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2005-06-14 - Research Triangle Park, NC, USA: Product customization technology company Raindrop Geomagic has implemented major new advances in its Geomagic Studio 8 which it says significantly speed patch layout and improve surface quality for complex CAD models.
The latest version of Raindrop Geomagic's reverse-engineering software has proven to reduce NURBS surfacing time for complex objects such as engine and transmission housings by as much as 80 percent. Geomagic Studio is used by manufacturers worldwide for automated reconstruction of CAD models from scanned physical parts, mass production of individualized medical devices, and build-to-order manufacturing.
New techniques in Geomagic Studio 8 automatically detect contours and regions to preserve critical fillets and transitions.
"The new technologies in Geomagic Studio 8 should enable us to create high-quality NURBS surfaces for complex parts in about one third the time it currently takes," says Joe Casale, co-owner of Perfect Fit Plastics and a reverse-engineering consultant. "It is fantastic at automatically setting up boundaries, which is currently a time-consuming and tedious manual process."
Surfacing advances in Geomagic Studio 8 were developed in conjunction with a major automotive manufacturer that has used the technologies in commercial production for more than a year.
Raindrop Geomagic put forward the following advantages for the latest version of Geomagic Studio 8 over other commercial software:
* An intuitive workflow for generating functional NURBS surfaces containing fillets and primary surfaces with tight tolerances and smoothness; with minimal training, even novices can begin producing results similar to the experts.
* Powerful feature detection and segmentation that saves time and enables companies to reduce labor costs and increase throughput.
* Patch optimization that helps users create accurate surface models for downstream CAD/CAM operations, engineering analysis, product prototyping, and NC machining.
* New adaptive surface fitting that requires less memory and speeds processing time without sacrificing quality.
Geomagic Studio 8 provides a fully automated method for detecting contours that partition the mesh and indicate where highly curved feature surfaces - such as fillets or free-form steps - are located. Sensitivity of the detection can be adjusted, and the regions can be refined interactively by the user.
The system automatically extends contour lines to create a patch structure in which the transitional surfaces are clearly separated from the larger, relatively flat regions. This aligns the layout in an optimized manner, which is necessary for high-quality NURBS surface fitting. Patch layout is computed automatically, and can be changed according to user preferences.
Using the patch layout oriented by contours, a new adaptive surface fitting procedure in Geomagic Studio 8 gives users the ability to specify a tolerance level and the software assigns the smallest number of necessary NURBS control points. The new procedure optimizes the number of control points, shortens processing time, and creates much lighter models. Surface quality is said to be also significantly improved due to the separation of large regions and highly curved areas, and special fitting procedures.
"Geomagic Studio 8 represents the first critical step in providing an automated process for generating CAD structures and high-quality surfaces from point clouds," says Ping Fu, Raindrop Geomagic's president and CEO. "We will build on these advances to make an increasingly greater impact on companies looking to achieve major productivity improvements."
Other new features in Geomagic Studio 8 include constrained global registration using photogrammetry targets, improved noise reduction without degrading features, new decimation techniques that improve performance and triangle quality, user interface improvements, and other general enhancements across all modules.
Geomagic Studio 8 will be available early this summer in multiple languages through Raindrop Geomagic and its worldwide distribution channel. The software includes extensive visual documentation, including videos that guide users through processes. It is supported both online and by native-language speakers in most regions of the world.
