Lutz,

Interestingly enough, you don't really need to do a whole lot in Moray
for a planar slice.  Duplicate the object and add CSG Intersection with
a plane (inverted on one side of course).

The hard part is clearly getting a good wireframe representation.  The
simple way is to simply clip all lines in each half against the plane
(really easy).  This will tend to leave gaps in the wireframe
representation.  The hard way is to make a mesh based CSG routine and
invoke it to build the wireframe (remember, it doesn't need to be
tremendously high fidelity - the modelling representation is just an
approximation to the final result).

WRT doing it the hard way, I have mesh based CSG in the renderer part of
the anim plugin.   [It does fail in some cases, but is better than
nothing.]  Perhaps you could use a code donation?

Xander

Lutz Kretzschmar wrote:
> 
> Hi Kelly, you recently wrote in moray.win:
> 
> > There are two features that would help speed up modeling significantly. The
> > first, as I've mentioned, is running object snap modes.
> Agreed, and that is one of the features on the list. We just haven't
> found a good way to implement it.
> 
> > The other feature is what I call slicing. If you could add the ability to
> > simply slice any primitive along any 2D plane, breaking it into two separate
> > entities, this would be quite handy for modeling.
> > .... way to turn primitives into more complex entities outside of the
> > CSG method ...
> > .... Adding slicing along curved surfaces would facilitate fillets and
> > chamfers. Adding slicing along any bezier patch, if even possible,
> > could add some interesting capability.
> > .....
> > expanding the extrude entity by allowing extruding of the 2D outline
> > along a 3D line/spline path, or the edge of a primitive or entity?
> All these things are well suited to a triangle based modeller, a
> modeller that works with meshes. It is very difficult (if at all
> possible) to make solid geometry modeller (like Moray) do this.
> That said, we are thinking of providing more triangle-based modelling,
> especially in light of the next POV-Ray being able to handle
> UV-mapping.
> 
> - Lutz
>   email : lut### [at] stmuccom
>   Web   : http://www.stmuc.com/moray

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