- [Instructor] Here we're going to talk about
the Line Function.
You can get the Exercise File from the download
or you select F1 on a keyboard,
if you have the help documentations,
and download that file and use that file,
either way, you'll get the exact same file.
So, for me, I'll just open the one
that I have on my machine.
Now, I'm going to select the Line Function
and the first type of line
that I want to talk about is Point-Point.
Here we have a couple of points,
select from Point One to Point Two
and again, you want to be very careful
how you pick those points.
The start point means something,
the endpoint means something, they form a vector,
so if I select the start point
and endpoint in reverse,
it'll reverse the vector
and if you're doing revolves and extrudes,
you want to be very consistent
with how you pick your points
in order to form the same vector every time.
Now, you'll notice down at the bottom, I have Length Type.
By default, it should be Length
and you can change the lengths if you want.
You have Infinite Start, Infinite altogether,
or just Infinite End.
If I go into Length, I can also do a mirrored extent,
so whatever happens to one end,
happens to the other end.
I also have the capability of specifying a Support.
I'm going to select this surface
and you'll notice that the line
basically projects down onto that surface,
and if I make the line a little longer,
you'll notice here at this end,
I'll just go to 120 and preview that,
it will eventually fall off
and just trims the line back to the edge of the surface.
Works just fine.
Cancel, let me go back into Line Function.
Next is Point and Direction.
With Point and Direction,
you're specifying your start point.
What direction do you want to go in?
I can pick a line element that's already created
or
you can specify a plane
and it'll give you the plane Normal.
Once again, I have my Infinite Start points and so on,
so if I just leave it at Length
and Mirrored Extent, start and endpoints are equal.
Go back into Line Function.
Next is what's called Angle Normal to Curve.
With this, you need your curve.
Once you have your curve specified,
if you have a non-plane or curve,
you need to pick a Support Plane,
but if you have a plane or curve, as I have one in here,
it automatically selects the plane or the curve
and then I need to specify a point.
What point do I want to go on that curve,
so in this case, I'm just going to right mouse click
and I'll just say Create Midpoint.
Create my midpoint
and on that plane that was selected to us,
or for us, by default,
at that point, I now have a line at whatever angle I desire.
If I go down to zero or 180,
that line is tangent to that curve at that point.
Again, my start and my endpoints,
drag those out, place them wherever I want.
I can this Normal to Curve
and as you can see, it is now perpendicular
to that curve at that point.
My angle, by default, just goes to 90.
Go back into Line.
Next is Tangent to Curve.
I'll go over here, have a couple of circles set up.
I'm going to pick my first curve
and since I'm tangent,
where do I want to be tangent to on that curve?
I'll just select this endpoint.
You'll notice that I am now tangent at that endpoint.
If I pick a different point down here, tangent there.
Currently I have it set to Mono-Tangent,
meaning it's tangent to one curve at
whatever point you specify.
If I change this to Bi-Tangent,
it's going to come back and ask me
for a different element for Element 2.
That error message is indicating
that it can't create a bi-tangent curve to a point,
so for Element 2, I'm going to pick this curve.
So, here you can see multiple solutions.
This solution that I want is the one in orange,
so in this case, I have several solutions
and the reason why that is,
is because this can be tangent in all
of these various locations.
I can either pick it out on the screen
or I can shuffle through these solutions.
Once I get the one that I want,
select OK, there's my curve.
Go back into Line.
Normal to Surface.
Pick my surface, pick a point,
pretty straight-forward,
so now that line is normal to the surface at that point.
Go back into Line.
We have what's called Bisecting
and for Bisecting, this is just going to allow you
to pick two non-parallel curves
and as you can see, I get a little error message.
The little error message is indicating
that I have no intersection of those curves,
so the two non-parallel curves have
to reside on a plane.
So, I'm just going to cancel out of that,
I'm going to go in, I'm going to draw another line on
Angle Normal to Curve,
we'll go to that curve, Support's the same.
Once again, I'll just say Midpoint
so they start at the same location,
change my angle,
select OK.
Now that I have my planar non-parallel curves,
I can come in, go into Bisecting,
select line number one, select line number two,
and once again, you're going to have multiple solutions.
Those solutions are based off
of the quadrant that you want.
In this case, just the two.
I can say Next Solution
and the one, again, in orange is the one
that'll be kept.
Select OK and there's my Bisecting curve.