Texture mapping in Revit

[Anonymous]

Is there a way of mapping textures more creatively in Revit ?

I'm modelling some Glulam beams, some of which are curved. Is there a way of getting the glulam texture (with the laminated layers shown) to curve along the length of the curve beam ?

Thanks

Martin

[constantin.stroescu · Accepted solution]

Mapping in Revit seems to be not very handy...

In such a situation I would make a new material in Photoshop with curved lines exactly at the dimensions of the side of the beam.

This can be done also in Photoshop (using an image of horizontal panel boards ) >Edit >Transform >Wrap - wrap the texture to a curved shape as you want to be.

Then in Revit apply the new material to the beam  and fix the position from Texture Editor >Offset.. a lot of work....

[Anonymous]

Thanks again Constantin,

yup that was what I was afraid of. Some texture Unwrap tools would be handy (along with normal mapping support) - here's hoping 🙂

[gsucci]

Yes, it is possible.

However,  if you only need one or two curved beams you should consider just building custom, curved textures.

If you wish to have a fully parametric beam with the texture that follows the parametric curvature of the beam, you need to slant ever-so-slightly the sides of your beam.

In other words, the section of your beam will NOT longer be a rectangle, but a trapezoid, whose major side is on top, the smaller side bottom, and the left and right sides are slanted symmetrically.

You can achieve this by making your beam out of a sweep, with the path following a parametric curvature. The trapezoid beam section can be parametric as well.

The brick arches in the attached image are all parametric and the brick texture is all the same: straight, horizontal bricks.

Regards

Gio

[Anonymous]

This is some really useful information that i'm not sure i've understood completely.
Can you please confirm :
When you build the "arch", you build a trapezoid looking almost like a rectangle and you make a half circle extrusion ?

"You can achieve this by making your beam out of a sweep, with the path following a parametric curvature"
I do not understand this part. (i'm using Revit in French language)

Thank you for enlightening me,
Ante

[gsucci]

Ante, I think you got it.

So, the "extrusion" actually is a Sweep.

The Path of the sweep is an arc, or some other curve that you need.

The profile of the sweep is the trapezoid, with horizontal bases, but with the sides slanted (hence, it a trapezoid).

See sketch... hopefully will help.

Regards

gio

[patrik.krchnak6Q4ZY]

Great workaround, thanks for sharing.