Smash

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Surface Tools	Surface > Surface Flattening > Smash Double-Curved Surface

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Smash Double-Curved Surface

The Smash command flattens a surface without restriction to single-directional curvature.

Note

Makes an approximate 2-D development of surfaces that have compound curvature.
This command can be used to deal with fabrics that have a certain amount of flexibility and stretch.
The Smash command is a modified version of the UnrollSrf command. With UnrollSrf, the surface has to be linear in one direction to unroll, and with the Smash command it does not.
Since it is not possible to flatten a double-curved object (like a half a coconut shell) to get a paper pattern, the answer is always inaccurate to some degree. This command is useful if the object you are flattening is not extremely curved and you want to make the pattern out of a stretchy material like rubber.

Steps

Select surfaces or polysurfaces.
Select curves, text dots, or points on the surface.

Command-line options

Explode

Yes

The resulting surfaces are not joined.

No

The resulting surfaces are joined along the same edges that were joined in the original polysurface.

Labels

Determines whether or not matching numbered dots are placed on the edges of the selected object and the resulting objects.

KeepProperties

Determines whether or not the selected object's properties are copied to the resulting object.

LinearDirection

Specifies which surface isocurves are treated as straight lines when flattening the surface.

Natural

Automatically determines whether the U or the V isocurves are treated as straight. RelativeTolerance is used to decide if a direction can be considered linear. If both directions qualify, the straighter one is used. If neither direction qualifies, the surface cannot be flattened.

U

Treats the isocurves at constant U as straight lines, so the surface is flattened as straight along its V direction.

V

Treats the isocurves at constant V as straight lines, so the surface is flattened as straight along its U direction.

On a developable surface such as a cylinder, all three LinearDirection values produce the same result.

RelativeTolerance

When LinearDirection=Natural, this tolerance is used to decide if a direction can be considered linear. It is how far an isocurve may bend away from a straight line, as a fraction of its length; smaller values are stricter. A value of 1.0 allows most free-form surfaces to be flattened. It has no effect when LinearDirection is U or V.