FANCYWIRES

This example is rather contrived, but if you can exert a high degree of control over the creation of meshes it’s possible to get some nice topological smoothing.  The base geometry of the second image is composed of all quad faces.

This definition uses WeaverBird 0.2 components (thanks Giulio!) so you’ll have to install the plug-in first.

It’s pretty easy to make this geometry go wacky and if the smoothing level gets cranked up too high you might crash GH so be careful, but break-a-leg.

DEFINITION

bridgeSrf.ghx (Right-click on link and “Save link as…”)

A WIP based on the ever-popular Make2D command in Rhino (but really I just wanted a reason to draw some dashed lines).

How does Make2D work for NURBS objects?  I have no idea.  A cursory Google search leads me to believe it might, in part, be based on render meshes and surface normals (pointing towards or away from the viewpoint).  However there must be more to it because that doesn’t really explain how hidden lines are generated for NURBS surface edges.  And clearly objects like cylinders and spheres are special cases.

This definition only works (sort of) with closed, faceted BReps.  I was going to try to work with meshes (and I may still) but converting referenced NURBS geometry to mesh geometry in GH is a bit uncontrollable.  I also think this definition is a kind of fake way to go about this.

Actual Make2D results are at the right and you can see obvious problems with the cylinder.  Back to the laboratory.

DEFINITION

make2D.ghx (Right-click on link and “Save link as…”)

UPDATE

Check out this definition at thedisContinuum for a GH scripted implementation of Make2D.

I’m not sure I would have followed the same procedure if I started completely from scratch, but just when you thought it couldn’t get better…  Exploding letters!

One little caveat, no symbols comprised of more than one piece (sorry all you !?%;=:ij lovers, but ” lovers you’re still in luck).

If you look under the covers I have an uneducated hunch that using [Trim with BReps] allows the definition to load / update text faster than [Inside], but as a result I had to do some crazy tree work.  Somewhere in there I also did a little VB.NET (still learning).

One might ask, why are are you messing with BReps anway?  It’s just stupid 2D letters.  Well, look at the B, A and R above.  They have internal openings, not just single boundary curves.  That makes imposing a uniform point grid properly on the letters a bit tricky, thus surfaces and BReps are your friends.

If I had more energy I would make a video, but you get the idea.

Happy shooting.

DEFINITION

bangLtr.ghx (Right-click on link and “Save link as…”)

As a logical extension of my current fixation with text and circles, exploding circle packed words was clearly the next step (obviously).

Using a counting timer, the words are setup to “explode” when hit by a “bullet”.

The use of txtLines and theEngine again comes from Grasshopper Tools in C#.  Idea shamelessly ripped off from Flash work by Nullthing.

Set a Rhino bullet and fire away.

DEFINITION

bangTxt.ghx (Right-click on link and “Save link as…”)

So a looooooong time ago (back in the list only days) I created a definition based on an example from RhinoScript 101 (Page 63) for packing circles on a sphere.

Well, I can’t find the file and if I could it’s probably too old to be readable.  So I created the definition again this time using data trees (which is more in the spirit of the original script anyway).

You can generate circles based on their radius.  This works pretty quickly.  The bottom image has 31,295 circles.  No sweat.

You can also (because why not?) make a golf ball type object.  This works very slowly and it might crash your computer.  The golf ball image has 370 dimples.  Take a coffee break.

DEFINITION

gBall.ghx (Right-click on link and “Save link as…”)
distribute_circles_on_sphere_070108.wrm (Found it!  Blast from the past, only works with GH 0.5 or earlier.)

Experimenting a little bit with VB.NET to create the gradient of horizontal lines and using data trees to do everything else.

The txtLines scripted component (for outlining the text) comes from Grasshopper Tools in C#.

Inspired by the SmartGeometry Open Platform Event Poster Fall 2009 (which actually included GH workshops).

Try it out with whatever text you like!

DEFINITION

jitterTxt.ghx (Right-click on link and “Save link as…”)

Inspired by the Arab World Institute (Jean Nouvel, 1989) and, of course,  cameras…

TOPICS

• Create geometric relationships.
• Translate geometry with vectors.
• Use expressions and functions.
• Create and manipulate planar surfaces.

DEFINITION

001UP_aperComp.ghx (Right-click on link and “Save link as…”)

An oriented semi-random fiber matrix.  Red means time to change the filter, it’s a dirty world out there.

TOPICS

• Generate and control randomly generated geometry.
• Generate lots of geometry and try not to crash GH.
• Use tree structure to interpolate curves through sets of points.
• Apply color to surfaces based on size.

DEFINITION

002UP_fiberComp.ghx (Right-click on link and “Save link as…”)

A membrane bladder liquid collector thing that stretches.

TOPICS

• Morph one curve into another.
• Create a surface of revolution.
• Subdivide surface and apply gradient colors.
• Bake objects with color using the ModeTools plug-in.

DEFINITION

003UP_dripComp.ghx (Right-click on link and “Save link as…”)

Some voronoi (and math) fun!

Here we have the random distribution of 300 points used to create a voronoi sphere with geodesic curves.

The equation to obtain a random distribution of points across a spherical surface came from MathWorld.

DEFINITION

vSph.ghx (Right-click on link and “Save link as…”)