[Tutorial > Modeling] A Cube with Radiused Edges
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A SketchUp user elsewhere asked me how to create a cube with a radius applied to all the edges. I did the attached tutorial and illustration. Obviously this could be used for other shapes perhaps with slight modifications.
Here's the text to go along with it.
- Square (12x12 inches in my example) with radiused corners. (1" in my example)
- Pulled up so the height is the same as the radius. Delete upper face. Draw a radius profile on the inside.
- Run Follow Me on the profile. Clean up as needed.
- Heal face on top by tracing an edge with the Pencil tool. Use Push/Pull to pull the face up. (5" in my example. 1/2 the total height of the cube minus the radius dimension. Delete the face. Clean up any visible lines--Ctrl+Eraser.
- Select the geometry and copy it with Ctrl+Move. Move it up above the original. Mirror it with Scale and -1.
- Move the top down onto the bottom. Delete the seam line edges.
Howzzat?
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This is great Dave! I'll give it a try later, thanks for taking the time to post here
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Simply elegant.
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an example of Dave's method applied there.
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Thanks Dave! I came here specifically tonight looking for an answer to this very question.
I find it odd, don't you?, that this is not a ruby script tool already.
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It is also a pity that Kerky (or SU2KT?) does not support bevelling edges in models imported from SU.
Note also that sometimes (when the poly-count of the two halves that you want to join at the end is too high) it is impossible to soften (or actually delete) the seam between the two halves. The workaround is to make a group of the half first, do the copy+move and flip, move it back and explode the groups. Now you can delete the seam.
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gaieus.
you can also try select all then intersect with model.. after that, you'll be able to delete the seam..
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@dave r said:
Here's the text to go along with it.
Howzzat?dave,
just found this wonderful tut. thanks. i hope you do not mind my copying/pasting the text you posted here onto the skippy. this way when i open it again a few months from now i will know what it is about and how it is done.
suggestion: on future tuts do include the text for the sake of clarity.
regards.
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@dave r said:
A SketchUp user elsewhere asked me how to create a cube with a radius applied to all the edges. I did the attached tutorial and illustration. Obviously this could be used for other shapes perhaps with slight modifications.
Here's the text to go along with it.
- Square (12x12 inches in my example) with radiused corners. (1" in my example)
- Pulled up so the height is the same as the radius. Delete upper face. Draw a radius profile on the inside.
- Run Follow Me on the profile. Clean up as needed.
- Heal face on top by tracing an edge with the Pencil tool. Use Push/Pull to pull the face up. (5" in my example. 1/2 the total height of the cube minus the radius dimension. Delete the face. Clean up any visible lines--Ctrl+Eraser.
- Select the geometry and copy it with Ctrl+Move. Move it up above the original. Mirror it with Scale and -1.
- Move the top down onto the bottom. Delete the seam line edges.
Howzzat?
How can i draw the square with rounded corners? Is there a menue for it?
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No, you use the arc tool to create the rounded corners.
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Edson, thank you.
Gai, I guess I missed a step?
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Yeah, but how to add fillet edges on current cubical component that has no radiused edges...is that posible?????!!!!!
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Hi Marko,
You can also use plugins for that like "Round Edge" or "Sketchy Bevel".
Neither will give you the exact same result but most of the times they should be sufficient.
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Another method is to use the follow me tool. Knowing that SU has issues with small facets, I used a 100' x 100' rectangle as the base geometry to create a cube. Didn't find any holes, but close up shows there still needs to be some line hiding if you're after perfection. A 10" x 10" cube after follow me has the annoying little holes in the corners. I upped the arc segments on the smaller cube to 24 vs 12 on the larger cube.
A few of these little boxes and 2 gigs of RAM with a 2 year old video card shows some strain.
Same technique works with other various shapes to end up with a variety of radius cornered shapes, some requiring more cleanup than others.
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Nice version, Walt. I's also in The Daily CatchUp now:
http://news.sketchucation.com/creating-a-cube-with-radiused-edges-in-google-sketchup/
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Dave, I get a BugsPlat any time I want to open this file. Can you open it?
(I can import it into a new file but I guess there are scenes in here which of course, will not import).
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There's nothing you can do about the small faces issue except avoid them. My general method for that is to scale up before performing an operation that creates them. You can scale up and back down or my choice is to make a component of the geometry where it sits, make a copy, scale the copy and do what I need to do. then close the large copy of the component and delete it. No need to scale back down and potentially have to move the component back into place.
BTW, this is an old thing. Now I would use the Round Corners plugin instead of doing it the way I showed way back then.
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I know this may be to easy... but why not use the fredo6 round corners plugin?
Seems lie you can achieve the same result much easier. -
Taylor, the tutorial was originally written before Round Corners and if you'll read the last sentence of my post before yours that was the suggestion I made.
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@jim4366 said:
Well, I have no problem opening the file, (Radiused Cube.skp)
But, zooming in with "show hidden lines", I am seeing in each of the 8 corners a small face that did not fill. The finished cube seems to have 8 little holes in it.
I know that scaling up, then back down, should fill these faces, but was wondering if follow me can be coaxed into working more cleanly?that's actually a fault of the follow me tool as opposed to the scale.. there are work arounds but they aren't quick.. i have a video floating around showing my old workaround that i might dig up. (you either have to followme 360º then cut it up or draw the corner manually which is how i used to do)
nowadays, i use TIG's lathe (via his extrude edges suite) for drawing portions of a sphere like that.
@dave.
this might sound odd (or maybe not?) but i remember this post from way back.. that exact picture in the OP is what got me hyped on rendering.. (and i still like the clay look.. most of my present day renders are still clayish but it all started with your picture )[edit]- found the video in this thread:
http://forums.sketchucation.com/viewtopic.php?p=268160#p268160the thread was when su8 first came out and they used an obvious FredoRoundCorner box as an example solid because otherwise, this same problem would of shown up and prevented the box from being solid
(or maybe they drew the box with one of the workarounds? nah..)
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