[Plugin] Shape Bender Beta
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@chris fullmer said:
Yup, should work with free version and with the Mac. The .zip file for the plugin is at the bottom of the first post in this thread. Enjoy!
Chris
... Unless you have Sketchyphysics RC1 X (Or maybe other versions too, but I don't know). Then it only works sometimes, and you can't switch the orientation with up, down, home or end.
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Here's a hint to keep that particular thing from happening so much.
Orient the model so that the solid green axis points away from you (points off into the sunset
). Then always draw your straight line from left to right. THat will elminate that particualr problem, and remove the need to use the down arrow key.Hope that little tip helps,
Chris
PS: I PM'ed Chris Phillips about the SketchyPhysics possible conflict. He never did get back to me. He probably has forgotten all about it now. I'll try to PM him again. Thanks for the reminder!
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Oh, another question BTM. Do you have any other scripts that make use of keyboard strokes during the script? Like Fredo's freescale suite. That uses ctrl, TAB, and probably others. Do those keys work in that script? Don't pay attention to the enter key, it doesn't count. It has its own special way to implement it, and its different than most other keys. So test to see if the tab key works in freescale for example.
Chris
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... The keys in freescale seem to work fine.
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Very interesting. I'll look at freescale and see how he implements them. Perhaps its different than what I am doing.
Chris
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Oh my, he hard wires them in for some reason. It seems unneccessarily complex, but perhaps he discovered bugs similar to this that he is working around. bummer for me. I might PM you with a code snippet to run for me to see what it does on your Mac. Thanks BTM,
Chris
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Yes, it is a problem with SketchyPhysics. And it might be on Mac only.
I'll fix it and release a new version asap.
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Thanks you, thank you, thank you so much for looking into this Chris!
Chris (Fullmer)
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Hi Chris,
Thanks for an amazing tool!
I have not read through the entire 163 (so far) posts on this subject, so please forgive me if this has been mentioned before.
@chris fullmer said:
Version: 0.2 Beta - Special release to Sketchucation only.
Does that mean that we are prohibited from mentioning this outside of SketchUcation, e.g. in personal blogs or on the Google SketchUp Group?
August
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Heh, good question! I don't really remember what I had in mind when I wrote that. I think I was just saying that I'm only releaseing it here, instead of on Smustard or anywhere else.
So please, feel free to blog about it, post links back to this thread, etc. Just don't host the file anywhere else is all. But please, links back here are very welcome! Thanks for checking it out August,
Chris
For the record though, I'll probably release it on Smustard when I feel like I've ironed out all the bugs and I'm ready to release a non beta version. I feel bad putting my scripts on there because I'm always afraid I'll break someone's computer with one of my scripts, and I don't want Smustard to kick me out
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Hi Chris, I see your visiting,
does this run on macs yet??
I was looking for the latest progressbar.rb and came across ShapeBender, so now I want both, do you have the links?
john
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Hi Chris
Would it be possible to make the path which branches. When I try it it seems to highlight it but does not do anything. Usage could be from road layouts to making trees.
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Hi John, the link to the bender script is this thread. Go to the very first post. It is at the bottom of my first post. It is a zip file.
And progressbar is found on the http://www.smustard.com website. Hope that helps!
@Sepo - Sorry, but a branching path is currently beyond my brain's abilities. It probably could be done. I just wouldn't count on it soon. I've got a few other features I'm trying to figure out first.
Chris
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@unknownuser said:
Would it be possible to make the path which branches?
Hi Sepo,
Cool idea, but it would be hard for a program to figure out what you want done at the fork because that will depend on what the content/meaning of the model is, and not just its shapes.
Meanwhile, you could try just making the two branches separately, with each one including the root part, doing the two Bends separately and overlapping the two versions. Anywhere along the root part that things are exactly duplicated, SU will automatically remove the duplicates if you un-group them so they are not separated from each other. Then you figure out how to adjust the fork according what you are trying to do.
I hope this helps,
August -
Yes I am aware of that pedestrian way, I was thinking along these lines when thinking about brunching path. So if it possible to do pedestrian way I can't work out why it can't be automated.
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It probably could be automated. It might not always work out exactly right, but it would probably be able to return pretty good results regularly. Ij just don't have time, and I've got a few bigger fish to fry on this plugin that are already in the works (don't get your hopes anyone, it'll be a while before I release a new version of this unfortunately
)But, once I get some more tools worked out, it may very well work to begin implementing forked paths. I would just have to think it through a lot more.
It might even be its own tool. More like profile builder actually. I don't have that script. Does it do what you want?
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No, profile builder does not do the same stuff. There is similar but free tool as part of Power SU tool which works on same principal like profile builder. None of these as far as I am aware can do forking (funny word). It is quite tedious to do this pedestrian way although possible. With simple forms and flat surfaces it is quite straightforward. Little cut and paste and hiding in the workflow. But my idea was for ramps and roads...interesting bridges etc...never mind the trees.
Anyway thanks for your reply. -
Rigth, PB doesn't do forking either. It would be cool however - for some intricate Gothic tracery for instance...
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This is a really remarkable tool. One minor nitpick/feature request. It works great on Bezier curves, as you demo'ed in the excellent video. Unfortunately, it doesn't work very well with freehand curves. I'd like something like an O(4) Bezier curve, which the Bezier tool doesn't support. The plugin doesn't work on a group of O(2) Bezier curves, and if I draw the curve freehand, what comes out of shape bender looks pretty busted.
Thanks again for doing this kind of stuff.
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Hmm, not sure what an O4 and O2 bezier is. IT should work on any series of connected lines. If you have 2 beziers and they are in separate groups, they would need to be exploded first.
Do you have a picture, or better yet a model that shows the problem? Thanks!
Chris
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