Non-polygon Elevations

[Cloud Hidden]

The exterior of my buildings is a NURBS surface created via Loft. When creating a hidden-line elevation, whether via the View menu or the Convert Copy to Lines, the NURBS surface is drawn as a million polygons. This totally messes up the elevation, which should be just the outline of the building. Having to trace the outline via the polyline tool, and/or delete all of those line segments, is a grandiose waste of time and loss of accuracy. Really, all I'm asking is that you have an option by which VW does LESS work--just show the perimeter shape of the NURBS surface without all the segments that fill up the field. Ideally I wouldn't need Convert Copy to Lines be/c then my curves would be smooth lines rather than segments.

[Cloud Hidden]

OK, I found it, downloaded it, seem to have put it in the right folder (Plug-Ins), and even got it into a menu in a custom workspace.

Now what?

When I view the layer from which I derive the elevation--a linked layer--and select this menu item, nothing happens. What should happen? What else should I be doing?

Thanks, Katie. If this works, it'll make my day!

[ 09-09-2002: Message edited by: Cloud Hidden ]

[Cloud Hidden]

Turns out I just had to quit VW and re-launch it for the PIO to work. Thanks Katie, for that instruction! And especially for telling me it existed.

This is the perfect solution! Will save me HOURS of work.

[Guest]

I need to check on this, but I am pretty sure the Hidden Line rendering only works with polygons and not with NUrbs -- which is why the surface is changing to a trillion polygons.

When I find something out that is set in stone, i'll let you know.

[Guest]

Okay I am wrong, sort of.

Whew.

In VW 9, there is an angle of smoothing which generates the facted polygons. The higher this angle, the smoother the drawing. This is not something that is built into the user interface, but can be added via VS, OR at vectordepot.com there is a script by Andrew Bell that addresses this.

[Guest]

Glad it worked for you.

[BG]

Dear Cloud Hidden

This may seem like a basic question.

I have just downloaded the script & ended up with a file "hidden line smoothing angle.sit" which I placed in the "plug-ins" folder.

I then re-started VW and went to the workspace editor but I can't locate this tool. Where do I find it? It is a "menu" item not a "tool" right?

Any help appreciated.

Brett

[Kevin]

Brett;

If the file is still ".sit", then it is compressed. It needs to be expanded to its original format using a tool such as Stuffit Expander.

[BG]

I have already uncompressed the file (tried it twice) using Winzip & this is the file that was created.

Any ideas?

Brett

[Cloud Hidden]

.sit is a Macintosh file format--StuffIt. Might you have downloaded the Mac version and not the Windows' version?

[Guest]

WinZip can decompress .sit files.

Once the file is decompressed, you should have a file that has the windows logo on a piece of paper as the icon. The file should be a .vsm file. Put that file in the VW> Plug-ins folder.

* make sure VW is closed when you do this step.

Then launch VW. Go to the workspace editor. Under the menus tab, select Misc at the bottom on the left hand side. You'll see the plugin listed there. Drag this over to the right hand side under the menu that you want. A good place to put it is under the View>Rendering menu - I put mine right below the hidden line rendering as a hint.

Once you have done that, you can exit the workspace editor. When you go to that menu, you'll be asked to enter in an angle. A good setting to start at is 15degrees. You may need to increase that degree in some situations.

[BG]

Thanks for the replies.

I definitely downloaded the windows version, but I can't explain why I ended up with a .sit file.

I extracted the file on a friends Mac & that worked fine.

It's a neat little tool to have.

Brett

[Guest]

You can create .sit files from WinZip too. It could have been one of those cases.