EVOQE's SolidThinking 6.5

SolidThinking Includes:

A Designers Interface

It is immediately evident that the interface of SolidThinking has been designed for fast, comfortable, and precise work. Not only does the application have clear and self-explanatory icons, but it also provides constant visual feedback in a customizable environment, so there is no hunting for tools or memorizing cryptic terms or names. The application Console guides you through each creation process, prompting you and providing a visual preview of the results. Input in SolidThinking can be either mouse-based by manipulating the HotSpots of each object and tool, or numerically and parametrically controlled through the Modeling Panel that adapts to every situation, but in all cases immediate feedback is provided to insure accurate and expected results.

Interactive Construction Tree

Construction history has been made effortless and fluid. In SolidThinking the Construction Tree immediately updates while you modify objects, points, or parameters. Amplifying the power of all of the tools, you can use it for interactive booleans and surface intersections, real-time mirroring, and curve and surface analysis with continual visual updates. Browse the graphic representation of the Construction Tree to identify and select source objects and actions. Add, remove, or replace source objects within the Tree with immediate reconstruction. Manipulate both the parameters and points of all objects freely. And never forget the steps involved in construction - the entire tree is saved inside the file and is accessible at any time.

Comprehensive Curve Creation

The most complete NURBS curve toolset with parametric controls for all curves, including seamless support for high order (2-7) curves, weighting, analytic circles and arcs, and interactive 'comb plot' curve analysis. Build curves from points using freeform NURBS, continuity controlled MetaCurves, and multi-entity curve objects. Extract complex curves from surface isoparms, edges, silhouettes, and surface intersections. Work fluidly with common construction methods like joining, splitting, blending, and filleting. Edit any type of curve at the point level, and even edit curves in a point-independent method like the bezier-type curve editor, or directly apply any of a suite of deformation tools.

Advanced Surfacing Suite

A true Class-A surfacing environment for the most precise and flexible shape creation and replication available, complete with a suite of surface continuity analysis and maintenance tools. Create surfaces from curves using unlimited rail and profile sets, curve networks, interactive trimming, and boundary curves. Easily transition between surfaces using continuity controlled blend surfaces, variable radius rounds, and extended or joined surfaces. Utilize powerful multi-surface intersection trimming, automatic solids creation, and high-level rebuild and simplification tools. And, as always in SolidThinking, directly manipulate the points of any parametric NURBS surface without breaking construction history.

Integrated Solid Modeling

Enjoy the seamless connection of surfaces and solid geometry in SolidThinking , with the automatic creation, maintenance and manipulation of solid entities, as well as the import and export of BRep solids from other sources. Closure and tolerance analysis tools insure accurate and precise solids, while interactive solid trimming, parametric boolean operators, and shelling and surface offset tools offer complete manipulation for the most demanding solid modeling needs. Unique to SolidThinking is the Make Manifold tool which takes any number of intersecting surfaces and derives a history-linked solid entity from the volume those surfaces enclose, trimming away the excess surfaces.

Interactive Analysis and Examination

To insure the highest quality, manufacturable models, along with accurate representation of the true design intent, a real-time analysis suite is fully integrated into the application. SolidThinking provides continuously updating feedback for examining and modifying all types of geometry, from tolerance and tangency checking with visual markers and highlighting, to an interactive curvature and continuity shading system. For the utmost accuracy, there is high resolution diagnostic shading and rendering, as well as area, volume, and region analysis.

Powerful Reverse Engineering

Whether starting from a physical prototype or bridging the gap between hand sculpting and a digital workflow, SolidThinking provides advanced support for scanned datasets. Integrated, native 3D scanner support, and point cloud import and export provides the tools to get a digital representation in, while point cloud creation and planarization refine the data inside SolidThinking. Curves can be interpolated and fitted to points, and complete NURBS surfaces can be fitted to cloud data using a variety of algorithms.

Polygonal Modeling and Conversion

There is complete control within SolidThinking for the import, export, creation, and editing of polygonal meshes, including support for n-sided polygons, vertex and normal repairs, and point, edge, and face selection and manipulation. The interactive polygonal tessellation engine provides History Tree feedback for the creation of water tight polymeshes at any stage in the design or prototyping process. Interactive Catmull-Clark subdivision surfaces offers the highest level of advanced control for the refinement and smoothing of polygonal geometry as well. Many major polygonal file formats are supported so compatibility with other software is insured.

Intuitive Organization and Management

No matter the complexity or simplicity of a project file in SolidThinking , the hierarchical browser system keeps track of everything. Drag-and-drop simplicity sets the standard for scene organization, and the World Browser supports this intuitive method of organizing for objects, layers, and groups. The History Tree graph illustrates the flow of creation for every object, and allows for easy sub-selections of source objects and actions with OpenGL 'ghosting' to show manipulations to hidden objects. The complete, internal library manager allows for quick access to frequently used models and shaders across all projects.

Complete Rendering and Visualization System

Communicating and evaluating the forms in SolidThinking is quickly achieved with any of the built-in, industry-leading rendering, animation and documentation engines. With unlimited resolution, internal image browser, and support for many standard image file formats including VR and web 3D, image creation can be tailored to any target audience. The fully-integrated renderThinking engine provides a state-of-the-art visualization system with ultra-fast scanline, raytrace, and hybrid radiosity solutions for maximum photorealism, and a multifaceted sketch rendering engine for everything from hand-drawn images to watercolor and oil paint versions of your scene. The keyframe animation system in SolidThinking adds time-based, functional animations of any native or imported geometry, and the full dimensioning and vector plotting system provides easy and accurate communication of engineering-specific data.

Open Architecture

The Plug-Ins Development Kit contains documentation for developers and users that want to create their own modeling tools and rendering plug-ins. Included in PDK are code samples that will furnish a reference guide for your programming.

The latest release of SolidThinking adds innovative new tools for creating and working with curves and surfaces, along with dramatic enhancements to its existing, industry-leading tools. The interface has also been streamlined to make learning and using SolidThinking even easier, and new visual guides have been added to further increase productivity. In total, SolidThinking 6.5. once again advances the standard of CAID modeling in terms of power and usability, while providing a seamless visualization environment to easily analyze and communicate design ideas.

New in SolidThinking 6.5

New MultiSweep

The new MultiSweep modeling tool creates a single, continuous surface by sweeping one or more profile curves along one or more rail curves. (This is similar to the Birail tool, but with an unlimited number of profiles and rails.) This powerful new tool includes options to control the rotation and interpolation of profiles, as well as the overall complexity of the surface. See movie.

New RadialSweep

The new RadialSweep modeling tool creates a single continuous surface by sweeping one or more profile curves between a common rotational point and a control rail curve. This tool includes options to control the rotation and interpolation of profiles, as well as the overall complexity of the surface. See movie.

New Intersect in Construction Tree

The new Intersect CT modeling tool offers a powerful new way to selectively and interactively trim multiple surfaces at their intersections, while maintaining construction history. Any changes to the source objects will be reflected in the Intersect CT object, and the surfaces and faces to split or remove can be manipulated at any time. See movie.

New Multi-processor support for Mac OS X

6.5 adds multi-processor support for Mac OS X versions. Users will see a significant rendering speedup on multiprocessor machines when using the Raytrace rendering method.

Enhanced MetaCurves

The MetaCurve creation tool now offers many powerful options to control the tangency and position of the curve points. These new options include both interactive and precise numeric control over MetaCurve start and end conditions, such as angle, elevation, and tangent length, as well as options for clamping the MetaCurve to any other curve in the scene for tangency and attachment.

Enhanced Mirror

The Mirror tool interface has been redesigned for maximum interactivity, while maintaining the precision and flexibility of earlier versions.

Enhanced Translate

Translate has a new Pivot option useful when you want to Translate an object in reference to a specific point.

Enhanced Round

The Round tool has many new options for controlling the type of surfaces created, as well as interface improvements. These include automatic continuous edge selection, and many new Blend continuity options for G1-G3 rounds with greater control for smoothness and shape.

Patch

The Patch tool now allows you to use multiple surfaces to patch between.

HeightField

HeightField had a new Flip option for changing the orientation of the image map without changing the surface or the image itself.

Enhanced PixelMap

The image-based deformation tool PixelMap has a new Flip option for changing the orientation of the image map without changing the surface or the image itself.

Enhanced Shelling

Improved speed and accuracy particularly when handling analytical surfaces.

Enhanced Solid Offset

Improved speed and accuracy particularly when handling analytical surfaces.

Enhanced User Interface

Streamlined and improved user interface, including new icon arrangements and visual placement and snap cues.

Enhanced IGES, STEP, VDA-FS

Advanced file I/O modules for increased compatibility with external applications.

SolidThinking 6.5 System Requirements:

• Mac OS X
• G3 Power Macintosh or higher
• Graphic accelerator card with at least 16 Mb Video RAM (32 Mb or higher recommended)
• 128 MB RAM (256 or higher recommended)
• 200 MB or more of free hard disk space