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
deform into rhombic dedocahedrons when they reach equilibrium.
http://mathworld.wolfram.com/CubicClosePacking.html
I was trying to model sphere lattice constrained within a boundary box. When inflated, they would not intersect with each other; they would stay in place; and would be malleable just enough to expand and fill in the gaps in between the spheres.
I started off with the help of this thread here(Thanks for those contributed!). As I understood, there was a bug in Kangaroo2. Solver can't handle more than one item plugged in. So I tried to understand David's Stasiuk's Script and adopted it with a few variations, please see gh file attached.
In the first 5 - I've used David Stasiuk's C# component-variable pressure (posted on June 9, 2015 at 12:25am): 'No. 4.5' being the most successful simulation so far(inflation value is kept very low so that they would not intersect);
although I realised I made some math mistake in setting the close packing grid.(could be checked by plugging voronoi3D to see if the area of the rhombic faces are regular)
No. 6-7 I tried with Kangaroo2 components.
After consulting my tutor(Andrei Jipa)'s help, I realised the following changes could be made:
- The definition posted by David on June 8, 2015 at 4:47pm with constant pressure would've worked better.
- Icosahedrons with WbCatmull(Quad divisions) would result in more even load distribution. With wbloop, vertices more concentrated at poles.
- Load in dir Z could be omitted. Andrei has suggested to use lengths(line) in Kangaroo 2 as 'pressure' instead. And I am trying to improve the grid; and maybe try with David's constant pressure definition. I will keep you guys posted of the progress!
I am new to the parametric world, comments/advice very much appreciated! :) Zhini
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- nickname is rather the best approach - and not on active group, but that's irrelevant anyway).
Step back (assuming that you are talking about the "Tens_from_random_blah_blah" definition):
1. Engineering is the art of demystifying (or we are promising that anyway, he he). This means that you start defining (better: outlining) some topology for things based on some "generic" rules (like the ones applied for the masts,cables,cones etc etc). These things are kept in some kind of structure (Lists, DataTrees etc). Things are few in 99.99999% of cases (i.e. : even the biggest membrane "module" has, say, 20-50 masts per "module").
2. Then ... handling things "individually" (mostly modifying) becomes the most critical part. See this (an x "possible" solution by combining a myriad of "options" : a no cones membrane solution, in plain English):
3. But the above is impossible (for more than obvious reasons). You should deploy masts in some high/low sequence in order to achieve some meaningful convex/concave formation that could work.
4. This "works" : 5. This doesn't:
6. This works partially (the formation at the back is "flat" == undo able):
7. This is utterly kitsch (and faulty as the case6 - the back portion):
So it's quite obvious that without a (quite complex) capability to individually control things (in this occasion : mast heights) the whole definition is a waste of computer time. Additionally the more the solution is "demystified" (some curve is defined, some random points are created, some masts are in place, some cables appear etc etc) the more additional constrains are required in order to "narrow" the possibilities (In plain English : sliders should control other sliders as regards their min/max values, true/false, you/me etc etc).
Remember that we are talking about ONE (mast height) out of a myriad things that you should control "manually" (it's utterly pointless to mastermind some kind of "generic" rules - or use naive attractors etc etc) .You'll see the difference when I'll completely reform the definition by adding individual control upon anything.
PS: what about the blocks? (the real life stuff that actually make any solution possible). Can you imagine a 2nd set of "restrictions" imposed by "a child to his parent"? (Assembly/Component modeling , that is).
more soon
…
uick answers. Below you will find some suggestions, but don't think of them as rules and especially don't think of them as guarantees.
1. Choose a descriptive title for your post
Don't call your question "Help!" or "I have a problem" or "Deadline tonight!", but actually describe the problem you are having.
2. Be succinct but clear in your wording
People need to know some details about your problem in order to understand what sort of answers would satisfy you, but nobody cares about how angry your boss or how bad your teacher or how tight your deadline is. Talk about the problem and only the problem. If you don't speak English well, you should probably post in your native language as well as providing a Google Translation of your question.
3. Attach minimal versions of all the relevant files
If you have a GH/GHX file you have a question about, attach it to the post. Don't expect that people will recreate a file based on a screen-shot because that's a lot of pointless work. It's also a good idea to remove everything non-essential from a GH file. You can use the 'Internalise Data' menu option to cut everything to the left of a parameter:
If you're importing curves or Breps or meshes from Rhino, you can also internalise them so you won't have to post a 3DM file as well as a GH file. If you do attach large files, consider zipping them first. Do not use RAR, Ning doesn't handle it.
It is especially a good idea to post files that don't require any non-standard components if at all possible. Not everyone has Kangaroo or Hoopsnake or Geco installed so if your file relies on those components, it might not open correctly elsewhere.
4. Include a detailed image of the GH file if it makes sense
If your question is about a specific (group of) components, consider adding a screenshot of the file in the text of the post. You can use the Ctrl+Shift+Q feature in Grasshopper to quickly create nice screenshots with focus rectangles such as this:
5. Include links to online resources if possible
If you have a question about Schwarz Minimal surfaces, please link to a website which talks about these.
6. Create new topics rather than continuing old ones
It's usually better to start a fresh question, even if there's already a discussion that kinda sorta tangentially touches upon the same issue. Please link to that discussion, but start anew.
7. This is not a 'do my work for me' group
Many of us like to help, but it's good to see effort on our part being matched by effort on your part. Questions in the form of 'I need to do X but cannot be bothered to try and learn the software' will (and should) go unanswered.
7b. Similarly, questions in the form of 'How do I quickly recreate this facade that took a team of skilled professionals four months to figure out?' have a very low success rate.
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David Rutten
Lead Grasshopper Development
Robert McNeel & Associates…
Added by David Rutten at 12:58pm on October 1, 2013
y interesting and smart way to construct surface. I tried some experiments out using a similar idea - take a developable surface which has a series of holes cut through it now offset that surface and unroll both of them, once both have been cut out insert a dowel into the holes (the dowel represents the offset distance). In the end the shape is recreated via tension and in that way there are some similarities. With your concept the thing I have trouble figuring out is how do you cut the variable angle kerfs. Are you using a 5-axis swarf cut, a cnc panel saw - how do you control this? It would be great to have a set of constraints which limit the number of possible angled cuts - these limits would equal the number of v-groove bits you have in the cnc - and then you could just cut the lines with the programmed tool which matches the given angle. Or maybe I am completely wrong, now I think I am wrong, about the execution and you are only changing the gap between each kerf and the angle of the side wall stays constant.
Anyway to answer your question catia can analyze the characteristics of a piece of formed material (this analysis is usually applied to sheet metal and to design forming tools)it's just a matter or defining the material to match that which you are using. Another possibility although not as numerically clear is using a simulation tool like Maya cloth or Virtools. I know this maybe less likely but you can define all sorts of materials in Maya and then simulate their behavior under numerous forces and constraints. I think it would work it's just how do you extrapolate the values Maya needs and then correlate them back into the cloth parameters. Once it yields the final formed mesh then further analysis could be performed in cosmos, ansys, or catia.
I have one other suggestion. In solidworks if you perform a lofted bend on a sheet metal part and then generate a flat pattern it creates a large set of bend lines representing how to perform the bending of an unusual shape using a metal brake. It seems like those bend lines could be machined with you technique to create lofted forms instead of extrusions.
What materials seem to work best so far, have you only been using wood (the purple stuff is probably not wood)?
If you are ever in Los Angeles I have a shop with a 3 axis and 5 axis router, a large vacuum bag, and all the other things to experiment on this and would be open to this.…
Amuse yourself by trying to figure what kind of series logic could deploy (or not) these room unit combos across the blue space grid shown.
2. Let's assume that surgery etc etc departments are sited in some ground floor and their requirement for rooms is variable ... meaning that some kind of heuristic GH approach must be applied here (for instance : fill the first level with rooms required by all departments with min distance from a given core and if more are required go to next floor etc etc).
The real room unit cluster looks like that (all units are prefab)
3. Voids in the whole cluster deployment (avoid Soviet type of bloc aesthetics) mean that culling could be challenge here (we need ...er..."visual" culling , so to speak)
4. After finishing some solution create custom preview(s) in order to visualize what dept owns what rooms.
5. If in trouble with Architectural things > relax > be cool > open 3d PDF > be a great Architect in just 10 easy steps.
PS: of course I know GH clusters...but as they are they violate my rule N1: never walk the walk if no return is possible, he he. But assuming that David could resolve the return issue (sure he can) this is NOT the answer for my "proposal" for multiple Canvas - again like multiple Views in any CAD stuff these days. Just imagine clusters with some serious hierarchy depth > where am I ? what input comes from what output?
I'll be back with a chaotic case (Series in complete anarchy) in order to demonstrate the critical necessity for a visual Tree Manager/Viewer (a visual thing within the GH visual thing). For manager read : decomposer, composer, visual identifier (per data item/branch) tree re-mapper, anything actually.
more soon (and a in depth analysis about what a Tree Manager/Viewer should do - in an ideal world, that is)
Cheers, Peter
…
which needs to go in the first line only.
Each value K is one element of the knot vector
XYZ is an individual control point. Each point gets its own line/string in the output list
R is the weight of the XYZ point defined in the same line
I can get all these data into separate lists easily enough using the buttons etc. But getting them into the proper order and moving stepwise down the data to generate the desired output string list is eluding me so far.
My thought is to make an array of columns.
Column one is a list of knot values.
Column two is a list of X values.
Column 3 = list of Y values
Column 4=z values
Column 5 is weight values
etc
The idea would be to read the first value in each list into a list of five elements, then make a string out of it. The second value of each column into a separate string on the next line, then the third value from each column into the third string in the output list and so on.The last few values in the output list will contain knot vector elements only, as there are more of these than there are control points. Some of these curves are very long, with many control points, like hundreds and hundreds.
It seems I should be able to pull the lists of interest and combine them into a tree somehow; so far all I have been able to manage is to get them into a single list by starting with control points, then weaving each list of interest successively into the growing list. I'm thinking I need to get the list for each parameter into an individual branch, then read a path across the branches at each index value. But I am missing something about the terminology. I have watched a few videos and it makes sense when people are pulling nested geometry out of models, but this is a little different. More of a data management issue. I'm sure if I wrestle with it I will get it, but it may not be pretty. Any pointers appreciated. A couple of approaches are attached. Not sure whether to loop a list subset through the data or do something else. Thanks,
Karl in LA…
urely; an inevitable symptom of developing a piece of software on what Generative Components was doing almost 10 years ago, and creating a generation of users who have the power but not the insight in to how to use these tools properly. Ever seeing, never perceiving.
@ André-Jacques BODIN: as answers so far seem to be coming via links, try this: http://www.bentley.com/en-US/Products/GenerativeComponents/
you can download the latest version for free and it is infinitely more superior to GH. The learning curve is steeper but worth it. Out of experience I can tell you that the problem you have would be solved via your own skill and intelligence in a matter of seconds, rather then clumsily relying on somebody else to write some code 'packaged' as a component, and ultimately restricting your capacity to explore novel design solutions in an intelligent way.
If you are going to work in practice then unfortunately GH becomes utterly useless as it can only really be used in the initial stages of design. Its merely a toy for students and hobbyists. If you are just starting out, invest your time more wisely and learn something which can be used over the entire life cycle of project. It's so versatile that you essentially have unlimited potential and all operations remain fully in your control, or put in another way; you're not restricted by the idiosyncrasies of another programmer who's 'components' might be totally unsuitable for a novel idea you may want to explore therefore killling it.
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t you're trying to do something which is not possible. Some solutions spring to mind other than changing the messaging behaviour of the Tree Item component:
Have an option for all objects (not just Tree Item) that allows you to disregard warning and error feedback. Sometimes a component has warnings (or indeed errors) and yet it still functions as planned. This often also happens with auto-casting, for example if you're trying to find all the curves in some data. Pros: solves the same problem in the same way everywhere, Cons: yet another menu item and yet another thing to watch for.
A global switch that disables the warning and error colouration. Pros: easy fix, easy unfix. Cons: if you also disable message balloons then you can't see where errors are happening.
Add a component which filters valid paths and item indices which you could insert in front of the Tree Item component. Pros: a very Grasshopper standard solution, Cons: yet another esoteric component.
I've been thinking about changing the way branches and items are accessed. Basically wondering whether it makes more sense to combine the tree path and the item index into a single data-type "{0;0;2} (0 to 9)" which defines both the path and a range of items in that path. It could be made to work almost identical to current Tree Branch and Tree Item components but it could also do some other cool stuff in addition to that. For example you could have:
{0;0;1} which defines all the items in that branch
{0;0;1} (2) which defines the third item in that branch
{0;0;1} (0,1,2,4) which defines the first, second, third and fifth items in that branch
{0;0;1} (0 to 4) which defines the first 5 items in that branch
{0;0;1} (!3) which defines all items except the fourth in that branch
And I'm sure people can think of even more combinations of symbols and numbers that can be added. Most of this logic is already in place in the [Replace Branches] and [Split Tree] components.
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David Rutten
david@mcneel.com
Poprad, Slovakia…
Added by David Rutten at 12:58am on January 27, 2013
e in Euclidean space then the distance metric can be discontinuous:
Discontinuous means that a tiny change in input may result in a large change in output. Observe the image above, we start measuring euclidean distances from point A. At first the process appears to be continuous. We measure at distance b and we get point B. We increase the distance slightly to c and we get point C, which is very close to point B. We increase the distance slightly again to d, but now suddenly we're in a completely different location. This jumping behaviour can mean that certain questions (such as: "how do I divide this curve into 4 points, all equally far apart?") do not have an answer. It could be possible for 3 and 5, but not 4.
Another problem is that there may be multiple solutions. In the image above the point D isn't the only point that is d units away from A and coincident with the curve. There may be any number of those points depending on the shape of the curve, the location of A and the value of d. And of course once you have two (or more) solutions, you can have two (or more) answers. Then each of those solutions may yet again have more than one outcome for the next point in the chain and before you know it the question you asked has 35295 different answers and good luck trying to find one you like.
Now of course sometimes it is possible to answer your question unambiguously. I made a solution that uses Galapagos. It's pretty slow, and it'll get slower the more segments you want:
--
David Rutten
david@mcneel.com
Tirol, Austria…
Added by David Rutten at 4:26am on September 9, 2013