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G-Code, CAD, and CAM discussions / Load Point Clouds into AutoCAD
« on: February 09, 2007, 08:16:09 PM »
I'm writing an AutoCAD macro to import point clouds, due to popular demand on the yahoo group. From what I gather, there are 2 types of point clouds created by mach3. One from the digitize wizard, and one from the digitize plugin.
After a few hours of re-learning how to write macros
, I can now load the point cloud into AutoCAD. And then I have a slight dilemma.
The digitize plugin outputs a file of points in rows. This is very easy to work with, and I should have a macro to output 3D faces tonight or in the morning.
The plugin, however, is a bit trickier. It probes in a spiral pattern. I don't know if the spiral is always uniform, and the same direction. If it is, I think that I can figue out a way to create the faces. If it's not uniform, then I'm not so sure. I'd appreciate some sample files created with the plugin if anyone has any.
Just to make sure I was reading the points correctly, I drew a 3D polyline through the points. Here's a screen shot of the prop that Art scanned. 23,335 points.
After a few hours of re-learning how to write macros
, I can now load the point cloud into AutoCAD. And then I have a slight dilemma. The digitize plugin outputs a file of points in rows. This is very easy to work with, and I should have a macro to output 3D faces tonight or in the morning.
The plugin, however, is a bit trickier. It probes in a spiral pattern. I don't know if the spiral is always uniform, and the same direction. If it is, I think that I can figue out a way to create the faces. If it's not uniform, then I'm not so sure. I'd appreciate some sample files created with the plugin if anyone has any.
Just to make sure I was reading the points correctly, I drew a 3D polyline through the points. Here's a screen shot of the prop that Art scanned. 23,335 points.