Automated A.I. vector graphics export from Grasshopper3d

If you spend 12 or more hours on an airplane travelling somewhere, it’s time to write something on your blog.

 

I had to provide a sequence of transformations for a design at work, that could be easily manipulated by a graphic designer (change line-weights, color etc). So instead of exporting the typical raster image format from the slider animate, I wrote a small C# routine that enable to export any GH created Curve/line/ 1 dimensional object to a native Adobe illustrator file.

Parameters include: incremental export, layer name, directory to save and file name. I trust that many people will find this code snippet quite useful, as I have encountered many times this wish for vector graphics export instead of flattened images.

Please find the code and an example at the usual page.

Enjoy,

M.

Ps. SourceCode below:

 private void RunScript(List<Curve> curves, int series, string name, string layername, string filepath, bool execute)
 {

 #region Authorship
 //[Aytomated AI Export] was written by Marios Tsiliakos on 06 / 11 / 2014 in grasshopper 0.9.0076
 //This definition is for the pubic domain feel free to use it , share it and modify it, by providing proper citing. The author, Marios Tsiliakos of digitalsubstance.wordpress.com , makes no warranty, expressed or implied, as to the usefulness of the software and documentation for any purpose.If this tool is used for commercial purposes please notify the author. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0
 //for more information visit digitalsubstance.wordpress.com.
 #endregion

 if (!execute)return;

 else
 {
 //check
 for (int i = 0; i < curves.Count;i++){
 if ((curves.Count == 0) || (curves[i] == null))
 {
 Print("No curves or valid curves provided");
 return;
 }
 }
 //create alist of guids
 List<Guid> mycurves = new List<Guid>();
 // layer to bake the objects to
 create_layer(layername);
 //create a directory to store the ai files
 create_dir(filepath);

 for(int i = 0; i < curves.Count; i++){
 //declare the objects attributes
 Rhino.DocObjects.ObjectAttributes attr = new Rhino.DocObjects.ObjectAttributes();
 //set attributes
 attr.LayerIndex = doc.Layers.Find(layername, true);

 Guid id = Guid.Empty;

 //bake the curves
 if(curves[i].ObjectType == Rhino.DocObjects.ObjectType.Curve)
 {
 id = doc.Objects.AddCurve((Curve) curves[i], attr);
 }

 // add the curves to the mycurve_guid list
 if(id.ToString().Length > 0) mycurves.Add(id);
 }
 // select the curves in Rhino to successfully export them
 for(int i = 0; i < mycurves.Count; i++)
 {
 doc.Objects.Select(mycurves[i], true);
 }
 //where to save
 string save_directory = filepath + ("\\" + name) + series.ToString("0000") + ".ai";
 //and export them
 Rhino.RhinoApp.RunScript("-_Export\n\"" + save_directory + "\"\n _Enter", false);
 //delete the curves after exporting them
 for(int i = 0; i < mycurves.Count; i++) doc.Objects.Delete(mycurves[i], true);