- [Instructor] Here I wanna talk about Offset Curve in Face.
It is located under Derived Curves inside of the Gallery.
So we'll go in, Offset Curve in Face.
First, define the type.
I want to use a constant offset.
Next, you define the curve.
So we'll come down, pick my curve.
Next, you define the Face or Plane,
in this case, I'm gonna pick this surface.
Once I have that surface selected, you'll notice
it goes and offsets that curve along that surface.
You'll also notice that the curve does not technically
go to the edge boundaries of the surface,
but the offset does.
What's happening is under the Trim and Extend Offset Curves,
you'll see it is extending to the face edges.
So if I turn that off, that is basically
the true length of that curve on that surface.
I can turn that on, and it extends it out.
So really great tool if you need that curve
to extend on out, I do use this.
It's saved me so many times, just because
now I don't have to build or stack additional commands
to get that curve to go to those edges.
Next, the distance along the surface
can be determined by various options.
If I look at this right now,
I'm just gonna leave it at Normal to Curve.
And for my Offset Method, it's set to Chordal.
Basically if I string a line from this point straight over,
that's my distance, it's measuring basically
a straight line from point to point.
If I change this and say Arc Length, or Geodesic,
they're very similar, in this case I'll use Arc Length.
You'll notice that it basically comes back a little bit.
Because the curvature of the surface, in this case,
is driving the distance.
So what it's doing is instead of going from point to point,
it's going along the surface curvature.
This is important in places like Aerospace world,
where I need a specific amount, or a specific length
along a surface for the strength of the joint,
or when I'm running my stress, I wanna make sure
that I have enough land on that surface
when I put holes in it, whatever that may be.
So it's typically going to be measured along a surface,
rather than a distance straight across.
So that's where something like that's very useful.
I also have the ability, we come up to the top here,
to go through a point, so if I have a
specific point location on the surface I wanted to hit,
I can use that.
And then also, I have the ability to do variable offsets.
Right now it's just set to Constant,
but I can change that and say Linear.
And the way this works is I have a distance at one end,
distance at the other end.
And what I want you to notice with this
is the distance as measured isn't at the end,
or edge, where it comes to the face.
It's basically from the point
as it would be offset at that distance.
So that's why these handles are somewhere in the middle,
not necessarily at the very ends.
So just to note, some people look at that,
think it's a little awkward, but it's because
if I turn this off, that extend,
you'll see that's right where those little handles appear.
One more thing with the trimming options,
let me go ahead and come up to the curve.
What I'm gonna do is I'm gonna go ahead and deselect it.
And this time, instead of Tangent Curves,
I'm gonna use Face Edges.
So I'm gonna just simply pick that face,
change this to Constant, come down here, let's do that.
Go back to Face, and lemme back this up a little bit,
that's why I'm getting some odd results.
So I'll back that up a little bit,
and you can see I picked the entire face,
I'm offsetting all of those edges in that distance.
And it's trimming up everything nicely.
If I want to, I can turn off those trims
and have those curves run out to the very ends.
Or again, if you want that frame, you can simply do that.
I also have the ability to put on a fillet.
So if I want to, I can just say a Best Fit,
and say Trim to Each Other,
let me put a larger fillet in on there,
so you can actually see it.
And now you can see those corners
are actually trimmed up nicely with a radius.
So this is great as far as being able to take edge curves,
offset them along that surface.
Now you can get a perfect perimeter,
maybe you're doing a cutout, you're punching something out.
Again, maybe you need to have a row of holes
that need to be a specific distance away from an edge.
And now you have basically, what would be the center line
for that pattern of holes running around that surface.