How Do I Surround One Material with Another?
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Thanks for the help. The Component method got me over the hump.
General question since two solutions were offered. One being Grouping and the other making a Component; is there a general rule of thumb as to when I should use one over the other. In my mind I would use Components if it is a part that I would use over again in the same or other project and I would use Groupings for one-offs. Does this logic sound OK to you?
TIA
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@monkminder said:
... I would use Components if it is a part that I would use over again in the same or other project and I would use Groupings for one-offs. Does this logic sound OK to you?
TIA
That's correct.
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Many people
[*]preach that you should just always use components. When you have a model full of components and groups, and you grab a group and make a bunch of copies of it, its hard to know if its a group or component. Then then once you've made a bunch of copies of a group, it can be a real pain going through the model and converting them all into components.Chris
[*]I am not one of those people, but I often wish I was. -
Yes, components, though similar to groups, have some "extra powers" and you can practically handle them as real true, separate "mini models" embedded into your model. What they can do (and groups not):
- change one instance and thus change all the other ones (just like Chris mentioned above) i.e. they are linked together
- use one definition with several instances and SU will only need to count the file size for the geometry of one instance (this won't help performance issues unfortunately)
- change axes
- export/import them ("Save as..." and "Reload")
- add gluing and cutting planes (groups can glue, too but you cannot control their axes therefore nor the gluing plane)
- well, and lately make them dynamic with SU Pro but that's something special...
However just quickly (and often temporarily) keep a set of geometry together / separated from others, grouping is just fine
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@gaieus said:
[*]use one definition with several instances and SU will only need to count the file size for the geometry of one instance (this won't help performance issues unfortunately)
What would SU do if you 'Grouped' several 'Components' and made multiple copies of this 'Group'?
Would it still only consider that only one 'Component' is present or because of 'Grouping' has SU now considered each 'Group' as independent geometry, thus increasing file size?
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I have tried to play around differently nested component to see how the file size changes. The case is that if you use only components to nest other components and make copies that way, it will help "compressing" file size even further but there is a practicaly limit of this as you do not necessarily want to build up everything from deeply nested components (also, this may even affect SU performance). Other times only the fact that a new component instance has to be counted (it obviously needs some bytes) can even increase file size if otherwise the geometry is not too complex in it (i.e. it is not economical to make a component).
See this file below - it is made up of one, single component which then I made into further components where possible and the two aisles of the vaulting are made into instances of again a higher parent component. Everything was made by simply scaling from outside differently.
Start exploding the bits, save and see how file size changes. Not too much until you explode the lowest level components into their raw geometry but then it is significant.
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Thanks for the example
After exploding all the way to raw geometry the file increased by 80%
As i played around with exploding the higher level components the change was not so dramatic, as you mentioned, but i imagine that choosing when to make a component is key to file size.
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Yes, indeed. And this one-piece vault is not even a very complex geometry.
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Thanks to you all for your insight. I appreciate the help and I look forward to haunting these forums!
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Maybe just one additional thought if the topic is bumped anyway; when you make a group and later (when you do not need it) explode it, there won't be any (noticeable) traces of it in the model.
An exploded component will however remain in the file and you can still access it in (and insert it from) the Component browser.This way, if you are not careful enough and keep playing with various ideas and download several components (of uncontrollable file size) from the Warehouse into your model, even if you discard them, they will make your file size really huge. Therefore you always need to purge your model regularly (although be careful NOT to purge whatever is needed) See example below:
There can be unused components, materials, styles and layers in a model. The first three can considerably boost the file size (styles only if you are using some sketchy style with high resolution watermark background image for instance). In every similar dialog, there is the option to purge them OR you can do it altogether under your Model info > Statistics tab.
Lately the 3D Warehouse warns you of unused items (such as above) and offers you to purge them before uploading. This is cool IMO - otherwise one would import Sang or Bryce like a thousand instances after each other.
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