There are plenty of times when I am designing in CC and want to show friends or family an idea of what the final product will look like. The single-tone (Pine/MDF/Cherry/etc.) of the current simulation makes this a little difficult, especially if I show it at an angle but the person is not very 3D-oriented.
Would it be possible to make all of the cut areas a different color/tone from the stock material in the simulation? I guess all parts of the 3D stock would be the second color, except for the “shell” of the stock, and would be revealed as the cutting paths are generated. This would be awesome for previews!
It’s on the todo list, but like many features like this, there’s been a deep discussion of how to implement it. The bulk of the discussion comes because we’re looking at making it possible to use more than two colors.
You guys’ discussion about that topic is sure way ahead of me, but what about a generic transfer function that maps cutting depth to color?
Examples of such transfer functions and how to edit them can, for example, be found in the area of medical volume rendering. Here you usually map density values of a CT or MRI scan to opacity and color.
The “Problem/Opportunity” stated above is for a more realistic looking model. I think this could be achieved with just better rendering of the same color. i.e. more realistic light sources.
If I think about using colors, which should be optional, I think about several things that would be useful to identify conditions in the model that you would want to know if you’re going to cut it.
Color by tool would be useful, if there’s a cross-reference to the tool so we know which color goes with which tool. This would make it easier to see what we perceive as flaws, and ID which toolpath is the culprit.
In 3D machining, having the part model imbedded inside the cut simulation with a different color would show us how close we are to our intended objective, and where we have left material (Corners, scallops & deep details)
In the meantime when I want to show a design to anyone I usually export SVG then convert to PNG and open in paint. Utilize paint to fully render my ideas for myself and others, this works for me and the best part is it is all free and simple tu utilize! (Navy Engineer by trait and not computer savvy)