Close for Surface Box Morph

I am close, but as usual I think I am doing this in the absolute most unnecessarily complicated way. If any one could guide me on this one that would be great. i am trying to construct 'boxes' on my surface in my own particular way, and then surface morph to those boxes. Obviously I want a grid instead of the basic isotrim circular pattern, but it would be cool to be able to adjust the grid as I c fit.

But how do I finish, so close!

Thanks!

Attachments:

Surface Distort.gh, 31 KB
Surface Distort.3dm, 144 KB

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Ol OneEye on January 6, 2017 at 8:29am

Okay So the real question is, if I have a have to closed polylines, how do I create a 'box'? Obviously I can loft the two polylines, but is a 'box' always planar? Can I surface morph from a planar boundary box, to a non planar irregular shape?

Permalink Reply by Dan Cascaval on January 6, 2017 at 12:33pm

I think what you're asking (and what Surface Box, already in your definition, is trying to do) relates to a specific type of Geometry in GH called a Twisted box, which can have quite a bit of distortion but still retains the topology of a box and is suitable for remapping operations like Box Morph. For your case, however, Surface Box needs a domain input - very similar to Isotrim, and results in a circular pattern.

Since you've already manually created the grid pattern you want. You can try offsetting your initial surface and using map to surface to remap the curves from your initial to the outer offset surface, and then the Explode and Twisted Box (takes 8 vertices, which you have four from the initial Polyline and four from the remapped Polyline on the offset surface) components to manually create the twisted boxes to feed into Box Morph. (A couple other tips - reparametrizing surfaces upon input usually makes them easier to work with, and the PLine component does exactly what a degree 1 int curve does :) Let me know if you have any questions.

Permalink Reply by Ol OneEye on January 9, 2017 at 10:36am

Hey Perfect!

I actually ended up just projected the box vertices instead of the lines because I had some trouble lining up the vertices. So question, is projecting a grid the only way to construct a grid on a non planar surface? Obviously, as the surface gets more complicated the projection will get more distorted... The goal here is to have the rectangles on the surface as equal as possible..... can't think of another way atm...

Thanks!

Attachments:

surface mapped.jpg, 856 KB

Permalink Reply by Dan Cascaval on January 9, 2017 at 12:21pm

I'm not sure that's possible - to have the rectangular grid the way you want it in your pattern is going to naturally have that distortion, because the cells still have to line up in the UV space. It might be possible to vary the sizes of the cells somehow, but definitely not through projecting. This problem gets much harder when you're not aligning to the UV coordinates.

If you're willing to deviate slightly from the grid, have a look at geodesic spheres - I feel like it might be possible for you to map to the triangle pattern somehow?

Permalink Reply by Ol OneEye on January 9, 2017 at 1:53pm

hmm interesting, unfortunately you may be right.. I may have to 'adopt' an existing geometric pattern instead of simply projecting a grid. I did find a problem, on convex problems, the twisted box (which is composed of degree 1 curves) undercuts the surface.

So a box in GH is always straight curves? Is there a morph like option that simply offsets from my initial surface (without having to construct boxes)?

Permalink Reply by Ol OneEye on January 9, 2017 at 1:55pm

Getting close though!

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