Monday, August 24, 2009

Cool (Free!) Plugin: Spirals, Tapers and More in SketchUp

Here's a beautiful wrought-iron gate by Samuel Yellin. Think it's easy to model inSketchUp? Not without some plugin help!



Terry Ross of DrawMetal has been in touch with me for a couple of years now, showing me his cool geometric plugins for metal design. (And everyone knows I'm a sucker for anything related to geometry.)

DrawMetal provides three plugins (all free):

CurveMaker draws several types of spirals. These would be extremely tough to draw using SketchUp's default toolset - lines and arcs won't get you very far! (Bonus: you don't need to know any math to draw these curves.)

TaperMaker enables you to extrude a cross-section along a path, with different sizes at either end of the path. This is akin to the Follow Me tool, but your cross-section grows or shrinks incrementally with each curve segment.


And finally, Stock Maker enables you to calculate quantities (volume) of material you'll need to make your model. It can also calculate cost and weight.

The obvious audience for these plugins is artists, blacksmiths, metalsmiths, jewelers, sculptors, and metal fabricators. But they are also quite useful for anyone who wants to draw 2D and 3D curves, and/or tapered extrusions.

First thing to know when using a plugin: its is simply a Ruby script file whose extension is RB. Once you have the RB file, just place it in the "Plugins" folder within the SketchUp installation. Then in SketchUp, you can find the new tool under the Plugins menu. These DrawMetal tools also have convenient toolbars you can download. (This is all explained on this page.)

Here's are a few things I made after playing around for a short time:

Spiral

First you need to use Curve Maker (from the main menu, choose Plugins/ Curve Maker / Draw a Curve). I chose the Archimedes Spiral, with no extra options, then clicked OK.



The parameters below set the spiral geometry. It will start at a quarter turn (90 deg) and end after 2 and 3/4 turns. At a quarter turn, the radius is 75 mm, and at 2 full turns, the radius is 230 mm.


Here's the spiral, in the red-green plane. It's created as a group. (If you explode it, it will become a curve, and you can explode it once more to break it into its individual segments.)


(If you want to create curves by clicking points, and not by entering parameters in a data window, you can use the Draw / Curve Maker menu. This video and this video provide more info.)

Once the curve is complete, you can view its data. Select it first, then choose Plugins / Curve Maker / Display Curve Data. You can even add the data to your model as a Sketchup text object.

To make the curve 3D, you use Taper Maker. First, select the curve, then choose Plugins / Taper Maker / Draw a Taper. There are a few cross-sections you can use; I used Round for this one.


For the parameters, I defined the start and end diameters.

Before completing the taper, you're shown where the start and end sections are, and can switch them if you want.


Here's my completed taper, after softening the edges. It's still a group. And you can display its properties by selecting it and choosing Plugins / Taper Maker / Display Taper Data.


Note that you can use Taper Maker on ANY SketchUp lines or arcs, not just those created by Curve Maker.

Helix

This time I started Curve Maker and specified Helix. This one will start at zero turns (0 degrees) and end after 5 complete turns. Each turn is 25mm high.



After completing the helix, I selected it and ran Taper Maker with a square cross-section. Very cool result:


Spline

This object should be a turn-on for anyone who likes free-form curve drawing. You start with a set of lines, whose endpoints define points along the spline.



Select the edges, activate Curve Maker, and choose the Cornu Spline curve. The resulting spline is shown below in black.


The original edges are still selected, so you can press the Delete key to erase them, leaving just your spline.

For the spline's taper, I used a rectangular cross-section. It starts at 250 x 50 (horizontal) at the left side, and ends at 50 x 250 (vertical) at the right.



These are extremely useful tools, and fun to use. Try them out!


Anyone can design anything in 3D! www.3dvinci.net

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We're Back! (and my kids are bored...)

I didn't post anything last week because we were away - a full week at some nearby beaches with family and friends. Not being a beach person to begin with, I can now say that seven days with five sand-filled kids is a bit much! But we did have lots of fun.

My kids still have one more week off before school starts, and not much to do. Letting them play with SketchUp is always a good way to keep them occupied for a while, and here are some examples of what they did today.

Here's my five-year old daughter's star art:


And my seven-year old son's "boy car sun" depiction.


My seven year old is autistic (PDD), and usually uses SketchUp for 3D models like houses and robots. Today he was in a 2D mood, apparently. He generally likes to create the same models repeatedly, but this was the first time he made the above picture, and got very excited.


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Thursday, August 13, 2009

Fairy Tale Origins

This has nothing to do with SketchUp or 3D design, but it's summer and I'm taking things a little less seriously for a couple of weeks.

I have 5 kids ranging in age from 9 to 2. So we read a lot of fairy tales, Disney books, etc. Many of them are gruesome and depressing in their modern form - lots of slaying, orphaned kids, threats of death. But I didn't know how much worse these stories were in their original forms!

For example: Snow White was supposed to be killed and her heart brought back to the wicked queen as proof. That's hard enough to explain to my 5-year old. But in the original, Snow White's liver and lungs are supposed to be harvested and served to the queen for dinner. And the rape of Sleeping Beauty won't be mentioned at bedtime anytime soon.

It's hard to picture parents in the Middle Ages reading stuff like these to their kids, but I guess there weren't a lot of child psychologists around telling them not to.


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Tuesday, August 11, 2009

Projects of the Month - Signup is Ready!

Last Friday I blogged about my upcoming project subscription service (see the previous post). Today I have it officially listed on my website. The promotional price is a mere $24 for an entire year; each month you get three SketchUp projects for kids.

I have posted one of the projects for people to look at before they decide to sign up: "Creating a Poster in Google SketchUp."

This is a wonderful, affordable resource for teachers and parents. Please help me spread the word!

Anyone can design anything in 3D! www.3dvinci.net

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Friday, August 7, 2009

SketchUp Projects of the Month

Starting next month (I hope), I will be offering a new service: SketchUp Projects of the Month. Each month, subscribers will receive three projects geared toward teachers and students. One project each month will be math-related. Details on how to sign up will be forthcoming - sign up for our mailing list (at the end of this post) if you want to be notified.

The idea behind this is that I often get requests from teachers how to demonstrate a certain concept or tool, by way of a "bite-sized" project they can share with their students. So rather than add these projects to another book, I thought teachers (and parents!) would enjoy receiving a steady stream of projects throughout the year. Each project will, in essence, be a ready-made lesson plan.

Each project will be a printable PDF, ranging from 10-15 pages, fully illustrated and detailed step-by-step. You won't need a lot of SketchUp experience to follow along; each project assumes the reader is a beginner.

YOUR INPUT MATTERS! If you have a particular topic you'd like to see me cover, please let me know!

Here are the projects I've created so far for September and October:

SketchUp Projects: September 2009

Escher Triangles


Paper Cutouts


Placing a Picture on the Wall



SketchUp Projects: October 2009

Hexagon Mosaics


Changing Textures


Placing and Changing Models in Google Earth


Here are some of the topics planned for future months:

Geometric nets
Animations
Walk-throughs
Jigsaw puzzles
Making a material collection
Finding what you need in the 3D Warehouse
Stained glass windows
Engraving your name
Printing to scale
Calculating surface area

(The entire list is to long to show here!)

Again, please sign up for our mailing list, and you'll be notified when the projects are ready for distribution!


Anyone can design anything in 3D! www.3dvinci.net

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Wednesday, August 5, 2009

Want to Know What I Really Think?

Check out an online interview I did for CRSTE (Capitol Region for Technology in Education). The questions are mostly about the state of our schools, how technology is used and should be used, and of course, I talk about the materials I write.

CRSTE is a relatively new group, and seems off to a very strong start. It is spearheaded by Walter McKenzie, Assistant Superintendent for Technology, Arlington Public Schools (right down the road from me). Walter is a great guy (and very funny), and is going gangbusters to find ways to get more tech in tech ed. If you're in the DC Metro area, you need to visit CRSTE!

BTW, I love the name of the interview series "Profile Encourage." But I'm a sucker for any pun (which I understand is an indicator of how geeky one is).


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Tuesday, August 4, 2009

This Video Will Get You Psyched for the New School Year

At least I hope it will - I found it very moving (and I'm not the sentimental type). It was produced by the Starkville, MS School District, and features a variety of students and teachers talking about their favorite subjects, their favorite teachers, and belief in student success. For me it was great to see so many girls interested in math and science.



Hat tip to my friend Phil Shapiro who found the video ;-)


Anyone can design anything in 3D! www.3dvinci.net

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