What a Mesh

Back to basics: Extrusion in AutoCAD part 3

Back to blogging, in this case continuing with solid modeling. As I said before, there may be little to say about the Extrusion command for advanced users, but some of you may find this interesting, and I would also recommend it to anyone that has not seen the enhancements after 2007.

The Extrusion command has an option called Direction. It can be accessed from the command prompt or by right clicking and getting to the in canvas menu (after having selected the profile and started the extrusion).

Why do we have that option? If you have a situation where instead of needing to do an extrusion along the normal of the profile, you need to do it along a certain direction, you would have two ways to do it. The long one is to draw a path and then select Path in the Extrude options. But if you have references that can be snapped, and the path is straight, then Direction is much easier, since you just need to select the first and last point of the direction of a non existent path.

Let's say you have two pillars, and need to create a reinforcement along the diagonal. These would be the steps:

In this case, I already have the pillars, and the profile to be extruded diagonally is already drawn next to the left pillar.

Once the Extrude command starts and we select the profile, if we right click or hit enter, the profile will try to extrude along the normal (in this case, vertically). That's when we right click and get to the in canvas menu, where we'll select Direction.

So, what points should I choose in order to get this result? Since the profile was a rectangle with half the width than the pillar, the first point to choose will be the profile's vertex coincident with the midpoint at the bottom of the left pillar. The second point will be the vertex at the top of the right pillar as shown in screen. It's quite obvious, since we need to select two points that will generate a path for the profile to move along.

That was easy! No more auxiliary lines for these situations. Just two clicks!

Now, we may need to edit the extrusion. Let's check its properties.

In the properties palette, under Solid Type, we see Extrusion, and we can change height and taper angle. In this case, height will be a vector along the path formed by the two points selected. Looks quite obvious, but in following postings, we'll see that an extrusion is not always such when we check the solid type. But I'm not going to steal my own thunder.

If we select the extruded object, we'll also see the grips that control the profile and the one for the height. As usual, this means that we can use direct manipulation in order to change the shape of the rectangle (as long as we keep four vertices, this works - meaning you can't add a new vertice), or we can also change its height by clicking on the control at the top of the extrusion and simply moving the mouse (or you can also type a specific distance).

And that's it.

You may wonder if there's a difference with making a path. We'll check that in the next post.

 
 
 
 

Back to basics: Extrusion in AutoCAD part 2

I just wanted to point out a couple of things about simple extrusions, before getting deeper into some more functionalities in following posts.

I received the question about how we could achieve the same results with numerical input and not press/pull.

There is really not much to say about numerical input. Once the command starts, you can obviously introduce a value for height through the command prompt. If you decide to use Taper Angle, just select the option from the command prompt (the shortcut is T), and once you enter a taper angle, the operation will prompt for the height.

One of the existing options is to repeat the last height, provided there has already been an extrusion done. This is actually the default, so if you just click enter, you will get the same height as the last object extruded.

If you already have the extrusion done and you click on the object, you can change both height and taper angle from the properties palette, if you really don't want to use in canvas editing.

Now, let me talk a little bit about in-canvas editing. Press/Pull is only a fraction of the options available for editing the object by having a direct interaction with it.

We have control over the height of the extrusion, the grips that belong to the profile, and we can also use direct manipulation over the faces, edges and vertices. Some of the old solid editing commands are probably not allowing that much flexibility as direct manipulation, and this is a trend that you will see getting more and more enhanced everywhere. Just take a look at Inventor Fusion and you'll see what I mean. We're not alone in this trend.

One last thing for today, and again, most of you will find it obvious. In the past, every command that requested for a distance would allow clicking in two points of the screen and retrieve that distance as input for the current command. This was also the case for extrude.

However, starting in 2007, if you just click on the height of any object in the screen, extrude will take the distance from the xy plane where the profile is placed to the Z of the selected object. So, if you just opened the file and you don't have the last extrude height, or maybe you are trying to retrieve any extrusion height which was not the last one you did, this option is tremendously productive.

In this image, I'm extruding a circle in order to get a cylinder, and I'm about to click any of the upper vertices of the box.

Both models have the same height now.

More on direct manipulation in the next post.
 
 
 

Back to basics: Extrusion in AutoCAD

After some weeks of adjustment and some sleep deprivation, I'm back with more tips and (hopefully) useful data about modeling in AutoCAD.

Talking about extrusion seems a little too basic, but I still need to cover some basics about it in order to get to more advanced topics.

The Extrude command has been around for some time already, and also allows other options than just the basic operation of generating a model that makes use of a profile and uses the normal to that profile as path.

AutoCAD 2007 introduced real time preview of the operation, and also introduced a couple of new controls in order to manipulate the extruded geometry. The real time preview can be seen in the image below. Once you select the profile, you will be able to define the height, or also access other options. It is important to clarify that the preview only happens if you select a single profile for extrusion. If there are multiple profiles selected, Extrude will prompt for the height without showing the preview of the operation.

The other options inside the Extrude command can be accessed by right clicking and using the shortcut menu, by using the cursor and then selecting the desired option, or by simply using the command prompt. These options include using the last height of a previous extrusion, taper angle, direction and path.

Let's focus on taper angle today. A positive taper angle will make the extruded faces converge. Once the taper angle is selected, you need to specify a height. The real time preview does not work after adding a taper angle to the operation.

 

So after finishing the command, the results would be the following:

 

If you now click on the extruded model, you will see grips along the vertices of the original profile, and a control at the top of the extrusion. Let's talk about the latter. If you click on this control, you will be able to change the height of the extrusion and have a real time preview. The curious thing is that we can see the preview even if we have used taper angle, even though the preview was not enabled during the creation of the extrusion.

 
 In older versions of AutoCAD, if the taper angle and the height produced a self intersection, the command would fail. After 2007, you can keep dragging the control for the height even up to the point of self intersection, and still get a predictable result. If you select the object again, you will see the extrusion control not on the edge that was defined at the convergence of the faces, but on the height where you dragged it. If you select it again and drag it down, you may recover the top face, if you go down the point of self intersection.

In the next post, we'll see what happens when we edit the vertices in the profile, and when we do some direct manipulation over the model's subobjects.

 
 

Offtopic - The reason for not having updated in the last weeks

Hi,

In a totally offtopic posting, I wanted to share the happiness of our addition to the family. Francisco Dante Melantoni Rey was born last Thursday, and he's a healthy and alert baby boy.

And who said that there's not a new AutoCAD for the new generation? I remember my beginnings in DOS, and compare with the possibilities of interaction and visualizations, and it's impressive.

I'll be back to normal by the end of this week, so keep tuned for more postings about AutoCAD and interop with verticals!

Probably the best animation I've seen - Kahn's Library at Philips Exeter Academy - by Alex Roman

Well, this may not have 100% to do with AutoCAD, but I felt I had to share this animation. I'm not sure I have ever seen a combination of technical expertise, perfect texturing, amazing illumination, outstanding cameras, and above all, a story told in such a beautiful way.

I did not know the author before, but from now on, Alex Roman, from Spain (3ds Max user among other applications) is my reference about how to bring a building to life. This masterpiece of Louis Kahn could not be better represented. It needed another masterpiece like this.

I can't wait to see whatever Alex does next.

Autodesk SketchBook Mobile for the iPhone and iPod touch

You may have already seen many blogs announcing the news about the new Autodesk Sketchbook Mobile for iPhone and iPod touch. If you haven't, I'll refer you to my friend Shaan's blog.

http://autodesk.blogs.com/between_the_lines/2009/09/autodesk-sketchbook-mobile-for-the-iphone-and-ipod-touch.html

What I want to do instead, is show you my first experiment with the app. I've been using Sketchbook Pro for a while (http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/index?id=6848332&siteID=123112), and was quite impressed at the quality of the app for iPhone.

You can basically use your fingers to sketch, and taking advantage of the pressure in the touch sensitive screen, not only have fun, but be productive.

Ever had an idea in a place where you can't grab your computer, or not even a paper? Remember the sketches on napkins while discussing about architecture in a pub? How cool is it to be able to use multiple tools, save, and email your sketch?

This is my first experiment in my iPod touch.

 

Then i just sent it to myself, and opened AutoCAD 2010, and made a very quick model based on my sketch.

 

Here's more information about the app. I hope you have a lot of fun!

YouTube Video SketchBook Mobile iPhone App from Autodesk

Press Release Autodesk Releases SketchBook Mobile on the App Store

Product details SketchBook Mobile Now Available for the iPhone and iPod touch

Webcast about AutoCAD 2010 in Spanish

Not so long ago I mentioned a Webcast about AutoCAD 2010 that I was going to conduct for Mexican customers. Even though this is my part of the blog in English, I felt it could also be useful to publish this link for all of you.

Just checking where my readers come from, many of the ones that read the English version still come from Spanish speaking countries.

Touring Autodesk's Gallery - Multitouch screen

While I wait to rush into Labor and Delivery, this is another video shot at the Gallery with my friend Brian Pene. This time, he's explaining how we use a Multitouch screen with Mudbox.

Enjoy!

In canvas editing of solids in AutoCAD 2010

These days have been quite intense around here, with the baby coming any time between right now and next week. Anyway, while we wait to rush to the hospital, I found some time to make a new video about AutoCAD 2010.

I have been in many situations in which I'm told that AutoCAD is a complex tool for 3d, but this statement normally comes from people that have not been around AutoCAD 3d for the last years.

In AutoCAD 2007, we made solid editing much easier with some in canvas editing. This means that by directly manipulating the objects on screen, we can get to results that needed commands like Move Face, Offset Face, etc etc.

I don't think I've used those ever since AutoCAD 2007, and have not had the need for 3d move, 3d scale and 3d rotate after AutoCAD 2010 either.

In this video, I'll show you how to make the best out of in canvas editing of a solid. I'll try to post a couple more videos on this subject, probably between diaper changes.

As usual, the video is in HD if you click on the YouTube link.

Mixed Reality Interface at Autodesk Gallery

This is the first of a series of 3 videos I did with Brian Pene, a great friend who works at Autodesk at the Office of the CTO. This time, he's showing the Mixed Reality Interface, which is a great tool to communicate a project either to our customers or to our own peers at the design firm.

The device is connected with the model that is visualized with Project Newport, which can import models from a variety of applications, including Revit, AutoCAD, Max, Maya, etc.

Check it out. As usual, you can watch it in HD if you click the YouTube link.