Overview

The Synthesis Field Exporter is a standalone application available in Autodesk Inventor to export fields into Synthesis. Although the Field Exporter is primarily used for internal use, this tutorial will walk you through the steps to export your field.

Applications

The Synthesis Field Exporter can be a valuable tool for teams seeking to enter the new Game Design Challenge for the 2021 FRC Season. Using the exporter teams can take their field designs from Inventor and convert them into glTF files to be used in the Synthesis Engine or other 3D viewers. Once loaded into Synthesis teams can test their field designs and game elements using sample robots.

Requirements

To get started, you will need to have Synthesis 4.3.3.1 and Autodesk Inventor installed as listed in the previous step.

Installing Synthesis

To install the Standalone Field Exporter, you will need to make sure you have selected the "Field Exporter" checkbox in the Synthesis 4.3.3.1 Setup.

After completing the installation, the Synthesis Field Exporter will create a shortcut to your Desktop. Note that before running the exporter, you will first need to open a CAD file in Inventor.

Running the Exporter

Before running the exporter, begin by opening your CAD file in Inventor.

  1. Open Inventor in Administrator mode by right-clicking on the Inventor icon and selecting "Run as Administrator."
  2. Open your designated CAD file through "File" → "Open". From here you can select any STEP, STP, Inventor, Fusion, and many other file types. Note: If you are using a SolidWorks model, you can import your design into Inventor and follow the prompts to convert it to an Inventor model.
  3. Return back to your desktop to open the Synthesis Field Exporter by double-clicking on the Field Exporter icon.

  1. A pop-up will appear with your open field assembly.
  2. Select your assembly and press "OK".
  3. Now the field exporter configuration window is made available.

We will primarily work on the Property Sets tab to configure our custom field properties in the next section.

In this section, we will prepare our field CAD model in Autodesk Inventor so our model is ready for the Synthesis Field Exporter.

Pre-Check

Before you get started, verify that your CAD model assembly is ready to export. In order to export specific attributes of your field, some elements in your field may need to be moved to the top-level assembly of your model.

What is the top-level assembly? The top-level assembly is the "parent" assembly which is used to manage the parts and sub-assemblies within it. This is particularly common with large assembly management.

Example Top-Level Assembly: FRC 2020 Field.iam

In this FRC 2020 Field.iam, we can see a list of parts and assemblies that are at the top-level, including the green highlighted assembly as shown in the image.

Here are some common parts and assemblies to include in your top-level assembly:

Floors and Walls

Game Specific Structures

Gamepieces or Dynamic Objects

Moving Field Properties to the Top-Level Assembly

Sometimes when you utilize a CAD model or STEP file, there are nested objects (e.g. the Power Cell balls are nested in this structure.) To correct that, you will need to open the assembly and drag that object to the top-level assembly:

  1. Click on the "+" icon on your assembly.

  1. Once you identify the parts you need to move to your top-level assembly, hold CTRL + Click on each object

  1. Now drag these items to the top-level (recall our top-level assembly in this example is called FRC 2020 Field.iam)

You will want to repeat this process for any elements on your field that your robot will interact with (don't forget about the floors and walls too.)

Creating Field Properties

It can be helpful to think of your field in sections. This makes it easier to configure various properties relating to the meshes that make up the 3D CAD model. Let's take a look at this field.

This field has a few different sections: floors and walls, gamepieces, and goals. Now that we have different sections of our fields, we will want to think of them in ways we can configure their 3D properties. For example, the floors and walls are "box-like" whereas these gamepieces are spherical. Here are some common properties that people configure for their fields:

Creating Property Sets

To begin, click on the "Property Sets" tab in the Synthesis Field Exporter. There will be no property sets created yet so you can begin by clicking on the "Create" button in the center.

Floors and Walls

The first property set we are going to create are static floors and walls.

Once you give your property set a name, hit "OK". Next, click the "Select in Inventor" button. Click and select all the floors and walls in your top-level assembly. For this field, we will be selecting all the floors and walls (including the red and blue alliance wall.)

Back in the Synthesis Field Exporter, click on "Add Selection".

Those selected objects should now be populated in the Synthesis Field Exporter. Note that on the right hand side, there are various property options. For the static floors and walls, we can leave it as default (Collider Type: Box, Friction: 50/100).

Gamepieces or Dynamic Objects

Next we will be setting some properties for dynamic objects, like gamepieces.

Once you give your property set a name, hit "OK". Next, click the "Select in Inventor" button. Click and select all the gamepieces that are of a similar type. In this example, we will be creating a property set for all the spherical gamepieces and name them "Power Cells".

Back in the Synthesis Field Exporter window, click "Add Selection."

In the Property Set Options, we will need to assign some attributes for the Mesh Properties and Physical Properties:

Because we are working with dynamic objects, be sure to also check the "Dynamic" box and configure your dynamic properties:

Goals

Let's create one last property set for our goals.

Select the red and blue alliance goals in Inventor.

Back in the Synthesis Field Exporter window, click "Add Selection".

Since we are working with a Mesh Collider, we will need to update our Property Set options:

Troubleshooting

If you have accidentally assigned an object in Inventor to two property sets in the Synthesis Field Exporter, you will be prompted to move it to your most recently created property set. You can either confirm or cancel your move.

Exporting Tab

In the "Export" tab of the Synthesis Field Exporter, click the "Browse" button to locate the C:\Users\YourUserName\AppData\Roaming\Autodesk\Synthesis\Fields\ directory. In this directory, create a new folder with the name for your new field. Then, click the "Export" button to complete the export process.

Opening in Synthesis

After exporting your custom field or environment, you can launch Synthesis to open your field. Once you are running synthesis, you can click on the "Change Field" button which will open a menu of available fields.

Click on the field you would like to open then press "Change." It may take a few minutes for your field to load.

You have now completed the Synthesis Field Exporter tutorial.