SectionTools plugin allows you to create dynamic sections and drawings to support modeling, drafting and fabrication workflows. SectionTools is now fully integrated into Rhino 8 for Windows and Mac and it has been updated to take advantage of the many new clipping and sectioning features in Rhino 8 such as Section Styles and Selective Clipping.
The following is a description of different SectionTools commands and workflows, and how they integrate into Rhino 8.
Clipping Sections: Create, View and Edit
Rhino 8 introduces a new command to create clipping planes called ClippingSections that is geared towards drafting and sectioning workflows. It helps select sectioned objects, set sections orientation, name, label and also save to Named Views for easy access in modeling and Layout spaces.
- SectionTools commands are located in the drafting toolbar and the menu under Drafting->Sections.
- The ClippingSections is the main section creation command. It creates clipping planes that cut through selected objects (or all objects). It has options to set the direction, depth, name prefix, label and saving to named views.
- Clipping planes properties such as name, depth and label and which views to clip can edited directly from the clipping plane property panel. You can also update which objects and layers to include or exclude from clipping.
- The clipping plane widget has been updated in Rhino 8 to indicate the up and normal viewing directions. The widget includes a dot or text label of the clipping plane name. The grip points of the widget are used to change the location and depth of the clipping plane. End grip points help scale the widget size.
- Sections geometry (curves, fill and hatches) is visible only when the view is actively clipped. Clipped views update dynamically when transforming the clipping plane, changing objects properties or editing the model. If you need to the 3d sections geometry (regardless whether the view is clipped or not) you can extract in-place using ExtractClippingSections and ExtractClippingSlices commands, and you can enable History if you need the geometry to update with model changes.
- Sections can be copied, deleted and transformed using the clipping plane object of the section, and regular Rhino commands. Coping a section that is saved to named views, creates a new named view for all copies. Deleting a section, also deletes the associated named view and the drawings layers of that section.
Fabrication: Extract 3D and 2D Clipping Geometry
Rhino 8 supports extracting curves, hatches, surfaces and slices of clipping planes for modeling and fabrication. Use ExtractClippingSections command to extract curves and hatches in place and ExtractClippingSlices to extract surfaces and slices in-place. Both these command support history. You can also use NestedClippingDrawing command to generate sections curves that are projected and nested on World xy-plane with tags which can be used in laser cutting workflows.
Dynamic 2D Drawings: Create, Edit and Export
Rhino 8 supports creating drawings of sections and elevations of clipping planes that update with model changes. The drawings are projections of clipping planes’ views on the XY-Plane. Use ClippingDrawings to create the drawings. The geometry is organized in layers to control visibility in modeling and layout. Drawings dynamically update when editing the associated clipping plane. You can also use UpdateClippingDrawings command to reflect model updates such as adding and removing objects from the model, or changing their properties.
Use EditClippingDrawings command to edit the 2D drawings properties such as grip point, label visibility, placement point, background and projection. You can also exporting the 2D drawings to 3dm and dwg files using ExportClippingDrawings command.
Sections: from 3D Model to 2D Layout:
Rhino 8 introduces a number of new features that enhance the flow between 3D modeling space to 2D layout paper space when it comes to sectioning data extracted from clipping planes. The following present two workflows.
1) Use Clipped Views in Layout
Create clipping planes for section, plans and elevations, then save to named views using SaveClippingSectionViews command with Clip=Yes option. Reference the saved named view from a detail in layout. You can set the depth of the clipping plane to zero to view the section without the background geometry.
2) Reference Drawings in Layout
You can generate dynamic drawings of clipping planes sections, plans and elevation and their background geometry, and place on the Work XY-Plane using ClippingDrawings command. You can then reference the drawing in layout from the Top view. The section geometry is organized in layers that you can turn on and off in layout. It is now possible to turn off layers in model space, and keep on in layout. This helps viewing the drawings in layout only.
Notes:
- Files created with SectionTools in Rhino7 should load correctly, however section hint and layers will be updated to use the new layer organization and features in Rhino 8, so please make backups of your files before loading into Rhino 8.
- SectionTools commands in Rhino 8 will work with clipping planes created using the ClippingPlane command. For example, it is possible to using any clipping plane to extract 2D drawings and save to named views.
