Struggling With Curvy Shape

spence · 14 Apr 2011, 23:16

I'm trying to design a door handle with some inspiration from a Polynesian fish hook. See the drawing below. I cannot figure out for the life of me how to model this with it's tapered curvature. Can someone please help?

Did I mention I have a deadline

Rich O Brien · 14 Apr 2011, 23:37

Have you tried TIG Extrusion Toolset or Fredo's Curviloft?

Your provided image has the top and bottom profile of the handle along with the side profile.

Rich O Brien · 14 Apr 2011, 23:53

Here's a very quick and dirty example...

Spence_exmple.skp

It's not accurate but shows the initial geometry used. If you have Curviloft select the lines in this examples and choose the 'Skinning of Shapes' icon.

If you spend time rounding corners etc you'll get it pretty spot on.

ledisnomad · 15 Apr 2011, 00:02

If you don't want to experiment with a plugin since you are on a deadline, you could do it with the native SketchUp tools:

Trace the profile in plan.
Draw a vertical line away from the profile and divide it a into 10-ish segments (more segments will be more smooth, but take longer).
Push-pull the profile up to the first division, then copy it multiple up to make a vertical, segmented extrusion.
Select each profile along the length, one at a time and scale it to approximate the side of the handle at that height.
Move and rotate each profile into place along the side elevation.

It may take some time, but if you are on a deadline, this may be the easiest way without downloading/learning a new plugin.

Marian · 15 Apr 2011, 00:47

Here's my imperfect attempt.
I drew the profile and the arranged and scaled the contours. I used skin.rb to make the geometry between the contours and then subdivide and smooth for the high-poly version.

attempt 1.skp

spence · 15 Apr 2011, 04:20

Wow Rich & Marian I'am blown away by these brilliant interpretations. So, Rich I downloaded Fredo's Curviloft and did just what you said, viola! That is soooo smooth and pretty simple to understand the way in which you can achieve this through the drawing of the connected curves. You're right, after this just spend a little time and round it up a bit.

Marian, nicely done as well. Your process ended up pretty smooth and not leaving a whole lot to fine tune. I guess it depends on how critical and precise one wants to get. I will now take some time to attempt your process and get back.

Awesome, thanks a million