Hi Burr,

> How about BoundingBoxCenter?

From what I understand, the distances between the bounding box centers are actually supposed to be variable for that style of array.

What I think is wanted is this distance to be equal:



So notice there that keeping that distance equal with different sized objects, will result in a variable amount of spacing between bounding box centers.

The desired result of this method is pretty clear when using exact circles in a straight line like I show there, the part that I am not certain about is what about for other objects than circles, and what about for other paths than a straight line, like along a curve? How is the distance supposed to be measured exactly in those cases?

Does it work with gemstones by treating the stone as having a circular outline around it?

- Michael

Hi Burr,

> I guess I wouldnt know how the "along surface" works

Along surface can work with any kind of spacing - what it does is incorporate an additional rotation in it to rotate from the base surface normal to the target surface normal, so if you had something that started out perpendicular to the surface, each array instance will also be perpendicular to the surface instead of possibly rotating off to some other orientation which is possible when it is only following a curve path without any surface data.

- Michael

BoundingBoxVariable>>

OIC. Actually Opposite of what I mentioned :O

Almost like you would have to create another "Widget". An object that presents on the boundingboxcenter that popsout and has 6 dragable arms (that would use snapping of course) that would be used to define the objects array parameters.







Seems like alot of work, but maybe some has been done already with the rotation widget.

Hi Burr, yeah but I would lean more towards having a specialized command to do that kind of a thing rather than have some kind of mondo complex multi-modal control widget tacked on to the regular array command.

One part that I don't understand is if it is meant to only work with something that has a kind of circular outline aspect to the shape.

- Michael

Yeah I got a little carried away. 6 months worth of work for a specialized op. :O

Hi Michael,

I'll have to go back and check out the plug-in again to see which functions would be the most practical/useful
options to suggest for MoI.

As far as defining how the graduated array would be determined, I think the operation would apply mostly to round gemstones.
(but if I'm missing something here, to my MoI jewelry design friends... please feel free to correct me on this :-)

As long as the stones wind up an equal distance from each other while following the path curve on the surface,
whatever method that does it the best would work.

Do you think it would be closest point?


Thanks,

Jesse

Hi Jesse,

> As long as the stones wind up an equal distance from each
> other while following the path curve on the surface,
> whatever method that does it the best would work.

Well, there are different ways of measuring the distance which will give different answers.

Here's an example that's been exaggerated a bit so you can see what I mean.

Say for example these 2 gemstones have been distributed along the path curve:



If you measure distance as "distance along the path curve", it would measure the length of this curve piece indicated in red to get the distance value:



If you measure distance as "closest point between the 2 individual objects", it would measure the following red line to get the distance value:




> Do you think it would be closest point?

I don't know - I was hoping you would tell me! It is hard for me to make a tool to do something if the desired result is not well specified.


My best guess currently is that you may want to have a kind of "virtual circle" associated with each array instance and then it would be the closest point distance between these circles that would be targeted as the thing to equalize...

If you have any model files from other things that have created the desired result, if you could post those or send them to me at moi@moi3d.com it would probably help.

- Michael

Do lines have Normals? because closest point in surface normal positve direction would be the 2 desired upper tips of the triangle.

Hi Burr,

> Do lines have Normals?

Well, curves have tangents which can be used to get perpendiculars which can be used similar to how surface normals work on surfaces.

- Michael

Yeah so closest point in relation to line tangent perp or surface normal... Where's Petr when you need him :O (sketching some cool animation! Thanks for the k-sketch link. Cool app.)

Hi Burr,

> Yeah so closest point in relation to line tangent
> perp or surface normal...

Yup, maybe... Do you have some jewelry models that show this kind of array in them?

It would be great to see some actual results of how the end result is supposed to look.

- Michael

No Sorry Michael, I was just chiming in. I was just watching a video demo the other day of a Rhino Plug that did a nice job, but couldnt re-find what I was looking at.

Hi Michael,

I'm not positive, but I've a feeling that what Jesse's referring to might be a feature within Matrix?
Matrix is a Hi End Jewellery Plug-in that uses Rhino as it's engine.
http://www.gemvision.com/html/products/matrix/matrix.html

I don't have Matrix, but a friend of mine does, so I've seen first hand some of the fancy things it can do.

There's another Jewellery Plug-in for Rhino called RhinoGold & that might also have a similar kind of feature?
http://www.rhinogold.com/en/

Again I don't have RhinoGold, but I've seen some of the features within their Tutorials.
http://www.rhinogold.com/en/videotutorials.htm

Hopefully some of those links might help to explain what Jesse is after?

regards Colin

Hi Michael,

I see what you mean... it's not out of the question that we'd run into a situation like your example.

I think your 1st version using "distance along the path curve" would accomplish the desired result.
But... could the object's "normal" relationship to the surface still be maintained?

Could the objects be uniform in size as well as graduated in size? A lot of times, the stones will be the same size.

Right now, we work with the diameter of the stones and the length of the curve to determine
the spacing of uniform objects. If the array doesn't work out with the desired spacing, then we have to either
change the length of the curve or the stone size, each dependent on constraints dictated by
the shape and size of the model as well as where we want the stones to go on the model.

Would it be possible to scale a uniform in size bunch of objects to fit a certain spacing along a curve
while placing them normal to the surface? Probably too complicated?

Colin's assumption is correct. I know Matrix does the kinds of things that ArraycrvPLUS does, but I'm not sure about RhinoGold.

I'll dig up a model as an example to send to you. I hope you don't think I'm asking for too much... :-)
I just want to explore some options because I don't know what's technically outside of the realm of realistic possibilities.

Thanks,

Jesse

While this is being discussed, Has anybody tried the scaleArray in this release. I'm on a computer where it just flashes up for a second then goes away? No need to go nuts till I test it on a few other computers. I re-downloaded it to be sure it hadnt been corrupted on my system or something. :O

Hi Jesse,

> But... could the object's "normal" relationship to
> the surface still be maintained?

Yeah, that's probably doable, did you see the previous link to the new "Align to surface" function for MoI's regular array curve function? (here) - does that do what you are talking about here? If so then it would be possible to do the same thing.

Does this kind of "Gem Array" function always involve a surface and a curve 100% of the time, or are there situations where you want to do something on a curve only and no surface is involved yet?


> Could the objects be uniform in size as well as graduated
> in size? A lot of times, the stones will be the same size.

Well, they could if that would be how it is supposed to work!

I'm just trying to gather information on how you would expect for this kind of thing to function.

The more exactly you can describe how it is supposed to work, with specifics like what inputs are required and what options are required, etc..., the more chance I have of actually being able to make it work at some point.


> Right now, we work with the diameter of the stones and the
> length of the curve to determine the spacing of uniform objects.

So are those the parameters that you would expect to give - a diameter value and a spacing and a curve for the path, and a surface for alignment?


> I'll dig up a model as an example to send to you.

That would be great, it helps a lot for me to see an actual example of how it is supposed to work.


> I hope you don't think I'm asking for too much... :-)

I don't know yet, I still don't entirely understand exactly how it is supposed to work yet, so before I actually know that I won't really know if it is a hard thing to do or an easy thing to do.

The more information you can give me on what parameters you want to give it, what stages you would expect for the command to have (like an "pick path curve step", a "enter diameter step", stuff like that), and examples of results would all help!

It's pretty clear though that it would be a special kind of "GemArray" function and not likely something that was built directly in to the standard array. That's because it seems like it is focused on a particular shaped object that has a circular/diameter type aspect to the shape rather than just any old random shape like a box or whatever.

- Michael

Never Mind. Forgot there were instructions. Doh! :O

Hi Burr, yeah don't forget that you need to include a point object with the things being arrayed, since that is used for the center point of the scaling.

- Michael

Hi Colin,

> Hopefully some of those links might help to explain
> what Jesse is after?

It kind of helps with the general idea, but it's tough for me to sort through all their tutorials to try and find the description of this one particular function.

I kind of need it to be broken down and described in more specific detail to have a shot at making it work.

Things like a step-by-step description of what each stage of the command is supposed to do, like what inputs are collected, and then of course a description and some examples of what output is generated.

It's hard for me to just guess at all that stuff since I don't really understand enough about how it is used.

- Michael

Hi Michael,

No probs, to be honest I'm not overly sure on how it all works myself, so I'm no help in describing it in detail.
I'll see if I can wangle my friend into doing a small video for you of it working in Matrix.

regards Colin