Gyro Posted June 6, 2016 Share Posted June 6, 2016 Hi All, I'm really need some guidance as I'm running short on time for my deadline. I'm building a Diatom to be 3D printed for movie prop. Being a something of a newbie this is a challenging exercise. I'm kinda close but every operation like selecting the spikes and the cage for rounding, meshing, union or SubD results in a crash. Every operation is taking a matter of minutes to perform, boolean, I can do a few spikes blending onto into the cage, but try the whole thing and a warning of a 1million plus resulting mesh comes up which when accepting of cancelling results in a crash. (I've had 20+ crashes tonight alone). I'm unsure as to how to proceed with the attached file: Is there an operation that will blend spikes to the cage if they are off the surface? If the spikes are intersecting the cage, or standing off the surface, which is the best rounding solution, most I have tried have resulted in a crash. Would it help if converting the cage to a mesh or other attribute prior the blending, One process that works on a small number of spikes is to convert the spikes to a facetted mesh, union with the thickened cage, then subdivide Iterations 2, Sharpness 18%, but only with a few spikes or the dreaded crash results. File:https://www.dropbox.com/s/fkytx9afqjr9cxl/Diatom_Partial_Success.fmz?dl=0 another file more complex: https://www.dropbox.com/s/33rp12ysdro2qgw/Diatom_Master.fmz?dl=0 Any advice much appreciated. Andrew@Gyro Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tech Posted June 6, 2016 Share Posted June 6, 2016 Hi Andrew, It looks like you have a good start on the base shape. Now you only need to add the spikes, right? To make these, if you start by drawing a cross section of the spike, starting and ending on the central axis of revolution, and then Revolve the shape around this axis, does that create the spike as you would like? And if so, can you then just Place these spikes on the desired Points of the base shape? Note that for many STL machines, you do not actually need to Union the parts together (just have them overlapping or touching). Does that then allow you to print the shape you desire? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pylon Posted June 6, 2016 Share Posted June 6, 2016 Hi Andrew, First off, I just want to say that I am a fan of Gyro's projects-- of course the beer bottle Edison player is a real stand out. In addition to developing the Maxwell plugin for formZ, I do work for clients in formZ by creating unique plugins to generate specific forms. Please get in touch if you'd like us to 'grow' a diatom like yours using custom computer code: Here's an example of a grown crystal project from a few years back: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AHTOH Posted June 6, 2016 Share Posted June 6, 2016 Hi Andrew. Is this what you need? Best, Anton. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tech Posted June 6, 2016 Share Posted June 6, 2016 Nice Anton! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AHTOH Posted June 6, 2016 Share Posted June 6, 2016 Pice of cake. Took about 8 minutes. 5 to figure an approach and 3 to create the model. Enjoy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tech Posted June 6, 2016 Share Posted June 6, 2016 Yes, it is clear from your file how quickly and easy you did it. That's why it is so nice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gyro Posted June 7, 2016 Author Share Posted June 7, 2016 Hi Anton, What a saviour! I've been chugging thru tutorials regarding boolean operations, blending SubD, slowly digging myself into a hole and a file that became so bloated every other operation caused a crash. Such a simple solution, I'll be approaching these types of problems very differently from now on! I have replicated your build process I think, I do have a few questions: The model is made from Facetted Solids is this necessary in every instance for this kind of model, I notice certain smooth solids can be converted to facetted objects and and used in SubD operations and others can't. When replicating your model I noted that the "Spikes" when placed on the soccer ball sit half way thru the ball rather than placing on the surface, so I made a sacrificial ball that was larger to counter this, was this what you did? Can the cuboid be adjusted to counter this? Now the tricky part of printing it. Thanks again for your input. Andrew www.gyro.co.nz Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AHTOH Posted June 7, 2016 Share Posted June 7, 2016 Such a simple solution, I'll be approaching these types of problems very differently from now on! I have replicated your build process I think, I do have a few questions: The model is made from Facetted Solids is this necessary in every instance for this kind of model, I notice certain smooth solids can be converted to facetted objects and and used in SubD operations and others can't. Hi Andrew. The cubes and soccer ball are Facetted automatically. There is no need for conversion. So the idea is to create simple first order surfaces shapes and than FormZ does the job for you. The thing is — FormZ IS simple approach app since v7. Gyro, on 07 Jun 2016 - 12:36 PM, said: When replicating your model I noted that the "Spikes" when placed on the soccer ball sit half way thru the ball rather than placing on the surface, so I made a sacrificial ball that was larger to counter this, was this what you did? Can the cuboid be adjusted to counter this? Of course it could be adjusted the way you want it. The only thing is spikes bases should be inside the base all the way in order not to create extra geometry. I just did not notice they are stick inside. Besides, if you need step by step tutorial, I can post it here. Best, Anton. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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