By Giorgio Gurioli
Modeling with T-Splines,
Grasshopper, and Rhino www.guriolidesign.it
In this simple tutorial we
will model these modular
chaise lounge cushions
using T-Splines, Grass-
hopper, and Rhino.
The purpose of the tuto-
rial is to show that these
programs can all be used
together in the design
process.
T-Splines is used to cre-
ate an organic look for
the cushions.
Grasshopper is used for
its parametric and gen-
erative capabilities to ar-
ray the modules and up-
date them in real-time as
we make changes.
! Page 1
First, create a surface from Rhino with six control Next, edit the control points of the surface so it Type Grasshopper in the Rhino command line to
points in both the U and V directions. Then, create takes the shape of a chaise lounge chair. load the Grasshopper program.
a T-spline box (tsBox) with one face in the x, y, For information on installing and using Grasshop-
and z directions. per, visit www.grasshopper3d.com.
I have previously created a file, gh+ts.ghs, which Click the right mouse button on the Srf icon to Click with the right mouse button on the Geo win-
appears below. The links between parameters and open the menu window, left click on Set One sur- dow to pop up a menu, click Set One geometry
components are telling us that we have a surface face, select the surface in Rhino, and it will turn and select the T-Splines box, which also turns red.
on which is perched a repeated series of geome- red.
try made with T-splines.
! Page 2
Immediately you will get a modular repetition You can decide the number of modules in the U By running the srf_divide_box command, you can
(based on the value in the slider) of the T-Splines and V directions via the sliders. preview where these boxes will be placed in the
box across the surface. geometry; to hide the boxes, just disable the pre-
view (right click on the component and check pre-
view).
When we extrude a face from the T-spline box, the Similarly, we can create a hole in the T-spline. The result is immediately updated in the rest of
extrusion is updated across the array in real time. the scene.
! Page 3
Right click on Morph, then select Bake to turn the Returning to Grasshopper, heres some examples
T-spline into NURBS polysurfaces. of how changing the values of the sliders will give
us other solutions.
Alternate design. Also, we can modify the surface by editing control
points of the NURBS, and the T-spline surfaces
will adapt to the changes (due to component
Morph).
! Page 4