Right. Bend a little more. Like a full 360 degrees?
The point had nothing to do with curvature, but rather that a lot of people ought to learn basic nurms modeling techniques instead of trying to brute-force their way through everything by using unmanageable polycounts.
Back in the day there were highly technical discussions about modeling challenges with new tricks and tools popping up all the time. These days it's "lol i donnu just use 96 segmants cylinder and viewcube and caddies lol".
Did you put the bend modifier on top of the smoothing one (assuming you are working with 3d Studio, as it seems)?
Are you here to help or not? It would be useful to know a bit more detail of your workflow; because when I tried to smooth that exact same mesh you posted, it deformed very badly; thanks
I'm asking whether you're serious because putting a bend modifier on top of the subd, aside from generally being bad practice, would defeat the entire purpose of what I'm putting forth.
Other than that, yes, I'm willing to help until someone gets lippy and reminds me that there are better ways I could spend my time.
Ok, sorry for being lippy, I didn't want to annoy anyone; but let's return to the topic; how did you manage to have the same smoothed result for both the front (that have a chamfered edge [EDIT: TWO chamfered edges, not one, but this does not change the concept]) and back part?
The normal meshsmooth algorithm in Max give the following results to me (sorry for the crappy drawing):
I see a lot of discussion about special cases here and would like to suggest that what's needed is understanding the basics of the subdivision algorithm. Once you have that, you'll be able to get the results you want, every time.
Luckily, the algorithm is very simple. Here's an overview:
So the challenge I leave you with is: With the above in mind, how do you need to modify the cage to get the same curve at both ends? The illustration explains the only technique I used - no magic or special tools involved.
You obviously can't have the same shape but different vertex distributions and expect the same sub-divided result, which is why you're getting the wonky shape shown in your sketch.
I guess your technique involves redistribute the vertices of the chamfered loop to match the Catmull-Clark result on the back ones, right?
Yup, exactly. You'll always be dealing with cases where you have limited control over your geometry density. So if you can make worst cases look good, you can deal with pretty much any situation.
Check out the following image. It's ridiculous what you can get away with when you understand subdivision. That cylinder is a complete mess, yet it subdivides quite nicely, and allows for complex soft-to-hard transitions.
Yeah, thats a very interesting and useful technique, it surely simplifies a lot of things! Maybe the only little drawback I found in the previous example, is that I had to loosen the chamfer a bit to match the cylinder, so maybe one more loop or two in the interested area would benefit, but using this method you don't have to put the additional geo all around the model;
thanks for the tip!
Yup, exactly. You'll always be dealing with cases where you have limited control over your geometry density. So if you can make worst cases look good, you can deal with pretty much any situation.
Check out the following image. It's ridiculous what you can get away with when you understand subdivision. That cylinder is a complete mess, yet it subdivides quite nicely, and allows for complex soft-to-hard transitions.
So I thought I understood sub-d pretty well, but this blew my mind. I understand the algorithm picture that you posted. I don't fully understand how you find the edges of that crazy cylinder in order to make it round. I can see how that would be extremely helpful to understand though, and I would forever grateful if you explained it to me
I am assuming that this is wrong also? Maybe thats what I am getting hung up on.
So I followed the steps but the vert I cut in doing the steps you posted isn't lined up with the 8 sided cylinder underneath.
A turbosmoothed square won't produce a cylinder. This is just to predict what a turbosmooth does on that square.
In fact turbosmoothing whatever cylinder will never produce a 100% mathematically perfect circle, but the more edges it has, the more close to perfect it gets. Not that we care tho
A turbosmoothed square won't produce a cylinder. This is just to predict what a turbosmooth does on that square.
In fact turbosmoothing whatever cylinder will never produce a 100% mathematically perfect circle, but the more edges it has, the more close to perfect it gets. Not that we care tho
If you need a sphere which is 100% made out of quads you can shrink wrap a subdivided cube onto a sphere with a lot of segments to get it spherized
There are some differences in the subdivision algorithm of the various applications; The example posted by BARDLER should be Softimage or Modo subdivision, that gives you a perfect circle from a square, unlike the Max one that operates differently. This said, just understand how your app behave and you are ok
I dont know if you can do it in Max, but in Softimage you can choose different subdivision modes. But most of the time you stick with the Catmull-Clark rule.
Hey guys, hoping that the quick screenshot is clear enough. I'm trying to model the hair as a whole piece. I've been thinking that curves should be the way to go, but I have had no success in figuring out how to plot the curves.
Feedback and suggestions please! I've been trying this out for a while now.
i personally prefer (as in, god do i hate box modelling, and edgecloning isn't much better) a technique i call silhouette modelling, which does exactly this!
model it from the more dominant side as a plane, add vertices and create the next view, in this case i'd start from the side and then do the front, filling the gaps should be no problem once that is done.
I see a lot of sense in what you're saying and it coincides with what I saw someone who worked on Avatar say awhile back ... plan your sub-d so you can get it done with the minimal amount of geo possible. You can iterate faster and it's more flexible.
So, in that light, is there a resource you would recommend to learn those fundamentals? A book or a website or whatever that could teach someone these base fundamentals? Or is it a matter of doggedly hammering away at it and asking questions on sites like Polycount?
Neox: Currently I'm trying out the Create Polygon tool to create the side profile, and perhaps extrude it sideways to create the overall shape. What I'm having a tough time dealing with is creating that fringe. I'm probably retarded or something. Just gonna keep meddling with this, see if it takes me anywhere.
Am I on the right track you think?
Perna: Didn't realize there were so many names for modelling techniques/approaches. I started off with a Dreadnought tutorial from 3D Palace to learn the Maya interface, and eventually general modelling basics. I've definitely tried strip and box modelling, but I'm not sure I understand what you mean by plane cutting?
crasong, you start with way too many polys on that silhouette. You won't manage to make a clean shape in the other dimension. I don't remember how to perform meshsmooth in maya, but look for it. Keep the mesh simple (blocking) then subdivide it. This is the whole point of that thread, keep a manageable low poly that once sudvided, gives you the right shape.
Then you can optimize from it if needed.
Fringe should basically be 3 extruded boxes. Sometimes when i think i'll struggle with a shape, i sculpt it quickly in a sculpting software (sculptris is free) and retopo from it.
Perna, here's a screenshot of the model as a whole so far. The feet look different due to feedback from the artist who did the character sheet/design. I've definitely realized that the profiles do not match up perfectly, specifically the head, actually. I'm trying to interpret the shapes, but I admit that it's a lot more challenging than I thought it would be.
Should I create a separate thread for this?
I also don't know how to avoid higher geo density for the head, unless I go for a much lower poly rendition as a whole, I suppose. That's why I've left the head separate for now.
Makes a lot of sense. It's scary how right you were about the back ending up very flat. I just tried more splines as guidelines, and the overall shape ended up being really flat.
Think I'll most likely take the road of compromise, since the concept won't be touched anymore.
Thanks a lot perna! This has been educational. Now just to figure out what shape I want to model...
Bardler: Noors is right. Don't make the comparison with a cylinder primitive, make it with a machine subd-result. Unless your app has a different subd algo, look into that.
Thanks. I got it to work once I set the sub-d level to 1, instead of 2. It matches up great.
So my question is about putting this into practice. It seams kind of time consuming to cut in a bunch of edges like that in order to add support to some detail you need. It would be awesome if you could show a practical problem and how this process applies to it. If you have the time I would be greatly appreciative, and thanks for your time already.
I've always used subdivision to refine shapes only and in this case, the geo loses its original shape though.
Was wondering the same thing, I always thought at the lowest level, it should already have roughly the shape you want. So should it be just the simplest possible way even if the lowest level looks different, as long as the subD looks fine?
Well yes thats the point of subd. You model the low poly while the smoothed result is on. So you have the instant feedback from it. The low poly is a sort of "cage", doesnt matter how it looks as long as your subd is cool.
I see. I always thought it should be used only for refinement. I remember seeing someone's work that looked good subD'd but looked a bit messed up at the lowest level. Won't that end up with a lot of texture stretching if you do the cage too different from the subd? Or is texturing/texture behavior upon subd already taken into consideration as early as possible when modeling subd?
There isn't any texture behavior on the subd because you don't put UVs on it. The only thing you need to be concerned with, subd wise, is how it smooths. If it looks good, you're golden. Your low poly model is a separate concern IMO...
Oh yeah, isoline control. Does modo have it ? Looks like on videos that you still have to go back to low poly to edit.
Are you 3point guys still enthusiastic about this soft ? I don't see many people around using it.
And I thought wouldn't this be a bit of a destructive workflow?
I've always used subdivision to refine shapes only and in this case, the geo loses its original shape though.
I had to loosen the chamfer, and the pointy tip lose it's straightness and sharpness, so yes, in this case it's a bit of destructive; also I noticed that the highlights on the "wacky cylinders" posted by perna aren't perfect, due to the different polygonal density around them. In my opinion, if you need maximum precision on your hi poly (automotive renderings, product viz, engineering works), add all the geo you need to obtain a perfect surface; if you need it for low poly baking, I would use this technique.
can i just add that 2d cheating on concepts sucks ass to work with as a modeler. i encounter that shit on well over half the concepts i've been given to model from and it's seriously annoying, especially when clients complain about the interpretation of impossible shapes. how hard is it really to make a blockout in 3d and draw over it?
I'm not sure I follow when people indicate that subd should only be used for refinement. To me it sounds like something I definitely wouldn't agree with.
This I agree with. I probably shouldn't have said "only" as different cases need different treatment.
The cage should just be easy to edit; there are no rules for how it should actually look.
Making it look similar to the end result could help improve the workflow in building the low-poly model; but I guess that's just a "nice-to-have" thing to consider about and not a hard rule.
Like Noors says: Edit your cage with "show end result" turned on. Now, if Autodesk could only stop making worthless updates and give us isoline editing instead, our work would be a lot easier.
As I understand, is isoline editing not the hotkey "2" function in Maya? Or is it something else instead?
Hey Perna, thanks for taking the time to do the step by step. I sort of get whats going on in the later half of the steps, but I'm having trouble grasping whats going on in the first 5-6 images.
From what I can see you started off from the front profile. I can't tell if you used polygons or nurbs, because the top part looks so smooth/round despite the few edges it has.
Next it looks like you edited the same shape from the side profile, but the next couple steps has me rather confused. The next step immediately has what looks like a shape thats in "smooth preview" or like nurbs. Followed by another round arch-like shape in the next picture. Was it used for booleans?
I'm truly sorry if it seems like I need a lot of spoon-feeding. I really did try spending a good hour or so meddling around in maya trying to recreate what you did, to see if I could understand what you were doing, but it seems I am unable to do so.
As I understand, is isoline editing not the hotkey "2" function in Maya? Or is it something else instead?
id like to know this. I´ve never acctually heard about Isoline editing before! :O
Perna, you are amazing by taking your time to help us understanding this stuff. And for that i will forever thank you!
And i have to give a shout out to all of you guys asking these hard and great questions. You are also teaching me what, when and how to think!
When i talked about isoline edition, i meant accessing directly the vertices on the subd, not on the low poly cage itself.
There at 16 sec :
[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-KyOQhYk_Vw"]Tip14 Isoline Editing in CINEMA 4D - YouTube[/ame]
This is not possible in Max, where you have to edit the low poly cage, making the display messy and manipulations less intuitive.
When i talked about isoline edition, i meant accessing directly the vertices on the subd, not on the low poly cage itself.
There at 16 sec :
[video]
This is not possible in Max, where you have to edit the low poly cage, making the display messy and manipulations less intuitive.
I see what you mean now. Indeed this is possible in Soft and Maya; I am surprised this isn't available in Max.
Replies
Yeah, but those are almost flat, try to bend the first one a little more, then you'll have to ADD MORE GEO
Did you put the bend modifier on top of the smoothing one (assuming you are working with 3d Studio, as it seems)?
Are you here to help or not? It would be useful to know a bit more detail of your workflow; because when I tried to smooth that exact same mesh you posted, it deformed very badly; thanks
Ok, sorry for being lippy, I didn't want to annoy anyone; but let's return to the topic; how did you manage to have the same smoothed result for both the front (that have a chamfered edge [EDIT: TWO chamfered edges, not one, but this does not change the concept]) and back part?
The normal meshsmooth algorithm in Max give the following results to me (sorry for the crappy drawing):
I guess your technique involves redistribute the vertices of the chamfered loop to match the Catmull-Clark result on the back ones, right?
Yeah, thats a very interesting and useful technique, it surely simplifies a lot of things! Maybe the only little drawback I found in the previous example, is that I had to loosen the chamfer a bit to match the cylinder, so maybe one more loop or two in the interested area would benefit, but using this method you don't have to put the additional geo all around the model;
thanks for the tip!
I don't quite get it. Can you elaborate on this using the cylinder example perna included?
I am assuming that this is wrong also? Maybe thats what I am getting hung up on.
So I followed the steps but the vert I cut in doing the steps you posted isn't lined up with the 8 sided cylinder underneath.
In fact turbosmoothing whatever cylinder will never produce a 100% mathematically perfect circle, but the more edges it has, the more close to perfect it gets. Not that we care tho
If you need a sphere which is 100% made out of quads you can shrink wrap a subdivided cube onto a sphere with a lot of segments to get it spherized
Hey guys, hoping that the quick screenshot is clear enough. I'm trying to model the hair as a whole piece. I've been thinking that curves should be the way to go, but I have had no success in figuring out how to plot the curves.
Feedback and suggestions please! I've been trying this out for a while now.
model it from the more dominant side as a plane, add vertices and create the next view, in this case i'd start from the side and then do the front, filling the gaps should be no problem once that is done.
I see a lot of sense in what you're saying and it coincides with what I saw someone who worked on Avatar say awhile back ... plan your sub-d so you can get it done with the minimal amount of geo possible. You can iterate faster and it's more flexible.
So, in that light, is there a resource you would recommend to learn those fundamentals? A book or a website or whatever that could teach someone these base fundamentals? Or is it a matter of doggedly hammering away at it and asking questions on sites like Polycount?
Concept:
Neox: Currently I'm trying out the Create Polygon tool to create the side profile, and perhaps extrude it sideways to create the overall shape. What I'm having a tough time dealing with is creating that fringe. I'm probably retarded or something. Just gonna keep meddling with this, see if it takes me anywhere.
Am I on the right track you think?
Perna: Didn't realize there were so many names for modelling techniques/approaches. I started off with a Dreadnought tutorial from 3D Palace to learn the Maya interface, and eventually general modelling basics. I've definitely tried strip and box modelling, but I'm not sure I understand what you mean by plane cutting?
Then you can optimize from it if needed.
Fringe should basically be 3 extruded boxes. Sometimes when i think i'll struggle with a shape, i sculpt it quickly in a sculpting software (sculptris is free) and retopo from it.
Perna, here's a screenshot of the model as a whole so far. The feet look different due to feedback from the artist who did the character sheet/design. I've definitely realized that the profiles do not match up perfectly, specifically the head, actually. I'm trying to interpret the shapes, but I admit that it's a lot more challenging than I thought it would be.
Should I create a separate thread for this?
I also don't know how to avoid higher geo density for the head, unless I go for a much lower poly rendition as a whole, I suppose. That's why I've left the head separate for now.
Edit: I also have a lot of tris around the arms.
Meanwhile I'll keep trying shapes out, find one that doesn't have too rigid of an edgeflow. All these curvy shapes are hard!
Also could you elaborate on how the concept cheats? Cause I know somethings not lining up here, just can't quite point it out.
Think I'll most likely take the road of compromise, since the concept won't be touched anymore.
Thanks a lot perna! This has been educational. Now just to figure out what shape I want to model...
You're getting soft in your old age.
this thread like got a completly new life when you started posting here again
Thanks. I got it to work once I set the sub-d level to 1, instead of 2. It matches up great.
So my question is about putting this into practice. It seams kind of time consuming to cut in a bunch of edges like that in order to add support to some detail you need. It would be awesome if you could show a practical problem and how this process applies to it. If you have the time I would be greatly appreciative, and thanks for your time already.
And I thought wouldn't this be a bit of a destructive workflow?
I've always used subdivision to refine shapes only and in this case, the geo loses its original shape though.
Sorry for the standard questions, I'm still trying to digest your example.
Was wondering the same thing, I always thought at the lowest level, it should already have roughly the shape you want. So should it be just the simplest possible way even if the lowest level looks different, as long as the subD looks fine?
I see. I always thought it should be used only for refinement. I remember seeing someone's work that looked good subD'd but looked a bit messed up at the lowest level. Won't that end up with a lot of texture stretching if you do the cage too different from the subd? Or is texturing/texture behavior upon subd already taken into consideration as early as possible when modeling subd?
Are you 3point guys still enthusiastic about this soft ? I don't see many people around using it.
I had to loosen the chamfer, and the pointy tip lose it's straightness and sharpness, so yes, in this case it's a bit of destructive; also I noticed that the highlights on the "wacky cylinders" posted by perna aren't perfect, due to the different polygonal density around them. In my opinion, if you need maximum precision on your hi poly (automotive renderings, product viz, engineering works), add all the geo you need to obtain a perfect surface; if you need it for low poly baking, I would use this technique.
Recreating this would be a good way to learn how subdivision modeling works, a lot of nice curves and edges.
Making it look similar to the end result could help improve the workflow in building the low-poly model; but I guess that's just a "nice-to-have" thing to consider about and not a hard rule.
As I understand, is isoline editing not the hotkey "2" function in Maya? Or is it something else instead?
From what I can see you started off from the front profile. I can't tell if you used polygons or nurbs, because the top part looks so smooth/round despite the few edges it has.
Next it looks like you edited the same shape from the side profile, but the next couple steps has me rather confused. The next step immediately has what looks like a shape thats in "smooth preview" or like nurbs. Followed by another round arch-like shape in the next picture. Was it used for booleans?
I'm truly sorry if it seems like I need a lot of spoon-feeding. I really did try spending a good hour or so meddling around in maya trying to recreate what you did, to see if I could understand what you were doing, but it seems I am unable to do so.
Apologies for being so uneducated.
Perna, you are amazing by taking your time to help us understanding this stuff. And for that i will forever thank you!
And i have to give a shout out to all of you guys asking these hard and great questions. You are also teaching me what, when and how to think!
There at 16 sec :
[ame="
This is not possible in Max, where you have to edit the low poly cage, making the display messy and manipulations less intuitive.
I see what you mean now. Indeed this is possible in Soft and Maya; I am surprised this isn't available in Max.