Platinium 3D viewports ideas to improve this function

Stefaan Coddé

In 3D, as soon when switched to layout and a view port is selected there are too many steps at this moment .

For instance , 3 viewports  where the view directions are are automatically aligned  so front, side and top view.
And if a viewport is selected , a quick way to to see the scale of this viewport so scale info somewhere on the bottom visible on the screen.

And: model space is 1/1, layout always a specific scale, but if on a later stage the scale has to change, if one of those 3 viewports are rescaled, the other two follow and use the same scale of the 1st selected viewport.



Ok, i'm used to work with Mechanical Desktop and Inventor so perhaps leaning more towards those 3D apps.

Louis_Verdonck

 Stefaan

I think you should try out the Viewbase command, which creates a series of orthogonal and isometric paperspace viewports of the 3D geometry in model space. The viewports are aligned automatically according to first angle or third angle projection standards. When the 3D geometry is modified, the paperspace viewports automatically reflect these changes (if VIEWUPDATEAUTO = ON). All tools sit on the Drawing Views toolbar.

Joe Dunfee

 If you keep the properties window open, any time you select a viewport, the scale will show as one of the properties.

When you start learning a new program that does similar things to a program you knew well, there is always a significant amount of discovery about your work flow.  I am now working in SpaceClaim, which is a 3D modeler that does not keep history. I have a lot of experience with SolidWorks and Pro-Engineer that I have to un-learn. SpaceClaim is easier in some ways, but  it certainly a different way of thinking, and some operations seem a lot more cumbersome. But, it may just be that my past experience is a bit of a hindrance.

-Joe

Tom Foster

How does Spaceclaim Direct Modeling compare with BricsCAD's? Any consequent sugestions for BricsCAD?

Joe Dunfee

 I am not far enough along with my experience on SpaceClaim to really make an in-depth  judgement.  But so far, I see that SpaceClaim, in general is harder for us old AutoCAD and SolidWorks guys to pick up.  A company is also less likely to be able to hire someone with experience on it.  A complex program like this really takes years of use before you see all the issues and complexities of working with it.  The lack of experienced users may be its biggest issue.

I heard an interview where a man was being  critical of how Apple has been simplifying the interface.  The simplicity gives the casual observer the impression that the program will be easy to use.  But, as soon as you start wanting to do more complex actions, those types of actions become harder to figure out, and are often quite obscure.  SpaceClaim seems to be in that same category to some extent.

Its main strength is its ability to import from other programs and either be usable as is, or make it fairly easy to fix problems with the import.  The company where I am using it is a job shop.  I am currently using it to import STEP models that were created in SolidWorks. They were intended as sheet metal, but were not properly done in SolidWorks as sheet metal. I can within a few minutes, import the STEP and convert it to a flat pattern using SpaceClaim's sheet metal features.  Its pricing is around $3,000 USD, which is about half that of SolidWorks. 

I also recently discovered what I consider a major flaw.  The print set-up is quite problematic.  Often some of the settings dialogs will ignore a setting.  The company saves as a PDF and prints from the PDF because it is much more reliable.  Another thing that  troubles me is that SpaceClaim took down their user forum.  And I can find no other user forum. So, there is no 3rd party to go to for solutions, or to hear about problems and how to work around them.

-Joe

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Joe Dunfee

 I will mention another benefit of SpaceClaim in regards to drawing views.  When you save a PDF, you can include a vector overlay on top of the raster image generated by shaded views.  This means you can go to a lower resolution, without seeing the pixelated edges, or the alternative of a high resolution with an extremely large file size.

-Joe

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Sander Scheiris

Why not give BricsCAD Sheet Metal a try? 

In combination with BricsCAD Communicator, it could be an answer to the SpaceClaim/SolidWorks setup.

BricsCAD Communicator allows high-quality 3D data exchange between major MCAD formats. Supported formats include neutral ones, such as STEP and IGES; native formats, such as CATIA, Inventor, and SolidWorks; and kernel formats, such as Parasolid. 

See www.bricsys.com/communicator/ and www.bricsys.com/sheetmetal/