Now if such a thing existed to say read in old blueprints and patents or whatever and let you edit them that would be pretty cool.
I’m sure there’s a script for that for any of the more popular suites. Something like “extract drawing from background image” or similar.
As it turns out this functionality has been added to Rhino 8 (beta) as a full PDF import. They’ve had a “make 2D” command for ages that poops out lovely line drawings sans dimensions which need to be added for print work, but being able to extract mechanical drawings into lines is pretty sweet. Naturally, some talented script writer has already incorporated run command to build a 3D model from the PDF imports using Grasshopper.
Fun stuff, and I could certainly see some use cases popping up in the future. Perhaps I’ll build our house from the framing schedules when I’ve got some downtime.
In other workflow news I’ve found that a useful set of tools for what I have been doing while often disabled is to design a project in Illustrator or Sketchbook Pro on my iPad since I grew up drawing first and foremost when trying to extract an idea from the braincell, and then importing .ai or PDFs into Rhino is surprisingly clean. I’ve had to do very little curve fairing.
This is extremely helpful as some days I need to stay on the couch. So beginning with a sketch:
Then some hours later making a flat spot on my ass at the workstation and we have:
My displacement analysis showed that it needed a slightly deeper deadrise angle in the fore planing surfaces as well as the planing tail, so some iterating later I jumped from 16.28lbs of buoyancy per hull
at the desired waterline up to 34.2lbs each. In other words, the concept sketch was helpful but the CAD systems solved the hydrostatics problems for me while retaining much of the look of the concept drawing.
I’d still recommend Rhinoceros for anybody who wants to actually own a very power suite of tools instead of renting one for thousands of USD per year. McNeel has been issuing rich point releases that integrate new features from WIP builds long before an update release hits the channel so you get evolving feature sets for several years and bug fixes many years later for a single purchase. .edu pricing is very reasonable. A single commercial seat is extremely cheap compared to the super big CAD suites, plus it’s cross-platform and you can switch your license (automatically assuming you’re online) between many computers both Mac and PC with a single license. That latter feature is a really lovely item that is partially solved for browser-based plugins, but you want native apps for full speed potential of the hardware you payed for whenever possible.
If you’re into parametric visual script programming you’ll have a field day with Grasshopper. I suck at it, though I’ll force myself to learn more uses soon enough so that tweaking chine curves and merging elegant fillets is not so time consuming. I’d say that Rhino’s “Preserve History” function is severely limited in parametric abilities as it tends to limit you to altering one area of a model, so you really want Grasshopper skills if you’re intending to iterate on complex geometric bodies or mechanical assemblies, otherwise you’re spending time rebuilding and relofting surfaces manually. It gets old without automation.
All that mentioned, wait for V8’s release. The new tools that they’re adding in are downright impressive.
and then you’ll be hunting for something likely NURBs centric. I mean, some lofting can happen in Fusion, SolidWorks can make lovely machine surfaces but you’re better off using their browser plugin for organics, but playing with native NURBs and being able to also edit in quads gets you advanced forms really easily.
