i.materialise Rhino design challenge

McNeel Europe and i.materialise announce a 3D Printing Design Challenge with over $1000 in prizes.

We will be looking at people who show the power of Rhino and 3D printing in their designs, at designers and artists that can make “Future Forms Today.” We will consider the originality and presentation of the design and will also take into account if you maximize the power of 3D printing in your product. So is your product customizable? Or can your product only be built with 3D printing? We will also look if you got the most out of Rhino plug-ins like Grasshopper, T-Splines, RhinoGold, etc. in your design.

Details...

RhinoParametrics 1.3

RhinoParametrics 1.3 has been announced. This new version includes a series of new functions and many bug fixes.

Details and download...

Thea Render for Rhino

Thea Render is a state-of-the-art biased/unbiased renderer with a rich set of innovative features, a powerful material system and its own advanced studio, all-in-one. A plugin that connects Rhino with Thea Render as an external rendering application is also available.

Check also this article about Thea Render for Rhino by Beppe Barone and Riccardo Gigante.

Rhino 5 OS X - Second WIP release

The second Work In Progress (WIP) build of Rhinoceros 5 for OS X is now available.  This Mac build is up to date with the 2010-12-07 Windows build.  There is a new Windows WIP releases every week or so and an updated Mac Rhino WIP will be released shortly after each Windows release. 

You can download the Wenatchee 5 2010-12-13 build.

The Mac V5 Rhino version supports 64-bit Intel, 32-bit Intel, and 32-bit PowerPC architectures. This Mac version will automatically run in 64-bit mode on Core 2 Duo Intel processors or later, so running out of memory should no longer be a problem. It requires OS X 10.5 (Leopard) or later.

Rhino OS X now also has most of the V5 improvements that are in the Windows version, such as:

• better stability
• many command enhancements
• faster drawing speeds
• display enhancements
• new commands
• new editing tools such as gumball

This build has many bug fixes and minor enhancements.

Everyone is invited to download and use the OS X version of Rhino while it is in development.

Most of the core functionality has been ported from Windows and is very stable. There is still much to do to port the rest of the functionality and refine the interface.

We don't expect the first commercial release to be ready until next year. Don't worry if the build you are using is about to expire. New versions will be available every week or so. There will be a newer one available before the expiration date.

Details and download...

SectionTools plug-in for Rhino 5 WIP

A new release of SectionTools plug-in is now available with the latest Rhino 5 WIP of December 14, 2010. You can find download instructions and documentation at SectionTools Wiki page.

SectionTools is a dynamic sectioning plugin from RhinoLabs to help generate and update 3D sections and their 2D layouts. The plug-in has editing, viewing and reporting tools to effectively manage big set of sections.

In this release:

• Added new command "stEditSections" to edit sectioning options such as solid mode, direction and attributes. stEditSectionHatch and stSectionDir are now part of the new command.
• Combined "stView", "stSetCPlaneToSection" and "stSetViewToSection" into one new command “stViewSections”. You can now “Clip”, “SetView” and “SetCPlane” all in one step.
  
• Added support for persistent options to stCreate, stCreateArray and stViewSections commands.
  
• Fixed a bug when flipping section direction.
  
• 2D Layout now outputs curves, solids and hatched to 3 different sub-layers. This will help assign different layer attributes to each one.
  
• Made it more reliable to view section curves, surfaces and hatches.
  
• Fixed CPlane alignment bug.
  
• Added a new item to "SolidMode" option in stCreate and stCreateArray commands. It allows adding both hatches and surfaces at the same time.
  
• Added enhancements to stMoveSections command. Dragging sections' now gives real-time feedback of intersections and section clipping plane location.
  
• When creating sections, selecting objects is now a separate step from options. This way it will be possible to preselect objects and change options.
  
• Fixed duplicate 2D layout bug.
  
• Enhanced reporting output.
  
• Fixed a crash bug when saving as V4 then open in V5.
  
• Many other minor bug fixes.
  
• Added nine new short clips and updated toolbars and help manual.
  

Rhino 5 OS X - First WIP release

The first Work In Progress (WIP) build of Rhinoceros 5 for OS X is now available.  This Mac build is up to date with the 2010-12-07 Windows build.  There is a new Windows WIP releases every week or so and an updated Mac Rhino WIP will be released shortly after each Windows release. 

You can download the Wenatchee 5 2010-12-08 build.

The Mac V5 Rhino version supports 64-bit Intel, 32-bit Intel, and 32-bit PowerPC architectures. This Mac version will automatically run in 64-bit mode on Core 2 Duo Intel processors or later, so running out of memory should no longer be a problem. It requires OS X 10.5 (Leopard) or later.

Rhino OS X now also has most of the V5 improvements that are in the Windows version, such as:

• better stability
• many command enhancements
• faster drawing speeds
• display enhancements
• new commands
• new editing tools such as gumball

Everyone is invited to download and use the OS X version of Rhino while it is in development.

Most of the core functionality has been ported from Windows and is very stable. There is still much to do to port the rest of the functionality and refine the interface.

We don't expect the first commercial release to be ready until next year. Don't worry if the build you are using is about to expire. New versions will be available every week or so. There will be a newer one available before the expiration date.

Details and download...