The SU Challenge - WIP

[SketchUp Guru]

Gidon, what Tim asked.

B.H. Looks like a great start. Keep working at it.

 

[gidon]

Tim, Dave:

I exported a JPG each time (I did create a shortcut for this ) I rotated the model by 15 degrees (grouped the plane and then used the group rotation handle). Ended up with 24 JPG's which I loaded in Photoshop Elements. Made each exported JPG a seperate layer (just shift-drag'ed each photo onto one photo). Then cropped as best I could. Then "save for web" ... Selected "GIF" and "animated". Played around with output size (reduced colours and dimensions). Selected loop and reduced frame delay to 0s for nice smooth motion. And that't it!

Well you did ask . Glad you like .

BH looking good.

Cheers

Gidon

 

[Neil]

Well I give up... ](*,)
Whoever thought up this challenge? :evil: Oh yes, Mr. Maskery, wasn't it? (hammer)

Here is my attempt - incomplete but I've spent long enough on this already! The Record #077A which I decided to model:

and the Sketchup version:

I must admit that I've learnt a lot about Sketchup - IMO it is great 99% of the time, but completely infuriating when you are trying do do something a bit different, especially once you get into curvy stuff. As you can see, I couldn't model the lever cap (?) properly. I tried to do it in Rhino (a NURBS-based 3D modelling package) and it took 5 minutes...

But for most (especially rectilinear) stuff its really great.

Cheers,
Neil

 

[SketchUp Guru]

Neil, I don't care what you say, it turned out great. Excellent job.

Everyone is turning out such nice stuff, it looks like my work here is done.

 

[Steve Maskery]

Neil,
Is that for real? Absolutely excellent! Sure you didn't just greyify the photo?

Very, very good.

I must admit though, I didn't realize the amount of work involved when I said "Let's model a plane". Glad you were up to the challenge though!

Cheers
Steve

 

[gidon]

Excellent Neil - well done!
You did better with your lever cap than I did with mine! Mine's not close.
Dave - how does one do bulbous'y things like that in SU? And no way is your work done here just yet ! Do you have an entry by the way?
Cheers
Gidon

 

[Neil]

Thanks, everyone

Didn't have time to do these earlier - here are the exploded & transparent views:

Cheers,
Neil

 

[Newbie_Neil]

Hi Neil

I'm in awe of you all.

Well done.

Cheers
Neil

 

[Nick W]

how does one do bulbous'y things ... in SU?

In SU Pro there is a tool called the Sandbox which is probably the easiest way to go. Basically what this does is create a grid of squares, and then give you tools for push/pulling lumps of various radii in that surface.

I see no reason why you should not do a similar process by hand (apart from the time taken that is). Create a rectangular grid over the area you want to model, and pull the vertices up/down to model the surface. The finer the grid, the better the model, but the more time it will take.

A second method to try would be to draw contours of the surface, with each contour at the necessary height. Add lines between the countours to create a surface.

Third method: Draw several cross sections of the surface in both X and Y planes. Again join the vertices to make a surface.

Fourth method: Model the surface outside SU, and import, but this again will require SU Pro.

Fifth method: Where the surface could be part of a turning, draw the profile, revolve it around the axis, and delete the bits you don't want.

Also don't forget that spheres (and any other solid shape, such as one produced by method 5) can be scaled differentially to create ellipses of rotation etc. which will approximate to many surfaces. You can have several of them overlapping, do some Intersect-with-model-ing, and deletion of unwanted bits, possibly followed up with a bit of manual modification (a.k.a. drawing your own lines between vertices (see above)), which I guess makes the Sixth Method.

Edit: And then there's the dreaded follow me tool which can sweep a curvy profile/shape along a curvy path. :evil:

But none of it is easy.

 

[gidon]

Thanks Nick - some good ideas there. Fourth method is the one I'm currently playing around with. You can import 3d models into GSU - only exporting is limited (but still possible). Follow me creates too much mess in the middle - well it did for me at least. How do you create a rectangular grid?
Cheers
Gidon

 

[Nick W]

Gidon,

Creating a rectangular grid is very boring - you just draw lots of lines :roll:

Of course the grid doesn't actually have to be rectangular - any old randomly laid down set of lines could do the job so long as you know (or can work out) the heights at the intersections of the lines.

When working with the sandbox it is sometimes useful to change the outline from rectangular before starting to model the surface, and the same will apply when doing this sort of thing by hand.

 

[Nick W]

Oooh, oooh, oooh, I've just thought of another way!

Draw a rectangular grid of lines on the thing you're trying to model. Photograph it - plan, front, back, left and right views. Import the pics to SU and trace the lines. Continue as for third method.

Even easier would be to project (as in slide projector) a grid onto the object and photograph that - if you have the equipment.

 

[SketchUp Guru]

You could also get a Ruby script to draw a grid for you.

Here are three different Rubies for that.

3D Grid http://www.crai.archi.fr/RubyLibraryDep ... 3d_grid.rb
2d Grid http://www.crai.archi.fr/RubyLibraryDepot/Ruby/grid.rb
Parametric Grid http://www.crai.archi.fr/RubyLibraryDep ... ic_grid.rb
For that last one you also need Parametric.rb http://www.crai.archi.fr/RubyLibraryDep ... ametric.rb

I do like Nick's idea of photographing the article with grids projected on it.

 

[SketchUp Guru]

If you try the Parametric Grid script, it needs a bit of editing to eliminate ./ from the line that says "require './parametric.rb' "

 

[gidon]

Thanks chaps. Those grids aren't created on the surface though - you'd still need to trace over them? Still (some more) useful scripts.
That is a good idea Nick - not sure I'm going to start draing over the LN plane just yet though .
Cheers
Gidon

 

[Alf]

Steve, Gidon, thought you might like to know your efforts have hit the Woodsmith/Shop Notes/Workbench Blog. Nice one.

Cheers, Alf

 

[Steve Maskery]

Ooo-er, do I get paid?

 

[gidon]

- well spotted Alf.
Embarrassing that I had a very bad model of a banana (was trying some prganic modelling) for all to see! (Too late - deleted it!)
Cheers
Gidon

 

[Chris Knight]

Well done guys - fame at last!