[Maya] Show wireframe on an object during sculpt.
polycounter lvl 11
Hello Polycounters, Maya no0b speaking.
I'm using Maya 2016 at work for my retopos, and I am wondering if there is any way to show the wireframe on an object (and only this object and not the whole scene) while using any of the sculpt brushes to modify it's shape.
Let me explain the why for those who care: The "make selected object live" is a bliss when it comes to using your decimated high poly as a ref to draw your topology on top of it. But sometimes you want your verts to float slightly above the surface, so you can better encompass the underlying shape with less polygons and cleaner topology flow.
When you start using one of the sculpting brushes, your selected object is just n shaded mode, without any preview of the wireframe. Toggling on the "wireframe on shaded" mode shows the wires of the high poly too, which makes the whole scene unreadable.
What I would like to have is either a way to see the wires on a shaded selected mesh OR a way to exclude a set of objects from the "wireframe on shaded" view mode so my HP meshes won't make me gouge my eyes out every time.
EDIT: Being the obsessed mo*#@!er that I am, I managed to find a redneck way to achieve what I need.
So for any of you that might be interested in the future.
After selecting your mesh, go in the Attribute editor and open the "Smooth Mesh" and "Subdivision Levels" roll-outs.
You need to set up your settings so the subdivided mesh isn't subdivided and the cage overlayed on top is the actual visible shaded geo.
switch Display to Both (wires on selected object, YAY!), uncheck the "Use global subdivision method" and switch back to the old Maya subdiv algo.
Toggle the Display Subdivs on and put the value to 0 (original mesh, YAY!)
And there you have it, a "duct tape and pray" solution to my problem, but a solution nonetheless.
Here's a screenshot of the settings just in case.
If any of you Maya Wizards know a better way to do this thing properly, I'm still happy to hear it.
...in the mean time, this will do.
I'm using Maya 2016 at work for my retopos, and I am wondering if there is any way to show the wireframe on an object (and only this object and not the whole scene) while using any of the sculpt brushes to modify it's shape.
Let me explain the why for those who care: The "make selected object live" is a bliss when it comes to using your decimated high poly as a ref to draw your topology on top of it. But sometimes you want your verts to float slightly above the surface, so you can better encompass the underlying shape with less polygons and cleaner topology flow.
When you start using one of the sculpting brushes, your selected object is just n shaded mode, without any preview of the wireframe. Toggling on the "wireframe on shaded" mode shows the wires of the high poly too, which makes the whole scene unreadable.
What I would like to have is either a way to see the wires on a shaded selected mesh OR a way to exclude a set of objects from the "wireframe on shaded" view mode so my HP meshes won't make me gouge my eyes out every time.
EDIT: Being the obsessed mo*#@!er that I am, I managed to find a redneck way to achieve what I need.
So for any of you that might be interested in the future.
After selecting your mesh, go in the Attribute editor and open the "Smooth Mesh" and "Subdivision Levels" roll-outs.
You need to set up your settings so the subdivided mesh isn't subdivided and the cage overlayed on top is the actual visible shaded geo.
switch Display to Both (wires on selected object, YAY!), uncheck the "Use global subdivision method" and switch back to the old Maya subdiv algo.
Toggle the Display Subdivs on and put the value to 0 (original mesh, YAY!)
And there you have it, a "duct tape and pray" solution to my problem, but a solution nonetheless.
Here's a screenshot of the settings just in case.
If any of you Maya Wizards know a better way to do this thing properly, I'm still happy to hear it.
...in the mean time, this will do.
Replies
Do you know by any chance if there's a way to never show the wireframe on any set of objects? Like avoiding wires on the high poly meshes?
Also, is there a way to adjust the Z-depth priority on meshes? I'd like to avoid my low poly mesh to disappear into my high poly.
X-Ray kinda helps but also kills the visibility of the HP mesh.
2) You could apply a semi-transparent material to your retop geometry. Sculpting tools will override that. No way to control Z-Depth, sadly, the best we can do there is to bump up the near clipping value on a camera a little to avoid some z-fighting.
If it helps, you can at least change wireframe color via Drawing Overrides on the transform of an object, or put objects in a layer and use that control. This only sets the colors when 'wireframe on shaded' is active. Here's the hotkeys I use. On the 3 key, it's wireframe on shaded.
And on 5 is enable/disable wireframe altogether, handy for checking smoothness or pinching without needing to deselect.
<p>{string $CurVal = `displayPref -q -wsa`;</p> <p>if ($CurVal == "none"){displayPref -wsa "full";}</p> <p>else if ($CurVal == "full"){displayPref -wsa "none";}}</p>The transparent material trick is something that I use and abuse already, having copy tabs of my LP mat and my HP mat on the second screen and tweaking the transparency live. But doing that kinda fucks with the visibility once again, and the fact that maya is not the most amazing Z depth sorter doesn't help the overdraw on faces on complex objects with multiple parts.
Dynameshing and the high poly helps but it's not perfect, you still get some issues here and there.
I remember one of my teachers had a custom shader in maya with a Z depth override for manual sorting (PSP development era stuff) That thing would be handy right now.
Just drop all your HP layer into the background of that Z buffer and enjoy "happy" retopo time.
Oh if only I was patient and rigorous enough to start learning scripting properly...