Hi everyone,

A lot of our customers asked us if there is way to share the results of topology and shape optimization without sharing the actual ODB?

The answer is yes!  You can save the results of topology and shape optimization as a VRML animation in Abaqus/Viewer. Here is how you do it:

In this example we will create an animation for the field output ‘normalized material property’ (MAT_PROP_NORMALIZED).

Once the optimization process is complete open the merged odb (*_post.odb) in Abaqus/Viewer.

Switch to the step ‘ATOM OPTIMIZATION’ and select the field output ‘MAT_PROP_NORMALIZED’ from the field output toolbar.

Animate the results for this step by selecting Animate->Time History from the main menu.

If the frame rate is too fast you can reduce it in the Animations Options dialog box.

 From main menu select Animate->Save As.

Change the Format to VRML and click OK.

Now you can open the animation in any VRML player such as Cortona:

http://www.cortona3d.com/Products/Viewer/Cortona-3D-Viewer.aspx

This is how the animation looks like in Cortona:

 For more details on the field output MAT_PROP_NORMALIZED please refer section 4.2.1 of Abaqus Analysis User’s Manual for release 6.12-1 (Abaqus/Standard output variable identifiers, Structural optimization variables, MAT_PROP_NORMALIZED)