So, it seems to me that we may want to split up the GH automation as follows:
Initiate
Parametrically generate geometry
Assign input values, material, etc.
Generate radiance/ E+ batch files for all iterations
Calculate
Calc separate runs of Radiance/E+ in parallel via network clusters. Each run will be a unique iteration.
Save all temp files to single server location on server
Post Processing
Run a GH script from a single computer. Translate .ill files or .idf files into custom metrics or graphics (DA, ASE, %shade down, net solar gain, etc.)
Collect final data in single location (excel document) to be read by Design Explorer or Pollination.
The above workflow avoids having to parallelize GH. The consequence is that we can’t parallelize any post-processing routines. This may be easier to implement in the short term, but long term we should try to parallelize everything.
Parallelizing EnergyPlus/Radiance:
I agree that the best way to enable large numbers of iterations is to set up multiple unique runs of radiance and E+ on separate computers. I don’t see the incentive to split individual runs between multiple processors because the modular nature of the iterative parametric models does this for us. Multiple unique runs will simplify the post-processing as well.
It seems that the advantages of optimizing matrix based calculations (3-5 phase methods) are most beneficial when iterations are run in series. Is it possible for multiple iterations running on different CPUs to reference the same matrices stored in a common location? Will that enable parallel computation to also benefit from reusing pre-calculated information?
Clustering computers and GPU based calculations:
Clustering unused computers seems like a natural next step for us. Our IT guru told me that we need come kind of software to make this happen, but that he didn’t know what that would be. Do you know what Penn State uses? You mentioned it is a text-only Linux based system. Can you please elaborate so I can explain to our IT department?
Accelerad is a very exciting development, especially for rpict and annual glare analysis. I’m concerned that the high quality GPU’s required might limit our ability to implement it on a large scale within our office. Does it still work well on standard GPU’s? The computer cluster method can tap into resources we already have, which is a big advantage. Our current workflow uses image-based calcs sparingly, because grid-based simulations gather the critical information much faster. The major exception is glare. Accelerad would enable luminance-based glare metrics, especially annual glare metrics, to be more feasible within fast-paced projects. All of that is a good thing.
So, both clusters and GPU-based calcs are great steps forward. Combining both methods would be amazing, especially if it is further optimized by the computational methods you are working on.
Moving forward, I think I need to explore if/how GH can send iterations across a cluster network of some kind and see what it will take to implement Accelerad. I assume some custom scripting will be necessary.…
ou will see all of the available components on a ribbon at once so there is no need to keep clicking drop down menus.
It's all about discoverability with GH. What if you're a beginner and don't know about the Create Facility (dbl click canvas) how can you find Extr?
Even if you hover over every component or use the drop down lists you will not see the name Extr appear anywhere.
Sure it makes sense that Extr is short for Extrude but it's also the Nick Name of Extrude to Point component
So you can easily miss the fact that one has a Distance Input verses a Point Input.
I think I made the move to Icons around about the move from version 0.5 to 0.6, possibly before. I initially thought that I would go back to text because I loved the mono chromatic look of the text but I soon realised that Icons were the way forward. The greatest benefit is speed. You don't need to digest and decipher every component (which is written 90 degrees to the norm).
I'm not saying you should move to Icons forthwith but at least consider that once you have a better knowledge and understanding of GH, Icons will set you free.
My top ten tips that I would highly recommend to anyone wanting to better themselves with GH.
1) Turn on Draw Icons
2) Turn on Draw Fancy Wires
3) Turn on Obscure Components
4) Use the Create Facility like a Command Line eg "Slider=-1<0.75<2" or "Shiftlist=-1"
5) Use Component Aliases to customise your use of the Create Facility eg giving the Point XYZ component an alias of XYZ will bring it up as the first option on the Create Facility as opposed to the other possibilities.
6) Try to answer other people's questions even if it's not relevant to your own area. By looking into solving a problem outside of your comfort zone and then posting your results it is very rewarding but it also lets you see the other approaches that get posted in a new light.
7) Take the time to understand Data/Path structures.
8) Buy a second monitor - There is nothing that can compare to real estate when working in Grasshopper.
9) Read Rajaa Issa's Essential Mathematics
10) Pick a panel in a tab on the ribbon and get to know every component inside and out and then move on. Start with the Sets Tab > List Panel…