How is EnSight Uniquely Suited to FLOW-3D Data?

July 5, 2011

figure 1. FLOW-3D model of Dam visualized with EnSight If you would like to know how CEI’s EnSight offers you more power than other post-processors in the market. Consider your needs, and review the partial list of features below, several which are unique to EnSight. The first step is getting your data into FLOW-3D. Direct FLOW-3D Data Reader EnSight reads directly the “flsgrf” FLOW-3D results files, and the compressed “.flz” files. Other options include particle tracks, ghost element handling, time control and reading STL geometry (see separate section on this).

figure 2. Left: FLOW-3D data reader dialog figure 3. Right: FLOW-3D data reader format options tab.

FLOW-3D Data Reading Wizard The FLOW-3D reader wizard is an excellent way for FLOW-3D users to access EnSight. The wizard performs several operations automatically according to the user preferences so that the first few normal steps in looking at your FLOW-3D data are done automatically for you. The wizard can be expanded to include more capabilities, either by CEI or by the FLOW-3D customer. See this screencast on using the Wizard. http://www.ensight.com/screencasts/FLOW-3D_wizard/FLOW-3D_wizard.html

Volume Rendering

figure 4. Volume Rendering of a FLOW-3D model of Casting Process

Volume Rendering is useful for peering inside the 3D domain and is particularly useful for looking at complex 3D fluxes like temperature, density, velocity, and pressure. Volume Rendering is standard technology used in Medical Imaging like MRI, Seismic data processing in oil & gas exploration, and 3D weather and climate research. EnSight is unique in bringing this visualization technology to general CFD such as FLOW-3D and making it available to structured (IJK indexed) or unstructured CFD data. EnSight is unique in offering Volume Rendering among the most common CFD post-processing packages.

STL geometry loading EnSight’s FLOW-3D reader looks in the dataset for additional model geometry stored in the STL format. Examples include the ship in the swamping simulation shown below.

figure 5. ship geometry in a FLOW-3D model with the ship overturning In FLOW-3D, STLs are loaded simply by checking the ‘STL’ box. In EnSight simply check the “read internal STL” checkbox to bring in the geometry stored in the FLOW-3D data. EnSight can also bring in external STL geometry or even CAD files from CATIA, SolidWorks, NX, and more through direct CAD readers.

Reading Data on Remote Servers EnSight is quite well known for its ability to load data on remote servers. It does this in an intelligent and efficient way by providing a separate server application which can be run on your remote server where the CFD data is computed and you can connect to that from your local desktop where you run EnSight’s main or client application. This is easily done using terminal windows if you are used to such things. But if you are more comfortable in a GUI dialog, use the “Remote Server” utility to make a connection from your desktop to a remote server. Any computer platform can connect to any other computer platform.

figure 6. The “Remote Server” user-defined tool. This icon will bring up the following dialog which remembers your previous settings and with your password makes a connection to the remote server. It is so easy and convenient. And you are now leveraging the large memory and power of the server and the interactivity and graphics of your local desktop. Only EnSight makes this so simple.

figure 7. The “Remote Server” dialog for loading data on remote machines, the

recommended way for large data. MP Parallel FLOW-3D/MP Data reading EnSight can now read the data from parallel runs of FLOW-3D, the FLOW-3D/MP option. Since EnSight has been reading large parallel CFD datasets for over 10 years, it has the capacity to read and efficiently handle these large datasets. Case Comparisons Have you ever wanted to read in multiple FLOW-3D datasets and compare them? With EnSight you can load up to 16 datasets. You can copy variables from one dataset over to the other and perform calculations like differences, even if the meshes don’t match up for example in meshing studies. There is no extra cost to do this and you don’t have to buy another product or version, it is included in EnSight Standard.

figure 8. Comparing two different gating designs for a casting.

Wide Variety of Free 3D Viewer Options How can you share simulation results with colleagues, customers, and management? Images are one way, movies provide the transient dimension, but the ideal way is with a 3D viewer which also handles transient results. EnSight does not expect that everyone would like the same 3D viewer. EnSight provides this 3D model sharing capability in several different file formats compatible with several different 3D viewers.

- TeamCenter JT (including iPads) - VRML - X3D - EnLiten - Reveal - Other (export your data in any format you like)

EnLiten provides WYSIWYG 3D model sharing. For customers requiring international language support or custom features we have CEI’s Reveal 3D viewer. EnLiten and Reveal are available on Windows, Linux, and Mac platforms, so that everyone on the team can share results. And both are free. Stereo Display Both EnLiten and Reveal from CEI provide stereoscopic viewing using the new 3D goggles and screens from nVidia, as shown below.

figure 9. EnLiten viewer showing a model in stereo.

Python scripting There’s nothing like having unlimited expansion capability and the ability to make things work exactly the way you want them to. CEI includes Python scripting and tools like command language to python automatic conversion so you can do an operation in EnSight and get out clean efficient Python code for creating parameterized, standard scripts to save you time and effort on large, repetitive projects. Easy to use for transient data Every version of EnSight has natural and convenient support for transient data. In fact many customers coming from other 3rd party post-processors come to EnSight for this capability. Want to see a different time step, just click the Forward button, backwards one step, use the backward button. EnSight doesn’t load all the data when you load a transient dataset, that’s crazy for large models and will swamp your computer or tie up all the resources of your computer. Instead EnSight uses the concept of streaming of your FLOW-3D results data, freezing at whatever time step is of interest to you. Just like Netflix movie streaming. It is the only logical way to handle large transient data with the minimum of computing resources. And we’ve done it that way since day one.

figure 10. Manipulating time is easy in EnSight, like using a media player.

Again, a major reason people leave some other post-processor for EnSight is because of EnSight’s excellent support for large transient models.

figure 11. Transient models like this FLOW-3D fuel tank are no more challenge

than static models. EnSight streams the data.

Support for Very Large Models Another top reason to use EnSight is excellent support for large models. EnSight has been 64-bit since before 2001. We are a spin off from the supercomputer company Cray. And we read the data that is computed on the world’s largest supercomputers. In addition to streaming the transient data and having a client-server architecture for loading data from remote servers, as mentioned elsewhere, EnSight is packed with additional tweaks and features making it suitable for very large models. How large? Back in 2004 we were loading datasets of 12 Billion cells, that’s 12,000,000,000 cells. Flexible Viewports EnSight provides the very flexible concept of Viewports for viewing your data. Allowing you to see the big picture in one viewport and zoom into an area to see details in another viewport. Different parts can be visible, the viewports can be seamless as shown below, or very distinctly separated, with unique backgrounds.

figure 12. FLOW-3D model of casting with the experimental data on the lower right viewport and the complete shape in the simulation in the upper right

viewport. Solution time is shown in the main viewport gauge.

figure 13. Viewports can be blended smoothly as in this figure.

Textures EnSight is unique in providing texture mapping technology in the CFD post-processing market. Texture maps allow for decals, realist material surfaces, aerial photos over construction models, and advanced engineering color palettes.

figure 14. Texture mapping provides context to this satellite data. EnSight-created image courtesy of NASA.

Keyframe Animation EnSight offers market-leading animation capabilities including camera-controlled or keyframe animation. This enables fly-thru movies, exploded views of complex assemblies, or sliding doors exposing internal volumes. Visit ensight.smugmug.com to see examples of EnSight’s keyframe animation capabilities. Your movies will soon be the preferred presentation highlight of your managers. Conclusion We’ve described above just some of the unique advantages of EnSight for your FLOW-3D data. We didn’t even mention the plotting, extensive variable calculator, and many other unique quantitative features. So, please stop by our table at the user meeting and we can talk about your requirements and we can talk about those as well.