Vector Work in Alibre?

[Sascha Uncia]

I'm having some trouble figuring out how to work with vectors in Alibre. I looked up videos and forum posts but many were quite old; I managed to piece together part of the process but I keep running into brick walls.

I am trying to get the outlines from this graphic I put together in Affinity Design into Alibre to do extrusions and create little badges for 3D printing. About 6 of them


The process I have used thus far is..

1. Save as .SVG
2. Open in Inkscape and convert to DXF
3. Open it in alibre which dumps it on a new drawing
4. explode the imported graphic (I don't quite understand what this does but I get errors otherwise)
5. Attempt to convert to a symbol and reimport for scale, it won't let me scale it based on mm, only a % from 0 to 1. I could only guess.
6. Open Sketch and copy all
7. Create a new part
8. Create a new sketch
9. Paste into the sketch
10. Select pieces that should be separate shapes, cut them
11. Create more sketches
12. Paste shapes into the sketches
13. Chaos
14. Ok, I finally have the paths, but the sketch is huge, I can't figure out how to change it's size.
15. I also tried to extrude some of the shapes, even the simplest ones give the following error

16. I tried projecting the curves to a new sketch as a possible fix. It didn't work.
17. Got frustrated and gave up. I was going to try importing a reference image and re-tracing everything Inside Alibre from scratch, but I can't find a bezier spline tool. We were taught to use them for CAD work in Solidworks class but I can't find anything like them in Alibre.

Interpolated splines aren't giving as much control. I neeeed my bezier curves...

Or just to get imported curves working in the first place...

 

[Sascha Uncia]

I found out how to edit control points. Not the same but I can set up four points to approximate a bezier curve. Helps a bit.

Still can't solve UV errors, nothing works.

 

[DavidJ]

Your point 4 - you may not need to explode. The warning that I suspect you see if you don't is because symbols pasted into 2D sketch on part workspace can sometimes cause some really weird issues. The message is to alert you to that possibility, but it doesn't actually block pasting of the symbol. Note I'm not sure when you are seeing error, so my comments here could be misplaced.

With problems like your symbol, the issue may be fairly localised - I tend to start by simplifying, delete features in the sketch until the error goes away, then you know where to look more closely. And you will hopefully prove the basic workflow with a simpler version, so you are at least making some progress.

 

[Sascha Uncia]

Your point 4 - you may not need to explode. The warning that I suspect you see if you don't is because symbols pasted into 2D sketch on part workspace can sometimes cause some really weird issues. The message is to alert you to that possibility, but it doesn't actually block pasting of the symbol. Note I'm not sure when you are seeing error, so my comments here could be misplaced.

With problems like your symbol, the issue may be fairly localised - I tend to start by simplifying, delete features in the sketch until the error goes away, then you know where to look more closely. And you will hopefully prove the basic workflow with a simpler version, so you are at least making some progress.

I've been creating new sketches and projecting parts of lines onto them. It seems like most sharp corners cause errors. I still don't have a solution since there's no obvious cause to the errors.

Honestly it boils down to two problems. If I can design vectors in another app and have them import properly then it's not as important to have perfect bezier handles in Alibre (Alibre doesn't have them right? They're not hiding somewhere?). The second problem is scaling, is there a way for me to set the scale of an imported vector? When I import it into a drawing it shows a scale box but it's a blind scale, there's no way to see the XY dimensions in mm. I'd prefer the import process not to be so convoluted but at least there are workarounds for that.

 

[Sascha Uncia]

I tested a few more things. Alibre gives UV errors and FreeCAD produces crazy spirographs as entering sketch mode causes reality to collapse to a single point..


Bird is the Alpha and Omega, an Interdimensional Being Beyond Time and Space.

The only program that is able to properly handle the file is Solidworks student edition. It seems to have a complex import plugin and I suspect it recomputes the splines.



SolidWORKS

It's possible that the DXF file from inkscape is corrupt and Alibre can't handle it. I tried different export options but nothing fixed the problem.

I tried some DXF online converters and some of them worked, sort of. The smooth spline segments were all converted to densely populated short line segments. They lost any smoothness as there were technically no splines.

Here is a link to the files if you want to try yourself - https://drive.google.com/file/d/1FBNEi3bboxBZsiA0zU3TpxcCwVM5IpZ3/view?usp=sharing

 

[BlackBird28]

Hi Sascha….
maybe you should try moi3d… it can easy handle stuff like this. I do a lot of vector editing in moi3d.
it has a very smart userinterface… snapping etc…

MoI, 3D modeling for designers and artists

MoI is a new 3D Modeling/CAD application for designers and artists. Offering a blend of precision and freeform NURBS drawing tools, it sports a unique user interface that operates seamlessly with a pen tablet.

moi3d.com

 

[Sascha Uncia]

Hi Sascha….
maybe you should try moi3d… it can easy handle stuff like this. I do a lot of vector editing in moi3d.
it has a very smart userinterface… snapping etc…

MoI, 3D modeling for designers and artists

MoI is a new 3D Modeling/CAD application for designers and artists. Offering a blend of precision and freeform NURBS drawing tools, it sports a unique user interface that operates seamlessly with a pen tablet.

moi3d.com

I could do it easily in Blender, but I'm trying to learn Alibre. This is the first technical problem I've run into that doesn't seem to have a solution no matter what I throw at it. It's frustrating because the curves are there, I can select, edit, duplicate them, but there looks to be corrupt data on import and no obvious way to recompute the curves.

 

[dwc]

but there looks to be corrupt data on import

That is my impression too, the problems are with the input data. Sometimes such work is no problem, other times just about impossible.
I usually now trace by hand over images in the background and have less problems.

 

[jfleming]

I suffered through this recently as well. All of the parts you see here came from DXF files that were generated in CorelDRAW. Had similar issues with much less intricate/complicated designs. Eventually worked through it but not with out some horse hockey.

EDIT: adding the source file screengrab. Notice they are extremely clean with minimal nodes.

 

[Sascha Uncia]

That is my impression too, the problems are with the input data. Sometimes such work is no problem, other times just about impossible.
I usually now trace by hand over images in the background and have less problems.

Fair enough, I was just aiming to have a workflow figured out for creating vector graphics and geometry from the same file. After a few days of trying everything I can think of It sounds like it's going to be impossible to get Alibre to play nice with imported vectors. I can do it all in Blender like I'm used to, it just lacks the precision/parametrics of CAD software (not to mention the messy messy booleans generated).

I'm still learning Alibre and running into issues like this is frustrating.

 

[Sascha Uncia]

I suffered through this recently as well. All of the parts you see here came from DXF files that were generated in CorelDRAW. Had similar issues with much less intricate/complicated designs. Eventually worked through it but not with out some horse hockey.

EDIT: adding the source file screengrab. Notice they are extremely clean with minimal nodes.

No kidding. Those definitely look like they should port over without issue. I think what Alibre needs in that respect is a few tools (or import dialogue) to recompute and repair spline data. From what I've been able to tell it looks like there's some hidden internal data from the import that is causing issues, but no way to edit it. I found an analyze and fix function but it says there are no errors with the sketch, so...

[EDIT] Oh, and for the record I tried several different programs to export the DXF including illustrator and a couple of online convertors. Only a couple imported without errors but those used the DXF save option that reduces everything to line segments. The result was pretty ugly unfortunately, it packed nodes really close on short curves, far too many points, and spread them out in a choppy manner over longer splines.

 

[NateLiquidGravity]

I haven't tested yet but Alibre Script has a new import/export function that might help. However the problem may still exist. Illustrations don't care about overlapping, open, and looping geometry but a solid modeler will.

 

[Sascha Uncia]

I haven't tested yet but Alibre Script has a new import/export function that might help. However the problem may still exist. Illustrations don't care about overlapping, open, and looping geometry but a solid modeler will.

Where is this script located? I don't see it in Alibre v24

 

[HaroldL]

If it's not in the Script Library then you may need to do a forum search for Gear Generator.

https://www.alibreforum.com/forum/index.php?threads/arc-length.20459/post-130305

 

[NateLiquidGravity]

If it's not in the Script Library then you may need to do a forum search for Gear Generator.

https://www.alibreforum.com/forum/index.php?threads/arc-length.20459/post-130305

Wrong subject.

Where is this script located? I don't see it in Alibre v24

I was talking about a function you can use in a script. Not an existing script - Or at least there were none publicly available before. So I made one: https://www.alibreforum.com/forum/index.php?threads/release-import-svg-dialog.23227/

 

[Sascha Uncia]

Wrong subject.

I was talking about a function you can use in a script. Not an existing script - Or at least there were none publicly available before. So I made one: https://www.alibreforum.com/forum/index.php?threads/release-import-svg-dialog.23227/

OMG you Wizard! It didn't even need to be converted through the site to work!

Alibre should include your script in the default install!


Thank you!

 

[simonb65]

Alibre should include your script in the default install!

Alibre should include this feature into the main application, things like this shouldn't be just user scripted add-ons!

 

[idslk]

Alibre should include this feature into the main application

sorry, i might sound harsh, but i never had any use of Vector import, so why should i pay maintenance for such a feature which is already "implemented" (surrounding script...) from Nate?
There are other things in CAD work which should be inplemented or bugfixed first...and this "wish list" very long and also very old.

Regards
Stefan

 

[simonb65]

sorry, i might sound harsh, but i never had any use of Vector import, so why should i pay maintenance for such a feature which is already "implemented" (surrounding script...) from Nate?
There are other things in CAD work which should be inplemented or bugfixed first...and this "wish list" very long and also very old.

Just thought that as the code to do this is no more than a few dozen lines of code, it would add more value add to the product out-of-the-box for very little effort! By your reasoning, why don't Alibre just stop developing built-in functionality all together, just put 100% effort into a UI framework and let the user (who are mostly programming and scripting illiterate) do all the functionality improvements in scripts, that would, make me not want to pay maintenance! ... and yes, your comment is a little 'harsh' Stefan!

Scripting is good for complex repetitive bespoke problems, but it shouldn't be a one-top-shop for everything and everyone.

I don't use scripting in things like Blender, 3D Studio Max or KeyShot, because they all provide the functionality 95+% of users could ever need 'built in'.

 

[idslk]

By your reasoning, why don't Alibre just stop developing built-in functionality all together, just put 100% effort into a UI framework

There are other things in CAD work which should be inplemented or bugfixed first...and this "wish list" very long and also very old.