Create Contours

Introduction
A contour is a line of constant value on a two-dimensional (though not necessarily planar) surface. The
region on one side of the line is larger than the isovalue; the region on the other side is less than the
isovalue. EnSight creates contour lines in groups where the isovalues either correspond to the levels in
the palette defined for the contour variable, or a user specified range and. The contour lines can also
be labeled with the corresponding palette value.

Basic Operation
1. Select the parent part.

2. Click the Contours icon.

3. Select the Variable to use.

Release 2020 R1 - © ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. - Contains proprietary and confidential information
of ANSYS, Inc. and its subsidiaries and affiliates. 1
Create Contours

4. Click the Create with selected parts button.

The Contour Feature Panel lets you set the number of contour levels (and sublevels) as well as attach
labels to the contour lines. Contour lines can be synced to the palette levels or can be chosen manually.

If You Want Contour Lines for Each Level of the Palette

In the Parts list, double-click the contour part you wish to edit.

Release 2020 R1 - © ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. - Contains proprietary and confidential information
2 of ANSYS, Inc. and its subsidiaries and affiliates.
 Basic Operation

Release 2020 R1 - © ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. - Contains proprietary and confidential information
of ANSYS, Inc. and its subsidiaries and affiliates. 3
Create Contours

1. Select Advanced.

2. Select the Variable and the component or magnitude if a vector.

3. Toggle on Sync To Palette.

4. Select the number of sublevels desired (if any). And make sure Visible toggles are set as desired.

See Edit Color Palettes for how to set the color palette levels.

See Edit Color Palettes for how to set the color palette levels.

If You Want to Set the Contour Line Ranges

In the Parts list, double-click the contour part you wish to edit.

Release 2020 R1 - © ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. - Contains proprietary and confidential information
4 of ANSYS, Inc. and its subsidiaries and affiliates.
 Basic Operation

Release 2020 R1 - © ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. - Contains proprietary and confidential information
of ANSYS, Inc. and its subsidiaries and affiliates. 5
Create Contours

1. Select Advanced.

2. Select the Variable and the component or magnitude if a vector.

3. Toggle off Sync To Palette.

4. Specify the Min and Max Range.

5. Specify the Distribution for the Range.

6. Specify the number of Levels and Sublevels.

Release 2020 R1 - © ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. - Contains proprietary and confidential information
6 of ANSYS, Inc. and its subsidiaries and affiliates.
 Basic Operation

If You Want to Place Labels on the Contour Lines

In the Parts list, double-click the contour part you wish to edit.

1. Select Advanced.

2. Auto labels will create a label on each main contour loop with a spacing as specified.

Custom labels: Right-clicking

3. Toggle on or off the visibility of the custom created contour labels.

Release 2020 R1 - © ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. - Contains proprietary and confidential information
of ANSYS, Inc. and its subsidiaries and affiliates. 7
Create Contours

4. Custom labels can be created by right clicking on a contour loop and choosing Label → Add to Add a label.

5. You can also remove any label by right mouse clicking on the label and choosing the Label → Delete this
one option.

Label formatting

6. You can control the label orientation, format (linear, log, or quadratic), size, and spacing.

Shortcut
1. Right click on a part in the Parts list or in the graphics window.

2. In the resulting pulldown, choose Contour.

3. A window will pop up to choose a variable.

4. This then automatically creates a contour part with the default settings using the selected variable and
using the right-clicked part as the parent part.

Release 2020 R1 - © ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. - Contains proprietary and confidential information
8 of ANSYS, Inc. and its subsidiaries and affiliates.
 See Also

Advanced Usage
When Sync To Palette is specified, the levels of the variable palette are used as the contour levels. You
must edit the palette using the Feature Panel for Variables to modify the number of levels, etc. See
Edit Color Palettes (p. ?) for guidance.

Other Notes
The default behavior is to color the contour part by the creation variable. If you toggle this off, the
contour part will not be colored by a variable automatically, but will be white.

Unlike most part creation operators, contours are created from the client's representation of the part -
not the server's. If the parent part of the contour consists of one-dimensional elements or has no client-
side visual representation at all, the resulting contour will be empty. This would be the case if the parent
part was currently displayed as feature angle, border representation, or not loaded. The 3D border, 2D
full representation is typically used for contour part parents. See Change the Visual Representation for
more information.

See Also
Introduction to Part Creation, Edit Color Palettes

User Manual: Contour Parts

Release 2020 R1 - © ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. - Contains proprietary and confidential information
of ANSYS, Inc. and its subsidiaries and affiliates. 9
 Release 2020 R1 - © ANSYS, Inc. All rights reserved. - Contains proprietary and confidential information
10 of ANSYS, Inc. and its subsidiaries and affiliates.