Software to rotate DXF and save out view?

[telmnstr]

Anyone know of a Windows, OS X or Linux/UNIX app that is somewhat lightweight at rotating DXF data and saving the view?

I'm trying to export from the free Google Sketchup application and saving as DXF. I'm using ILD-SOS to convert it into LSX data. The problem is Google Sketchup won't let you export a view without jumping to the $500 version. Literally none of the other features of the pro version are a care to me.

Laserboy seemed to get me sort of there, but zooming in and out didn't seem to happen and I was mostly stumbling into rotations.

Many of the viewers I found that would run under XP only save to raster formats.

Anyone have a solution off the top of their head?

I'm going to try a Wacom for drawing, but want to convert some stuff from the 3d warehouse to test. I don't expect results like the 3dsmax plugin as surfaces won't clip?

I also tried the svg output plugin for sketchup but it didn't seem to work well.

[colouredmirrorball]

Blender? I haven't looked into it much yet, but I believe there might be a solution there. I don't know if it is capable of projecting objects on a plane out of the box, but maybe somebody made a plugin? Might be worth investigating.

[kecked]

just draw in cad or 3dsmax. There are a ton of shareware converters out there that are under $100.00 IF you just have a few frames I'll do it for you.

[james]

Laserboy seemed to get me sort of there, but zooming in and out didn't seem to happen and I was mostly stumbling into rotations.

Can you describe what you want a bit more accurately? Maybe LaserBoy can do what you want. If it doesn't do it already, maybe I can add some new feature.

Maybe provide an example.

James.

[telmnstr]

Oh hey James!

Basically, I'm just trying to turn stuff from Google sketchup into laser frames.

There are large libraries of 3d objects in a .skp format. Google sketchup has a free version, but it can't export a view. When you export you get one specific view which is normally totally top down.

The exported dxf from sketchup is indeed a 3d object, but setting it up properly to turn into ILDA frame requires rotating it and then converting to ILDA. ILD-SOS can convert DXF to ILDA but with the exported frames top down only, it's a flat object that isn't a 3d model in ILDA format (When I only had low end tools I always thought ILDA 4.x was 3d objects but I think I'm way wrong.)

I think laserboy is close. Load DXF file with object, rotate to a position (and zoom out), then export as ILDA?

I was thinking about it this morning and perhaps just tracing things with illustrator or inkscape or LSX or whatever is the way to go.

But the more tools available to make stuff the better!

I keep listening to songs trying to think of shows to put to them. On the way back from SELEM 2012 Cfavreau and I had long discussion about all sorts of show ideas -- but trying to break from clipart that matches key words in songs is tough.

[colouredmirrorball]

Ild Sôs actually produces a 3D ilda frame from a DXF file, but you need to make sure that Optimisation is disabled, otherwise it will produce a 2D image!

The lines that are normally hidden behind surfaces are still there, but in LSX you can use Z-clipping to hide those as a quick way to get slightly better output.

[james]

ILDA sections 0 and 4 are 3D.

But that doesn't really matter so much. You can import 3D DXF into LaserBoy and zoom out the 'camera' (so to speak), then rotate to camera for the correct view.

You need to do the zoom-out and apply that view to the art, then rotate and apply that to the art in separate steps. It's best to do the zoom-out first to be sure the rotate fits inside the limits of the cube of defined 3D space.

Once you have the whole frame set the right size and rotation, you can save it however you want. You can do a best match to the default palette and save it as 3D ILDA format 0 or you can flatten Z and save it as 2D format 1. Or you can skip the color reduction and save it as 3D format 4 or flatten it to save it as 2D format 5.

Check out menu x for switch settings that determine DXF imports and ILDA format outputs.

James.

[telmnstr]

Awwwww Yea! Sweet - I'll try this tonight or tomorrow!!!

Thanks James & coloredmirrorball!

Super thanks!

[james]

Show us a nice example!

[telmnstr]

Sorry I haven't made any shows yet. Still tweaking the projector. Alignment is such a beast.

I did play briefly with taking a sketchup model and running it into 3d object and it mostly worked.

I've been thinking up some LSX show ideas. Got some ideas in mind for some songs.