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Milestones

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 And here it is! The end of the course. 😅 While I struggled a lot overall, I did end up liking this course. There were a lot of projects that I found really helpful with learning 3D modelling, and stretching my legs a bit in the area. I was particularly proud of my laser cutting. It felt great to take something I'd modelled in a computer program and make it real.  Overall, the most important thing I've learned this semester is that Rhino is not a good program for 3D modelling and has the most annoying rendering interface imaginable. My castle.    Applying my surface design.   My laser-cut project.   My 3D render.     And my ring:    

Assignment 5 Part 3: Reverse Engineered Object

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 So, it is finally done.   Rhino's rendering capabilities are not as powerful as Keyshot's, admittedly, but lacking a Keyshot license, I am pretty happy with how these turned out. It ended up being enjoyable to render these parts, and I learned a fair bit about measuring, more about the tools I could use in Rhino, and how to effectively colour objects in Rhino (you have to have those thumbnail objects on the Materials window open to get the effects to apply correctly). I still wish I was able to add the detailings present on the original pen, but it would have been a very long and arduous process learning how to import Grasshopper curve maps on to a surface in Rhino, and even longer learning how to use Grasshopper to create these very detailed shapes. Knowing they exist, however, is half the battle. I also wish I'd used my time more effectively to figure out how I could use a tool like Taper, or create a better shortcut to having a straight slope of a tapered object, but t...

Assignment 5 Part 2: Reverse Engineered Object

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 Now that I had started making proper progress on my models, I tried to apply more details and shapes to the pen. The avenue I was able to make the most success on was the cap's clip: I used the control point view to bevel the edges of the caps slightly. Unfortunately, it was very difficult to add details elsewhere. The details I initially wanted to add were the metal edging on the main body, the textures on the rubber grip, and the cap's top. However, etching objects in Rhino is next to impossible. It becomes even more impossible to etch objects in the style of the rubber grip... I tried creating a grid of squares, rotating it diagonally, and projecting it on to the grip, but this created looping circular shapes on the sides of the grip. This also made it difficult to loft or extrude the shapes I created so I could engrave them. The same problems with extrusion applied to the cap on the pen's body, as it quickly became hard to apply a cap on the top of the pen's body, ...