Part II: Building Intelligence into Your Parts
reflects off of the surface. The same principle applies when evaluating solid or surface models. Bad
transitions appear as a crease or an unwanted bulge or indentation. The goal is to turn off the edge
display and not be able to identify where the edge is between surfaces for the transition to be as
smooth as if the whole area were made from a single surface.Zebra StripesZebra Stripes can be activated one of two ways, by choosing View ➪ Display ➪ Zebra Stripes from
the menus, or by clicking a toolbar button on the View toolbar. Zebra Stripes place the part in a
room that is either spherical or cubic, where the walls are painted with alternating black-and-white
stripes (although you can change the colors and the spacing of the stripes). The part is made to be
perfectly reflective, and the way that the stripes transition over edges tells you something about the
qualities of the faces on either side of the edge. Four conditions are of particular interest:
l (^) c0 = faces contact at edge
l c1 = faces are tangent at edge
l (^) c2 = curvature of each face is equal at the edge and the transition is smooth
l c3 = rate of change of curvature of each face is equal at the edge
The Zebra Stripes tool can only help you identify c0, c1, and c2, and only subjectively. This feature
is of most value between complex faces. Figure 11.9 illustrates how the Zebra Stripes tool shows
the differences between these three conditions.
Notice how on the Contact-only model, the Zebra Stripe lines do not line up across the edge. On
the Tangent example, the stripes line up across the edges, but the stripes themselves are not
smooth. On the Curvature Continuous example, the stripes are smooth across the edges. The part
shown in Figure 11.9 is a surface model, and can be found on the CD-ROM with the filename
Chapter 11 Zebra Stripes.sldprt.
Tip
You should rotate the model a lot when you are using the Zebra Stripes tool. Changing the density of the lines
can also help, as can increasing the image quality (Tools ➪ Options ➪ Document Properties ➪ Image Quality).
Turning off the edge display may also help. n
RealView
RealView Graphics display is only available to users with certain types of video cards. To see
whether your card supports RealView, consult the SolidWorks Web site.
RealView causes reflections that can be used in a way similar to the reflections in Zebra Stripes.
Rotate the part slowly and watch how the reflections flow across edges. Instead of black and white
stripes, it uses the reflective background that is applied as part of the RealView Scene.