Hey @inno,
I imagine it could be desirable to orient the numbers to take account of a wood grain direction. Can OpenNest cater easily for that instead of just fitting them whichever way takes least space?
Regards
Jeremy
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oh yes, you are absolutely right 
the “rotations” parameter accounts exactly for that, and means the slices of 360 degrees by which a given curve can be rotated
I guess the perfect number for that would be 2, which means either no rotation or 180°?
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Maybe you can use bounding rectangle around every number and than use OpenNest to distribute the rectangles.
I think OpenNest have an option to group shapes.
Thanks for all your input and evolving GH file Inno. The nesting is looking good. Jeremy, you are correct about the wood grain direction. Most of the numbers are currently cut with a laser and they can be nearly touching, let’s say 1mm or 1/16" apart. I am looking forward to understanding GH and apps like OpenNest. Japhy at Rhino tech support said Petras, who created OpenNest, is active with the forum. Maybe we can get his input.
How can I see a circle around the numbers on the GH image? That will help with designing the overall face.
Thought you would enjoy seeing where these clocks will be made. Monica and I got a great lease on a 6,000 sq. ft. warehouse in Sellersburg IN and have been transforming part of it to be a studio. The truck has been our shop which houses the CNC router. This region is hardwood heaven so we have been collecting pallets of great hardwood that normally would be disposed of. Please come and visit!
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Neat stuff. Of course, have you checked out ‘gearotic’ by Art Fenerty, author of Mach3 CNC controller. Generates curves which can be imported into Rhino; specifically for clockmakers
Thanks for your note Mark. So far I am making everything but the movement. Check out a little YouTube site by Kevin Nolan, the CEO of GE Appliances - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKbO8Kjfk-LhQ2YAP5HhZfQ. He makes all the parts from scratch. Nice guy and really into the details.
I have received about 200 fonts so far from the designer - who has well over 600. I have been bringing them into Rhino as outlines. Placing them into the rectangles will be incredibly tedious. It would be wonderful if this step could be automated! Adjustments to the number kerning (10, 11, 12) can be made after this process, correct?
are the fonts literally .ttf files? or are they Rhino curves? could you please post an example file?
The fonts I have been sent are .otf files. Unless I am mistaken, there are only two ways to bring a font into Rhino - as a Text Object, which makes it an outline or as Text Block in the Dimension menu, which keeps it as a font. I cannot attach a font file so you will need to use a .otf file on your computer or download this free font from MyFonts.com which I used for this example… Is this _nest file the most complete GH file?
Clock_numbers_nest.gh (13.4 KB)
Naftera Display Solid Font | Webfont & Desktop | MyFonts
ForumFontTest.3dm (264.3 KB)
this uses the plugin Fennec: once you have a given Font installed in your machine, then it should be already available inside the GH definition (if you install a font while the GH definition is running, then it might not appear in the list until you completely restart Rhino, not sure about that)
there are for sure other plugins that can handle text with any fonts, I picked Fennec just because I like the plugin very much
Clock_numbers_nest_Font_selection.gh (28.1 KB)
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Inno, this is astounding and beautiful. Thanks. Can’t wait to get it working on my computer. When I tried to install the new GH file this showed up.
What do I need to install?
I think it’s better to confirm in which Rhino version you are (I’ve just noticed Fennec is for V7 only)
I am using Rhino7.
good, then you just need to go on foo4rhino and log-in to download the plugin Fennec (see link on my previous reply)
Fennec plugin comes as a ZIP file containing a folder full of components: after you download it the first think you need to do is → right click on the zip file → choose “properties” → (bottom right) check the “unblock” box → click OK
after that you can unzip the FENNEC folder to your GH Libraries folder:
C:\Users<yourUserName>\AppData\Roaming\grasshopper\Libraries\
restart Rhino and GH if they were open, and it should work
thanks. Will try right now.
It is working!! The small rectangles are no longer part of the process, correct? Now to get familiar with the controls. Thanks to Seghier for Fennec!
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So, you created Fennec? Thanks. Can’t wait to get all the systems working and create real examples.
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Is it possible to have the radius be fractions of numbers, not just whole integers? There needs to be more subtle control of that detail.
Right click the slider and change from integer to double.
Thanks! That was a challenge. : )