I use Rhino 7 and I’m far from good at it, but I do love it. I’m having difficulty doing one particular thing that is essential to my work in designing water slides.
Is there a way to draw curves on the X/Y plane that, as you draw, will slope up or down in the z axis at a specific slope?
I know you can make a surface and slope it and draw on it but that is in one direction and I just feel it would be easier to draw a line or arc that is already constrained to a certain number of degrees (on z axis) so when you complete your chain of curves (drawing on X/Y in any direction) you can move around it in 3d and the beginning of the curve is higher or lower than the end of the curve and no matter how many twists turns or changes in direction, the curve is like a road going up or downhill.
Is this possible? If not - would anyone be interested in making a plugin that will make it possible? I’m hoping something this simple has already been thought of and I just dont know how to do it!
because the angle from the last point to the next would have to be recalculated for every point you make to keep it steady in your angle, that might be a bit tricky having this in a dynamic setup might work with a script or with grasshopper, but what makes that even more challenging is when you have different acceleration regions how are you going to solve that?
for a steady slope what you can do otherwise if you are not doing it that way anyway:
draw your first flat curve from above on a plan or on a satellite image or similar
measure your curve with the command length draw a line with the result and draw the hypotenuse with your angle for your slope. activate history and use flow with option stretch to flow the hypotenuse over your initial planar curve.
with history enable you initial curve and your angle can be adapted and the flowed result will update.
Not exactly what you are looking.
Use Flow
Draw x-y path.
Draw a line with the desired gradient. Line needs to be longer than the x-y path.
Draw a horizontal line starting at the lower end of the sloped line. Line needs to be longer than the x-y path.
Flow command
Object to be flowed - sloped line. Select near the lower end.
Base curve - horizontal line under the sloped. Select near the lower end of the sloped line.
Check Flow options. Need Rigid=No Stretch=No PreserveStructure=No
Target curve - x-y path. Select near the lower end.
Sloped line will flow around the x-y path.
To trim the excesspart of the flowed curve.
Trim command with ApparentIntersections=Yes
Cutting objects - Select the x-y curve.
Objects to trim - Select the overhanging portion of the flowed curve.