Cut two seats, then share one claw between two stones

WhereThe top bar: the row of words that begins File, Edit.

DoDownload p3-08-start.blend from Files above and open it. Then choose File > Save As and save it under the name below, in a folder of yours. Open an exercise file and keep the start file safe (P0-07) shows how.

Typemy-seats.blend

You should seeThe 3D view shows a grey plate seen from above and in front, with two small pale round stones side by side in its top. Nothing is selected. The Outliner, the list at the top right of the window, holds the plate and the two stones, and the title bar, the strip above File and Edit, begins my-seats. The first picture is the 3D view and the second is the title bar.

It worked whenThe title bar, the strip above File and Edit, begins my-seats.

WhereThe 3D view: click one stone, then hold Shift and click the other.

DoClick the left stone, then Shift+click the right stone.

You should seeBoth stones have an orange outline. Make Cutters acts on the stones you have selected, and the status bar says “Select one or more gems first” if none is. The second stone’s name ends .001: that is Blender’s number for the second stone, not a width.

It worked whenThe words at the top left of the 3D view end CJ_Gem_Round_3.00x3.001, and both stones are outlined.

WhereThe sidebar. If it is shut, press N with the pointer over the 3D view. In the section bar, click Setting. A list at the top of the section names every panel in words: it is not a button. Under the list stands the open panel Stone Settings: click its title once to fold it, so that the panel titles stand close together (scroll with the wheel, or slide two fingers on a laptop’s touchpad, if you need to). Then click the title of the panel Cutters & Seats, the line with a small arrow beside it.

DoClick Setting in the section bar and open Cutters & Seats.

You should seeThe panel opens on a box of numbers, and under it a picture of the Hole, what is cut under each seat, with the words “Through (azure hole)” below it. A seat is the cut a stone sits in. A cutter is the shape that cuts it. The first picture, Through, drills right through the metal, which a plate 2.4 thick cannot spare. The next step changes it. Leave the numbers in the box as they are.

It worked whenYou can read Seat Size at the top of the panel, and the Hole picture lower down.

WhereThe panel Cutters & Seats: the picture under its box of numbers.

DoClick the picture. A grid of three pictures opens, the first picture below: click the one named Divot (blind).

You should seeThe picture changes to a rounded hole and its words to “Divot (blind)”, and new lines appear: Divot, share of girdle 0.60, Divot Depth (auto), Fit Divots to Metal ticked and Divot Floor 0.40 mm. A divot is a blind hole under the stone’s culet that ends round and never goes through. Divot Floor is the least metal left under it, and 0.40 is the add-on’s own starting number. The second picture shows the panel after the click.

It worked whenThe picture reads “Divot (blind)” and Divot Floor reads 0.40 mm.

WhereThe panel Cutters & Seats, the button Make Cutters. Scroll the sidebar down to it.

DoPress Make Cutters with both stones still selected.

You should seeA line at the foot of the panel: “2 cutters in CJ Cutters”. The status bar says “2 cutters made” and “divots fitted to Plate” for a moment: the add-on measured the plate under each stone and made each divot as deep as the plate allows. In the 3D view each stone now has a wire cage round it: the cutter, which stands partly above the plate’s top with the stone inside it, and partly in the plate. Nothing is cut yet: the plate is untouched. Leave Solver, Keep Modifier and Apply Modifiers First, above the button, as they are.

It worked whenThe line “2 cutters in CJ Cutters” stands at the foot of the panel.

If it goes wrongThe status bar says “Select one or more gems first”: no stone is selected. Click a stone, Shift+click the other, then press Make Cutters again.

WhereThe 3D view: click the plate, away from the stones.

DoClick once on the plate, near a corner.

You should seeThe plate has an orange outline and the stones do not. The wire cages are the cutters. Cut Metal cuts the active object, so the plate must be the one you clicked last. The status bar says “Make the metal object active first” if it is not.

It worked whenThe words at the top left of the 3D view end Plate.

WhereThe panel Cutters & Seats, the button Cut Metal, under Make Cutters.

DoPress Cut Metal.

You should seeThe status bar says “Cut 2 seats” and ends “result manifold”: the plate is cut and is still one closed solid. The cutters are still there. Each stone now stands in a round seat, a pit cut in the plate under it, which the stone hides from above.

It worked whenThe plate is outlined in orange, and the status bar line, which fades, begins “Cut 2 seats”.

If it goes wrongThe status bar says “Make the metal object active first”: the plate is not the active object. Click it in the 3D view, then press Cut Metal again.

WhereThe panel Cutters & Seats, the button Show / Hide, at the right of the row of three buttons under Cut Metal.

DoPress Show / Hide.

You should seeThe status bar says “2 cutters hidden” for a moment. A cutter is a working shape and never part of the piece, so it is hidden now that its seat is cut. Pressing the button again shows them, and they are still in the file. The picture shows the two seats the cutters made, a round pit for each stone and a thin wall of metal between them: it hides the stones for the picture only. To look into a seat on your own plate, click a stone, press H to hide it, and press Alt+H to bring it back.

It worked whenThe status bar says “2 cutters hidden”, and the line “2 cutters in CJ Cutters” still stands at the foot of the panel.

WhereThe 3D view.

DoLook at the picture, which is the plate cut through the middle of both stones and seen from the front.

You should seeUnder each stone a round-ended divot that goes down past the stone’s culet, and under it a band of metal 0.40 mm thick down to the plate’s underside. The divot stops short of the underside: the add-on keeps at least 0.40, Divot Floor, under it. Nothing goes through the plate.

It worked whenDivot Floor still reads 0.40 mm on the panel: the least metal the add-on leaves under a divot.

WhereThe section bar, Setting. Fold the panel Cutters & Seats by clicking its title once, then open the panel Claws, the line with a small arrow beside it, and scroll down to the box Place Claws settings at its foot. Stone Settings stays folded.

DoFold Cutters & Seats, open Claws and scroll down to Place Claws settings.

You should seeThe box with its lines: Style (Pave claw, a small round pin, or Setting claw), Diameter 0.50 mm, Snap (Gap, Shared, Girdle, Free), Height (Over table or Fixed) with Over table 0.30 mm, and Bite 0.10 mm. Bite is how far the claw covers the stone’s girdle: this box has its own Bite, apart from the one on the Claws panel in P3-07. A claw this small is a pave claw, a small pin. Pave is a way of setting many small stones close together (P3-05).

It worked whenYou can read Diameter, Snap and Over table.

WhereThe box Place Claws settings: the Snap row, then two fields.

DoPress Shared in the Snap row. Then, for each field in the table, click the middle of it once, type the number and press Enter.

You should seeSnap shows Shared and a line under it reads “Clicks into a shared corner”. Diameter reads 0.45 mm and Over table reads 1.00 mm. A claw that holds one stone may be 0.35 at the bench, and one that two stones share 0.45. The Standards Check’s own least for a claw is 0.60, and its message says so. Over table 1.00 is the number this page uses for stones this small: the 2.00 of Give a stone claws, then change them (P3-07) was for a Round 5.00, and the setter trims the height at the bench either way. The panel drops the zeros of 1.00 and shows 1 mm.

It worked whenSnap is on Shared, Diameter reads 0.45 and Over table reads 1.00.

WhereThe 3D view. Move the pointer off the sidebar and into the dark area, then over the plate, at the place marked in the picture, just off the line between the two stones. The plate must still be the active object.

DoPress Alt+C with the pointer at the marked place, then leave the pointer still.

You should seeA small claw in green at the corner between the stones, touching both. Place Claws has started and runs until you press Enter. The status bar reads “Pave claw 0.45 mm | top 1.00 over table | Shared: corner, bite 0.10 OK” and then lists its keys: the keys stay on the status bar while the tool runs. OK and the green colour mean the claw covers both girdles by the bite. Amber means weak, and red means the claw reaches towards a table.

It worked whenA green claw stands at the corner between the stones, and the tool is running.

If it goes wrongNothing starts: the pointer is still over the sidebar. Move it over the 3D view and press Alt+C again.

If it goes wrongThe status bar says “No surface under the mouse”: the pointer is off the plate. Move it onto the plate, near the marked place.

WhereThe 3D view: the pointer stays where it is.

DoClick once with the left button, then press Enter.

You should seeA real claw where you clicked, standing between the two stones, and the green preview is gone. Enter ends Place Claws and the status bar says “Placed 1 claw(s)”, but the message fades. The claw is a separate object: the Outliner has a row for it under CJ Settings, apart from the plate and the stones. Diameter 0.45 is the claw’s widest part, low down at its foot: at the stones’ tables it is 0.36 across and a little under its tip 0.26, because this pin narrows towards the tip. The claws of P3-07, with Taper, degrees at 0.0, keep one diameter all the way up.

It worked whenOne claw stands between the two stones and Place Claws has ended.

WhereThe 3D view.

DoLook at the picture. To see your pair like this, click a stone, choose View > Frame Selected, then orbit a little, turning the view round the plate.

You should seeTwo stones, each in its own round seat, and one thin claw at the corner where they meet, taller than the stones’ tables by 1.00 mm and 0.45 mm thick. The seats were cut first, so the claw is whole.

It worked whenYou see two stones in seats and one claw between them.

WhereThe 3D view: move the pointer over it.

DoPress Ctrl+S.

You should seeBlender writes your copy at once, with no question, because the file already has a name. An asterisk, *, in the title bar marks changes that are not saved, and it goes now. Save your work and get it back (P0-12) says more about saving.

It worked whenThe title bar begins my-seats and carries no asterisk.