Clipping and sectioning are essential tasks in Rhino for highlighting specific parts of your design or creating detailed documentation. Rhino offers powerful tools that allow you to manage sections and clipped views efficiently. In this guide, we explore a workflow using the SectionTools plugin (now called Clipping Section) to streamline your Rhino 8 or later projects.
1. Creating Clipping Sections in Rhino 8
Clipping and sectioning in Rhino can be enhanced with section styles, which let you customize line weights, hatching patterns, and other visual elements to match your design aesthetic. By learning how to work with section styles, you can generate professional-looking section views that communicate your design intent clearly.
Download the model set, unzip it into a folder, and open the files to follow along. A PDF handout is also available for more detailed instructions.
2. Understanding the Clipping Plane Widget
The Clipping Plane Widget is a key tool for controlling and adjusting clipping sections interactively. It allows you to manipulate the position, orientation, and depth of your clipping planes for precise control over which parts of the model are visible.
3. Setting and Managing Clipped Views
The SaveClippingSectionViews command lets you save the current views of selected clipping sections to the Named Views panel. This is useful for quickly revisiting specific section configurations without having to manually adjust the clipping planes each time.
4. Extracting Nested Sections and Vector Drawings
For fabrication or detailed documentation, the NestedClippingDrawing command projects object sections from 3D space onto the World XY-plane on the current layer. You can specify spacing and arrangement for the output, creating static snapshots that do not update with subsequent changes to sections. This workflow is particularly useful for laser cutting and other digital fabrication processes.
By combining Rhino’s robust clipping and sectioning tools with the SectionTools plugin, you can streamline your workflow, produce detailed views, and prepare files for documentation or fabrication efficiently. Try these techniques in your next Rhino project to see how they enhance both presentation and production.
CREDITS
Masterclass by Rajaa Issa
