Anyone tinkered with T-Splines?
I would love a review as to whether or not its worth investing some time into.
looks very interesting…?
I played with a demo. I found it complex to use, but it looks like it may be worth it . Demo ran out before I got anything meaningful out of it.
I have recently looked into it, and it does look fairly promising for more organic shapes. I believe it also builds to C2 continuity. The interface looks like a pain to learn though. Menu’s do not seem very intuitive, and I think the learning curve may be steep if no one around is familiar with it. Here is a video to a webinar so you can see how it works a little better: NOVEDGE : The Largest Selection of 3D Design Software and Solutions
Greetings all,
I’m an authorized tsplines trainer and daily user of Tsplines in my design consultancy (http://www.theoutside.biz). I want to offer some thoughts-
Tsplines is a great, battle-tested tool. We use it here everyday, and keep finding more and more uses for it- It has hacked DAYS out of our production schedules and has proven to be truly useful.
It is a totally different way of modeling than a typical NURBS work flow, and can be a bit baffling if you have never done any sub-d or polygon modeling. (As it was in my case) That said, once you get the concept of how it works, it is EXTREMELY easy, and fast to make shapes you couldn’t previously dream of.
The interface is very minimal, far fewer tools to learn than most programs. However there is a legitimate conceptual learning curve to modeling this way. You can’t just put your NURBS hat on and go.
Check out the tutorials page, http://www.tsplines.com/store/tstutorials.html there are a ton there, and more going up all the time- There is a new version in the works, and it has some incredible new features, with more goodness coming that I can’t talk about …yet… 
As far as pricing, there is a free trial, and if you decide to purchase, remember…it’s a TON of modeling power for less than a seat of photoshop!
grab the trial, and check out a few tutorials to start, especially the iron, the hand, and the knife…
very best regards,
Kyle Houchens
http://www.theoutside.biz
Kyle,
I have Rhino, am an ID student, and am still new to Rhino (haven’t used it in a while), have dabble in it for school projects and made fun simple shapes, but why is TSplines so different? I heard about the push and pull features T splines offers, but doesn’t Rhino have that capability already? I forget. If you click on the control points you desire in Rhino, and pull on them, doesn’t it do similar to what T Splines does? Maybe not. As I said, I haven’t used Rhino in a while. And can you explain, in a nutshell in terms a newbie can understand, why Rhino work better with TSplines? Thanks Kyle! I might want to get the educational version of TSplines if convinced enough.
T-Splines allows you to create a NURBS model using SubD techniques. In essence, you model with a polygonal cage, creating a lightweight faceted model, which is then smoothed. So it’s totally different to modeling with common NURBS tools, with its pros and cons. The main modeling difference between it and a SubD modeler is that the model doesn’t need to consist of quads on curved surfaces. This means the mesh can be kept lighter. There are lots of T-Splines videos to check out.
You might be getting confused with the Solidworks version of T-Splines (TS Elements), which doesn’t allow you to model, but simply to push and pull the imported T-Splines surface about.