New nurbs modeler ! MoI3D

#1

Moment Of Inspiration :thumbsup:
Sketchup + Rhino3D = Moment Of Inspiration! :applause:
Created for use it with a Pen Grafic Tablet !!! (works also with a mouse :wink:
Have fun! :cool:

#2

Thanks for the heads up!

Wow! It feels great at first! If it would export to IGES I would be set alreadyā€¦

Edit: I really encourage people to try this one out. The Option>UI Size is something all 3D software should copy :slight_smile:

#3

Itā€™s interesting, and prettier than most NURBs modeleres. But it strikes me that NURBs modeling is destined to keep itself in the past.

CAD workflows really arenā€™t sufficient or good anymore. They can be useful for precision work but that goes out of the window if youā€™re trying to make things easier to use and have such things as snapping enabled. Having to select a move tool for every move (because as soon as youā€™ve done your move it deselects the tool) is tremendously tiresome and stops you from tweaking, and having instant feedback, you also do not want to have to click multiple times just to grab and move something, really you just want move tool, now select and move things, no defining of axis or anythign else. The Developer should check out polygon modeling toolsets and see what could be learnt from there in terms of workflow.

Also the whole viewport navigation thing, nasty. Having icons of course for navigation is nothing new many apps have had it for years (C4D, even Lightwave, etc), but you need shortcut methods too because you donā€™t want to have to keep going back and forth to click on specific areas just to navigate. Most tablets these days come with a set of buttons on them, you can assign keyboard shortcuts to them for navigation, so the tablet argument is out of the window. Unfortunately this is indicative of the problems throughout in terms of workflow, too many clicks, insensitivity to existing selections and so on. The prettyness is there, but the workflow is still back in the CAD/CAM dark ages, itā€™s certainly a step on form most other NURBs modelers, but itā€™s no-where near where it should be.

Iā€™m sure that the guy could totally turn this around into being the easiest to use NURBs modeler ever if he resolved these issues, but those issues do need resolving first.

#4

Thanx I will try this out tomorrow on my tabby!

#5

This is exactly like Amapi except it has only 1/10th the number of tools/features.

#6

I have no complaints on the ease of use of Rhino.
What I really wonder is how there still isnā€™t any app that kind of combines the relative ease (and speed) of use of Rhino/Alias Studio and the robustness of more engineer oriented tools (especially for high-precision finishing detail). There really is no in-between as far as Iā€™ve seen.

While tools like Rhino and Alias Studio have a lot of tools that help you create a design fast, in many situations (even moderately complex) it can still be a hit-or-miss thing, which forces you to fall down to various tedious and unintuitive workarounds.

So I kind of agree that there really hasnā€™t been much significant improvement for the end-user in CAD apps for what can be said decades now.

#7

Did some initial testing of this soft, and it feels pretty good.
The viewport navigation isnā€™t that bad, you can zoom pan rotate solely with the mouse (mmb, rmb, and scroll wheel). I really like drawing curves in this app, the snapping features seem very intuitive. I can almost leave all the various snapping options on, no matter what Iā€™m doing, not obtrusive at all for the stuff that doesnā€™t need it.

Overall I like where this is heading, and the developer seems to know his stuff (apparently he was the chief designer of Rhino?). He isnā€™t bloating it with countless of features in the beginning, but is trying to get the foundation right.

Anyway, hope the development goes well. The tool already seems usable for the initial stages of modeling.

#8

Me likey! It takes some getting used to, especially for someone like me who doesnā€™t use my tablet much, but this progrtam is seeems really nice. I really like the ui as well. Itā€™s laid out very well, and is very intuitive.

#9

ā€¦and with any luck, 1/10th of the price :wip:

Sometimes itā€™s nice to have some cheap tools for us hobbyists :slight_smile:

#10

I tried it out. Here are the primary tools that I use when designing (or modeling) cars in Rhino 3D (in order)

[ul]
[li]Match Surface: Matches edge position(G0), tangency(G1), curvature(G2) or G3[/li][li]Trim/Split (included)[/li][li]Blend: (included)[/li][li]Scale: 1D, 2D, 3D[/li][li]Rebuild: Rebuilds a surface or curve to the specified number of control points[/li][li]Remove Knot: Removes a control point from a curve or line of control points[/li][li]Set Point: Makes selected points planar[/li][li]SaveMinimal: Doesnā€™t save viewport/rendering mesh . . . rebuilds when file opens[/li][li]IGES Export: So I can inport into 3DS Max.[/li][li]KeyBoard shortcuts: Ability to map functions/tools to keys.[/li][/ul]If they had all of these tools, I would definitely try it out more extensively (model an entire car). I rarely touch any tools othe than the ones listed above.

Pros:
[ul]
[li]Scalable Interface[/li][li]Antialaised (SP?)[/li][li]Semi-Transparent Surfaces (see hidden objects)[/li][li]Runs SMOOTH (so far, havenā€™t tried any heavy models)[/li][li]Can move objects X,Y, or Z in viewport easily.[/li][/ul]Cons:
[ul]
[li]Incomplete . . and . . . thatā€™s it.[/li][/ul]

#11

There is some incorrect information in one of the posts there - one person complained about needing to click the move tool for every single movementā€¦ They donā€™t seem to realize that you can just click and drag on an object to immediately move it around. The move tool on the Transform tab is for doing a precise move with an exact displacement between 2 specific points.
Michael Gibson

ā€¦ so have fun nurbsing :cool:

#12

:eek: NURBS are scaryā€¦

#13

Look that :slight_smile:
MoI + Carrara by Grendel

#14

You ought to send this list to the developer of moi3dā€¦

#15

You ought to send this list to the developer of moi3dā€¦

He canā€™t answer anywhere and program in the same time :slight_smile:
Ps he knows some Rhino3D (he was one of the conceptor of it :rolleyes:

#16

Yes, I agree. Except for Houdini, which has had this feature since at least before Houdini 4.0 (ie. more than 6-7 years ago). Itā€™s not quite as nice though as you have to set it through an environment variable.

#17

And C4D, which has had this featureā€¦ since god knows when. Though there you just get small/medium/large (show icon/text/both) on a per palette basis. Itā€™s not as rare as you might think.

Itā€™s nice that i was wrong about the moveā€¦ but what about scale & rotate, too many clicks, selection sensitivity and just general workflow? Itā€™s still to my mind stuck back in CAD workflows. But like I said thereā€™s every chance that the coder can change this.

#18

Well, as a Max/Maya user I wouldnā€™t know anyway.

Thanks for the info.

#19

I already did & we sent back and forth a few emails. I must say Iā€™m very impressed with how proessional and friendly the developer was in the emails.

Hereā€™s a few notes from the emails (I donā€™t think heā€™ll mind) . . .

[ul]
[li]MOI v1 is not targeted at Advanced users.[/li][li]Focus is easy/fast workflow.[/li][li]Plans on full *.3DM support & copy/paste between MOI & Rhino.[/li][li]Match Surface: Probably a V2 Feature[/li][li]Blend: Will be overhauled before v1 release.[/li][li]Scale: Included in transform tab (I missed it)[/li][li]Rebuild: Probably not in V1 release.[/li][li]Remove Knot: Select a control point on a curve & use delete. Doesnā€™t work with a row of points on a surface though. :([/li][li]Set Point: Evidently there will be some alighn tool . . . interesting.[/li][li]Save Minimal: Itā€™s default in MOI; surfaces can be dynamically rebuilt better and faster.[/li][li]IGES Export: Will be in v1. For the moment you can load models into Rhino and export there.[/li][li]Keyboard Shortcuts: Edit MOI.INI located at ā€œC:\Documents and Settings[user name]\Application Data\Moi\moi.iniā€ and look for a section ā€œ[Shortcut Keys]ā€ & make sure moi is closed. A better interface might come before v1.[/li][/ul]

#20

i dig it!

being a long time Rhinoceros 3d user. since the early beta 1ā€™s

Rhinoceros v4 too!! is going to take out autocad fully now with itā€™s new abilities. i sugest you try it if you can get into the beta testing.