'Taming The Rhino II' (Rhinoceros 3D Workshop)

This second workshop helped me learn how to perform 'advanced modelling' within Rhinoceros 3D.

ADVANCED MODELLING

In the front window draw the outline of a rail, 0.15m wide and 0.17m high: first draw half of the shape, then mirror it. Make sure the polyline is closed; and extrude the polyline by 100m.

Then dupliacte the extrusion 1.4m to the right.

Create a new layer called ‘boxes’; in the front view draw a box underneath the two extrusions so the box is centred between them: 2m length, 0.15m height, 0.3m depth select the ‘Rectangular Array’ icon for copying the box along the full length of 100m or type ‘array’:

for x type ‘1’, for y type ‘150’, for z type ‘1’; for distance type ‘0.75’. When in the top view preview the array and accept with ‘enter’ delete the boxes that are beyond the length of 100m group the rails and boxes by drawing a window around them and typing ‘group’.

In the concrete layer, stil in project mode draw a column between the concrete extrusion and the floor. Create a new layer called ‘roof’; make a 4pt surface type ‘rebuild’, set u and v each to ‘10’ and turn the edit points on by typing ‘editpt’ deform the surface into a roof: pull the surface points up and down, using the gumball to shape in front view: make enough space for a train to pass through and make the surface touch the floor at 3 areas.

Now make a new layer called ‘wireframe’; make it the active layer; select the surface and type ‘extractWireframe’.

Create a new layer called ‘space frame’; make it the active layer; select the wireframe (right-click on layer, select objects) and type ‘extrude’: extrude 1m down select surfaces and type ‘offsetSurface’; offset 1m. Make sure to connect the two curves by another spline: make the first point of the spline touch one curve, draw the second point somewhere in between and draw the end point onto the other spline type ‘Sweep2’, select one closed spline as first rail, the other one as second and the connecting spline as cross section curve.

Offset the upper closed spline (1 m to the inside) select both curves and type ‘PlanarSrf’ to create a surface between the two curves. Then select the inner curve and extrude it down until it touches the floor.

From the top menu select Render>Current Renderer>Vray click on the teapot to open the Vray render editor select the materials tab. Expand the editor by clicking on small arrow

drag materials from list on the left into space on the right select a material for each of the project’s layers. Assign materials to layer by right-clicking and choosing respective layer.

For materials with photo textures set the factor of how often they are mapped onto the geometry: in the quick settings tab of the asphalt material click on the ‘diffuse’ map.

Set U and V values both to 100 go back and repeat for the ‘bump’ map.

In the settings tab select the Environment map. expand the list to the left, choose ‘Sky’ then go back. Get the Sun tab: from the top menu choose Panel>Sun.

Play with ‘Exposure’ slider update the sun’s position to change shadows watch the render update live set output size in settings tab.

click on teapot to render the last preview.

After the render is finished open the correction tab - adjust exposure and white balance and save the image.

Draw a large surface and rebuild it (6 by 6 counts); make a shell-like shape from it using edit points and the gumball make a point close to the surface.

Open grasshopper by typing ‘grasshopper’ into the command line in the parameters tab:

drag a surface component into the workspace also in the parameters tab: drag a point component into the workspace.

To connect elements: in Rhino, select the surface in Grasshopper, right-click on the surface component and select ‘Set one Surface’ in Rhino, select the point in Grasshopper, right-click on the surface component and select ‘Set one Point’.

In the parameters tab select a number slider and drag it into the workspace right-click. Choose edit change to integers: choose ‘N’ set the maximum to ‘15’ - confirm with ‘ok’.

From the vector tab select the ‘Plane Normal’ and drag it into the work space. From the surface tab choose a ‘Center Box’ and drag it into the work space.

Copy one of the number sliders and connect it to the x, y and z values of the box play with sliders to test script in order to make the size of the boxes dependent on the distance to the point we need to intoduce other components (disconnect the x,y,z by righ-clicking, ‘disconnect’; delete slider).

In the math tab select ‘Multiplication’ and drag it into the workspace connect the ‘Distance’ output with A connect the slider with B, drag the slider out to get more refined control over the factor connect the result from the Multiplication with X,Y and Z.

Test script by moving point in Rhino and playing with slider in GH in order to get a version into Rhino right-click onto the Box component and choose ‘Bake’ in the dialogue box choose a Layer from Rhino and confirm with ok go back to Rhino to see the result.