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3D Assistance Needed for Odd Shape


Bill Tillman

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I've got an odd shape here that I want to turn into a 3D model. It's a round object with lots of irregular curves. I do pretty good with 3D objects that are not so complex, but I really don't know how to do this one. Extrude will most likely not work since the diameters change so much and it's not a flat bar. I've thought how revolve might work, but that too is not what I think will work.

Drawing3.dwg

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I'm thinking LOFT but you'll have to create all the necessary circles to adequately cover the range of diameters that would be needed.

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Thanks. I think ReMark has got what I need. I'll study up on doing a loft, and he's right, I'm going to need lots of circles to get it done. And as always, BIGAL you got some cool stuff there. But what I should have said is that this thing is shaped kind of like a dildo, if you know what I mean.

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I would suggest Loft with the PATH option.

Might need to do the fluid reservoir tip outboard, and add it, not sure how the loft to point would handle that. :|

 

I shouldn't think you will need all that many circles, as long as you have a Path.

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Thanks. I think ReMark has got what I need. I'll study up on doing a loft, and he's right, I'm going to need lots of circles to get it done. And as always, BIGAL you got some cool stuff there. But what I should have said is that this thing is shaped kind of like a dildo, if you know what I mean.

 

Bill, I played around with this a bit, created a spline to use as a path.

It ain't perfect, but it might help you come to grips with a better way to do it.

 

I added some circles, after earlier tries.

The loft on the right is the last one I did, and it is based on the linework entities to the left of it.

It was generated with the Path option.

In the screenshot, you can see that if the lofted 3D Solid is selected, after the fact, there is a drop down menu available to alter the surface treatment, which affects the overall shape.

something like this.dwg

surface normals adjustments.JPG

Edited by Dadgad
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Dadgad I thought the same idea a series of circles joining the two edges, just my 3D skills are pretty basic.

 

Reading another post referring to Fusion 360 the reference was "Freeform modeling" this may be more suitable for this type of shape.

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Dadgad I thought the same idea a series of circles joining the two edges, just my 3D skills are pretty basic.

 

Reading another post referring to Fusion 360 the reference was "Freeform modeling" this may be more suitable for this type of shape.

 

 

No doubt this is how ReMark envisioned doing it in his earlier post.

 

Given that Bill had already supplied the .dwg with the shape, it was pretty straight forward.

I started by drawing a number of straight polylines across the shape, each of them to the Perpendicular snap on the far side.

I then drew circles centered on the midpoint of each of these lines, with the radius defined by snapping to either of the polyline endpoints.

Each of these circles was 3D Rotated using the 2Points option, and the polyline endpoints by 90 degrees.

I then drew a SPLINE, defined by the midpoint of each of the polylines (or the center snaps of the circles, as they should be the same).

I enjoy doing most modeling from an isometric perspective, as it makes it easier to see what you are picking, although in some instances, it may not display the completed 3D Solid as accurately as an ortho view. I also tend to keep a copy of the defining linework to one side, in case I want or need it again.

Start the LOFT command, and pick the circles in lofting order, then I used the PATH option, and selected the Spline as the path.

By using the perpendicular snap when creating the defining polylines, the orientations of the individual circles conform to the overall design intention, as I understand it. :huh:

If they were parallel to the XY plane, that would not be the case.

 

Probably the Reservoir tip is the hardest part of it, and I only spent a minute on it, nor did I do it justice.

 

I have never used Fusion 360, but based on the rave reviews by Shift, and other forum members, you may well be right about the Freeform Modeling capability. :beer:

 

I have only ever modeled 3D Solids, never meshes, surfaces nor nurbs, one of which might be more appropriate for this, not sure. :|

 

Offended by my failure to address the Reservoir tip a tad more diligently, I revisited it.

Suffice it to say, that I improved the overall loft again by adding a few new circles, yet again, and I fixed the tip.

 

Honey let me introduce you, to my red headed mend. :)

 

It is now officially time for me to step away from the magic box! :beer:

better still tip redone.jpg

something like this.dwg

Edited by Dadgad
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Thanks everyone. I'm just getting back to this method and will study how you modeled it. I think I understand but the first couple attempts I made at it did not function correctly for the loft. In any case, I was able to place the 3D model into my model and it looks great. Kind of a weird shape with nothing uniformly curved though.

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Kind of a weird shape with nothing uniformly curved though.

 

Isn't that how it was supposed to look?

 

Presumably the diameters of the circles are meant to be somewhat random, as that was my impression from your original linework.

If they are meant to be the same diameters, that would be easy to do. :|

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given you're dealing with circles (closed) one could simply draw ruled surfaces (command: rulesurf) to draw the meshes automatically between each circle?

 

Surftab command will let you experiment with the number of surface tabulations before using the rulesurf command.

 

Loft could also work but would almost be too complicated in my opinion.

 

-ChriS

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given you're dealing with circles (closed) one could simply draw ruled surfaces (command: rulesurf) to draw the meshes automatically between each circle?

 

Loft could also work but would almost be too complicated in my opinion.

 

If you use Rulesurf you're going to end up with a series of straight cylinders, not a single organic shape like what is shown in Dadgad's images.

 

In the image below, I used Rulesurf for the object on the left and Loft for the object on the right. Not only was Loft easier and faster than Rulesurf, but it is smooth and organic in appearance and it's all one solid piece as opposed to the linear and faceted shape of the Rulesurf object which is made up of 3 separate hollow pieces.

 

For my money, Loft is the way to go.

Loft.jpg

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If you use Rulesurf you're going to end up with a series of straight cylinders, not a single organic shape like what is shown in Dadgad's images.

 

In the image below, I used Rulesurf for the object on the left and Loft for the object on the right. Not only was Loft easier and faster than Rulesurf, but it is smooth and organic in appearance and it's all one solid piece as opposed to the linear and faceted shape of the Rulesurf object which is made up of 3 separate hollow pieces.

 

For my money, Loft is the way to go.

 

Additionally, once created you can still affect the overall shape by changing the surface treatment of the completed lofted object, as I mentioned previously. :beer:

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That looks really good SEANT, I figured there would be another more modern way to do it, my techniques on such things tend to be pretty old school. :beer:

Edited by Dadgad
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Seant, that's really cool. Would you be able to explain a little more in detail how you did that? I'm totally new to things like "Control Vertex modeling of a nurbs surface" and "SurfSculpt".

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Here's a quick screencast demonstrating the general procedure for processing a revolved surface to allow for vertex editing. Part of the problem regarding manipulation is the selection methods have to coordinate Object selection, to highlight the Vertices, then a vertex filter, to grab the group of vertices for any particular operation.

 

The right click menu whilst vertex editing allows for Move, Rotate, Scale, and Stretch (same as move).

 

Once the surface shape was as needed, a "Planar Surface" can be created (aligned with the World XZ plane in my example) and used to cap the curvy surface via the SurfSculp command.

 

http://autode.sk/2q3qnKx

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Surftab was an example given the ring pic above that I assumed was what you were trying to model (my bad). BUT there are other mesh commands that can draw the mesh thru multiple closed objects that would be able to emulate your desired result at the very least and would be easier yet than loft in my humble opinion...

 

If you have an actual model or 3d example of what you are trying to draw in Autocad you can always use Recap 360 to take multiple photos of the object which will be able to create a complete 3d model of the object which basically gets emailed to you after it is processed by Autodesk.

 

OR, and I'm just using this as an example, if you wanted you could model it from clay, then use this feature to create a complete 3d model of the object that would get emailed to you as a DWG file.

It's possible is all I'm saying...

 

-ChriS

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