Friday, April 11, 2014

Rhino: Create a few chess pieces

The plan for today is for you to create a few chess pieces.  Basically you use one of the curve tools to draw a profile of the piece (just like we did with the vase/goblet/bowl) and then "Revolve" the piece.  Instructions for the "Revolve" project are still on the board, but here are the basics:
  • Draw a Curve Shape Profile
  • Type Revolve
  • Select the Curve
  • Set the Beginning Angle to "0" (Press Enter)
  • Set the Revolve for "360" (Press Enter)
If you aren't familiar with the shape of chess pieces, here's an example:
You can see that most of the shapes are done by revolving a profile and then using Boolean Difference to cut out a few shapes here and there.  The biggest difficulty that I can see is the Knight (horse).

Here is my creation for a King and a Pawn. You can see my profile drawing and where I set the Axis (in red).  Notice that my profile for the Queen is shown, but I added a Sphere to the top to make it look like a pawn.

There are many styles, sizes, and materials for chess sets so don't feel like you're locked into a specific design.  Here are a few unusual examples:






Note: The hardest piece to do [in my opinion] is the Knight.  I usually revolve the base and then add a shape to the top for the horse... although it doesn't HAVE to be a horse.

Here are some student examples:



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