Curves and plugins
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Hi, all !
I have two problems with curves and plugins. They are very basic, so please excuse me.
1 - If I select a number of joint segments and use "Weld" to create a curve, everything looks all right. But afterwards, it seems that I can't select the whole curve in itself. I can just select one of the segments that were used to make it up. So, what's the use of "Weld" ?
2 - Problem #1 being supposed solved, does any of you know of a plugin that can ( could ? ) fragment the curve in a number of equal-length segments ?
Thanks,
Thierry -
I don´t know if I understand you correctly, but you´ll need an extra plugin for that - Bezier Spline: http://forums.sketchucation.com/viewtopic.php?t=13563
Weld your curve, or draw one using the above mentioned plugin, and choose the Polyline Segmentor option from the context menu.
And did you by any chance select the "Yes" option while running the Weld plugin? -
Weld.rb will make a continuous 'curve' of any preselected edges, always provided that they all 'join' and there are no intervening edges branching off at nodes to 'split' the potential curve up into pieces.
Try it on a collection of edges that join end-to-end - these should all then 'weld' into one 'curve'... -
I made a number of attempts, and I could have sworn that these segments were joint. What happened ? Well, I'll try again and find out, I guess. Sketchup can get touchy at times.
The plugin is excellent, of course, but what disturbs me is that the last segment is not the same length as the others. However it seems that moving the N-1 th vertex to the previous coordinates of the last one ( if you see what I mean ) solves the problem, even tough the "common" length varies slightly. The last segment is then redundant and can be deleted. Is this correct ?
Anyway, many thanks to both of you
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Thierry -
I know you weren't talking to me, but I don't see what you mean. If you posted a picture, or even better a model, we might all be able to see and help.
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And there is the chance that there are tiny gaps, and you haven't connected the edges. I almost always elect "No" to each of the two questions-- so much that I forgot the wording in them.
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Theirry I don't fully understand...
If by the 'last segment' you mean closing the loop, that's optional and often you will want to NOT have it made at all - answer 'Non' to both.
Can you post a simple SKP showing the edges in question so we can comment more constructively... -
Essai.zip@TIG and Brookfox
Here you are. The thing is simple enough : a curve made of 5 segments, with a total length of 4.719 m.
I want to reshape it with 7 segments, all with the same length. With the plugin, le last segment is shorter than the others.
Thanks for your help,
ThierryP.S : One obvious use for this is to help in putting the railing stanchions on such models, wheelhouse windows and the like.
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You still don't make complete sense...
Your SKP contains a 'welded curve' of 5 segments.
You say you want it to have 7 segments.
Where are the other 2 to be ?
You say you want to divide the exact same length of the 5, within these 7...Try this:
Explode the curve back to edges [right-click context-menu 'Explode Curve']
Select an edge you want to be sub-divided.
Use Divide x2 [right-click context-menu again].
Repeat for another edge.
Now if you double-click on any edge in the continuous collection of edges, it should say 7 in 'Entity Info'.If you want some of the vertices in these 7 edges to be in different places you can use the Move tool [with nothing selected] to move any vertex over which you hover the cursor+clicks.
When the 7 edges are as hoped, then you can select the 7 and run Weld.rb; answering 'No' to the prompts; the 7 should now be welded into a single 'curve'...
I can't actually understand what the problem is
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I looked at the file, too and can't understand it, either. How do you intend to keep the same "curve" with 7 segments instead of the 5 with all of the segments having the same length. I think that would be geometrically impossible.
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It was a kind of smoothing that I was looking for. Well, let's drop the idea for now.
Thanks to you all, anyway.
Thierry -
Thierry, you won't get off that easily. Nice of you to include the ship pic!
Anyway as they were saying, or implying, since your segments are not aligned it is impossible to have 7 equals made out of 5 nearly equal when they are disjointed. That's why numbthumb suggested something closer to curve and thus smoother to begin with, that could be made into 7 equal segments, perhaps. My pic just shows your geometry with a line connecting the beginning ans end directly, then divided into 7 equal segments which could then be moved around in 3d to approximate your original.
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@thierry_st_malo said:
It was a kind of smoothing that I was looking for.
I have two plugins on my blog that might help you. The first is EqSegCurve which allows you to specify either a number of segments or segment length. The input segment length will be adjusted as required if length is entered. The second is Spline which adds interpolated points to smooth the curve.
Your model is attached with an example of each.
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