Surfaces

Description

The Surfaces panel provides tools for adjusting the display style within the Automatic Surface Mesh command, for assigning specific target edge lengths on a per-quilt basis, and for specifying which quilts should receive the special mapped treatment.

Display

The Display frame provides tools for adjusting the display style of individual quilts within the Automatic Surface Mesh command. Select a quilt and change its display style to one of five options: Boundaries () , Wireframe () , Flat () , Shaded () , or Hidden Line () . After running the Automatic Surface Mesh command on the Global tab, the newly created domains are also rendered using the same display style as their underlying quilts. For more information about display styles, review the Attributes section of this User Manual.

Resolution

The Resolution frame provides tools for creating, assigning, and deleting resolution filters which allow you to specify target edge lengths on a per-quilt basis.

The first row in the Resolution table shows the Global resolution filter, which contains all quilts by default. The columns of this filter are populated by the settings on the Global tab and cannot be edited nor can this filter be deleted.

The buttons (New, Delete, Add to Selection, , , , and ) and first 4 columns in the table (priority, Set, #, and Name) all function the same as other filters in the Flashpoint toolset. Please refer to the Flashpoint Filters section for more information.

Edit the Pattern column to define a filter pattern containing one or more comma-delimited wildcard patterns. If a filter's pattern list is empty, the filter is disabled. Refer to the Wildcard Pattern Matching section of the Flashpoint Filters page for more information on specifying wildcard patterns.

Edit the Max. Edge Length column to set the desired maximum edge length for the resolution filter. Leaving the Max. Edge Length column empty turns the filter off.

Mapping

The Mapping frame provides tools for creating, assigning, and deleting mapping filters which allow you to specify which quilts receive special mapped meshing treatment.

The Mapping table is similar in structure to the Resolution table discussed above. As before, the first row in the Mapping table shows the Global mapping filter, which contains all quilts by default. The columns of this filter cannot be edited nor can this filter be deleted.

The buttons (New, Delete, Add to Selection, , , , and ) and first 4 columns in the table (priority, Set, #, and Name) all function the same as other filters in the Flashpoint toolset. Please refer to the Flashpoint Filters section for more information.

User-Defined Mapping Filters

Selecting a user-defined filter in the Mapping table brings up a secondary frame with the same name as the selected filter that contains controls for editing the filter definition.

Use the Type pull down list to select the desired mapping filter type from four options:

• Automatic: Determines the suitability of the assigned quilts for mapped meshing based on the default qualification parameters. This is this type for the Global mapping filter, which contains all quilts by default.
   

  Note: Not all quilts are eligible for mapped meshing treatment, which is intended for quilts that represent thin surfaces with 4 boundaries. If you expect a quilt to receive mapped meshing treatment and it does not, you can hover over the domain while in the Automatic Surface Mesh panel to display more information in the probe area of the status bar. For more information about probe messages for mapped meshing treatment, refer to the section on the Mapped Subdivision Ratio parameter in the Advanced frame of the Global tab.

• None: Specifies that no mapped meshing treatment be applied to the assigned quilts.
• Force: Explicitly applies mapped meshing treatment to the assigned quilts, provided that they meet certain criteria. After meshing, the resultant unstructured domains are linked to underlying structured domains to retain their structured appearance. In the situation when mapped meshing fails for a quilt, Thin Surface Interpolation is used instead.
   

  Tip: It is a good idea to go ahead and assign quilts that you want to receive mapped meshing treatment (such as blunt trailing edges) to a mapping filter with the Force type. This produces more consistent results if your settings (and name patterns) are being used across multiple similar geometries and avoids having to re-run the Automatic Surface Mesh command if the Automatic type fails to identify the quilt as a candidate for mapped meshing treatment.

  When Type is set to Force, the Subdivisions parameter appears and can be used to specify the desired number of subdivisions along the short sides of the mapped quilts.

• Thin Surface Interpolation: Applies the Thin Surface Interpolation algorithm to the resultant unstructured domains to give a structured-like appearance without strictly requiring the domain be computationally balanced. For more information on the Thin Surface Interpolation algorithm, see the Algorithm section of this User Manual.

Use the Max. Aspect Ratio parameter to specify the target maximum aspect ratio for the quilts assigned to the filter. By default, the Max. Aspect Ratio is set to the value specified on the Global tab (displayed in gray text for convenience).

Use the Distribution parameter to control the distribution of points along the short sides of the mapped domains. Distribution has two options:

• Automatic: Automatically syncs the clustering of points across both short sides of the mapped surface and also with the clustering on adjacent surfaces. Automatic is the default setting and is the preferred option for thin surfaces that maintain a constant width across their length.
• Equal: Applies an equally spaced distribution of points to each short side of the mapped surface. This option is ideal for thin surfaces that have varying height along their length (such as tapered trailing edges on wings).

Use the Adjacent Boundary Type parameter to control how anisotropic cells are influenced by the mapped surface. Adjacent Boundary Type has two options:

• Automatic: Applies anisotropic clustering on the adjacent surfaces according to the stretching filter settings for the long edges of the mapped surface. Automatic is the default option.
• Adjacent Grid: Applies anisotropic clustering on the adjacent surfaces using a 2D T-Rex Adjacent Grid boundary condition. This option should be chosen whenever the Distribution is set to Equal, since it allows for varying anisotropic cell height along the length of the long edges.

The table at the bottom of the mapping filter's frame displays the set of patterns that determine which quilts are selected by the filter. This filter pattern table functions similarly to other filter pattern tables within the Flashpoint toolset. Please refer to the Filter Pattern Tables and Wildcard Pattern Matching sections on the Flashpoint Filters page for more information on defining filter patterns.

Understanding Why A Surface Doesn't Get Mapped

After the Create Surface Mesh command is finished, hovering the mouse over the domains displays information about whether or not the domain is mapped in the probe area of the Status Bar. Domains that are mapped also display the computed subdivision ratio while domains that are unmapped show information about why it was classified as such. Please click the Mapped Domain Probe Messages button below to view a table showing the possible probe messages that could be displayed as well as their meanings.

Mapped Domain Probe Messages

Demonstration