Trouble with the stitch tool

[Anonymous]

It seems that I can't select the faces I want to stitch together when I'm in the Patch mode.  What I'm trying to do is to combine the vertical faces that are broken down into parts and still keep the curvature of the topographic level.  Maybe I'm going about this in the wrong way.  Does anyone have any suggestions?

[mavigogun]

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@Anonymous wrote:

 Does anyone have any suggestions?

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It would be a great help to see you demonstrate the failure- can you attach a screencast?

[ToddHarris7556]

It would be easier to look into a Fusion model if you can share it, vs. guessing what might be going on via pictures.

I'm going to speculate that it probably has something to do with the way the topo layers were generated - the only way that you'd be able to stitch them is if they really are tangent at the edge. I suspect that everywhere you have a vertical line, there's a slight discontinuity. i.e. a sharp edge. 

[Anonymous]

Wow.  This is super frustrating.  I ended up cleaning up my lines in V8 but then many of my lines wouldn't work as they should (they registered like they had a break in them but I couldn't find it with sketch checker) so I had to revert to an older version in V9.  So I'm back to the drawing board on that one.  Here's a link to what I'm working with:

https://a360.co/2w0h1A0

[TrippyLighting]

This has nothing to do with the stitch tool. 

You had a rectangular solid body that you shelled. Then you split that with a cylindrical surface anding up with a cylindrical shell landscape.

That cannot be stitched to a surface. You can only stitch surfaces. If you want a hollowed solid body, then there are at least three ways to do that.

But at this time I am not sure what exactly you want to do.

What is the end goal of your design ?

[Anonymous]

I'm not trying to stitch the landscape to anything.  I'm just trying to get rid of the vertical lines that are drawn on the landscape.  If you look at each level you can see the vertical portion.  Along this vertical curve there are vertical lines.  I'd like to get rid of these lines to make a single face.

[TrippyLighting]

These vertical lines indicate the border between two NURBS surfaces / Patches. You cannot simply "get rid" of them and it might not even be necessary.

Why would you need to get rid of them ?

[Anonymous]

I'd like to get rid of them for two reasons:

1. in order to have less lines in hopes that this will render faster.
2. so that I might add an appearance to each vertical section easier.

Is there anything else you'd recommend I do?

[TrippyLighting]

It will not render faster.

What is the color scheme you have in mind. Do the vertical walls will have different color then the top surfaces ?

Instead of creating the extrudes with the "join option enabled, before extruding I would create a new componet, call it Level 1, 2, 3 etc.

Then with the component activated I'd extrude the 1st layer, so all the bodies for that layer will be created in that component, etc.

You'll end up with multi-body components equivalent to the number of layers you have . Then you can apply materials to the components or to the individual bodies.

If the top faces need to have a different color than the vertical faces then you can apply appearances to faces instead of bodies/components.

The above is much faster then having to pick each single face on a single solid body.

[Anonymous]

Yes.  The sides will have a different color than the tops.

Do you think there would be a faster way to apply the appearances.  Since the vertical faces are broken up as they are I'm concerned the appearance will be a little dodgy.

[TrippyLighting]

You've not answered my question. Is this for rendering only, or are you going to manufacture this in some way ?

Both are possible but require a different workflow. How to get this done for rendering I already described briefly in my last post.

[Anonymous]

Oh.  This will be for rendering.  But I'm interested to hear how the manufacturing design would be different.  I'm clearly still learning.

[ToddHarris7556]

On the manufacturing front, possibly the easiest approach would be to work from a smooth topo surface, and just adjust the stepdowns on the roughing toolpath to leave that staircase/stepped finish. 

We usually cut very smooth surfaces from SignFoam (HDU) for exhibits - but I do think the stepped look is pretty cool. 

[I_Forge_KC]

It can be done, but...

1) It's super tedious. You have to select each face individually - which is the same as just applying a texture

2) It makes for nasty edge conditions (notice in the picture how some of the edges drift in and out of the part - this is BAD)

3) It makes children (and professional designers) cry inconsolably when you do this

4) You lose design history

The operation is MERGE, available in the patch space when you turn off design history.

[TrippyLighting · Accepted solution]

If I'd do this from scratch I'd make sure to work with components instead of body folders, but working with bodies and folders altogether is not bad at all

This workflow, while still bing a bit of work is definitely much less work than selecting each face individually.

[Anonymous]

Thanks so much for taking the time to help me with this TrippyLighting!  Your video was super informative.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for showing me this even though it's the way that makes children cry. 

[TrippyLighting]

Well, you are out of that age aren't you 😉

[ToddHarris7556]

NICE!

I hadn't looked closely enough to realize the workflow in the part file. 

This is the digital version of how we actually used to build 3D topo maps 'in the old days' - it involved lots of tracing paper and many, many layers of individually-cut hardboard. 

While it was cool, I really can't say that I miss those days 🙂

[TrippyLighting]

The workflow would be easier if done with component instead of folders.

In that case you can actually assign a material to all bodies in a component which make the process a little more streamlined.