maya bevel tool issue - interactivity

maze

Hi there,

I was wondering, if there is a way in maya to have a decent bevel tool without having to purchase something like NEX.
And by decent I mean real time interactivity. Maybe someone knows of a mel script to fix this?

That would be really helpful!
Thanks

maze

Also, does someone know what is the Maya's equivalent for polygon island (in xsi) or Element (in 3ds) And how to select it?

thanks

BARDLER

For the bevel tool, or anything in maya, you can select the value in the channel box and while holding middle mouse in the view port drag to change the value. I do not know if that is the function you are looking for, but that usually works well enough for me.

I am not sure what you mean by polygon island, do you mean drawing custom polygons?

Scruples

You can edit your bevel in real-time after it is applied in your objects construction history.
Maya's element selection is called select "shell", you can get to it by ctrl right-clicking with a point, line or face selected to bring up that widget menu thinger, and selecting "to shell".

maze

hi guys,

I was just about to post an image showing what I meant,
but I think its now clear. Although I still find really cumbersome as workflow to
have to go back to the object history to modify something that should be dealt right on the bevel menu.

Thanks for your time guys

maze

does anyone know if there is a way to actually map "ToShell" to a hotkey?
Cant seem to find it on the hotkeylist,

Thanks!

passerby

i think i could possible script something, like maybe new bevel command that changes the offset when you drag lmb and change segments when you drag mmb or scroll?

im 99% sure something like that would be possible with python or mel, i would just need to do a little research and put a little time into it.

having to click a cv or have the toshell run after the bevel seems like a pretty shit way to get to the history fast since you lose your current selection.

give me a few days since i got lots of work work to do.

maze

hey passerby,

thanks man, if you ever find some time to script something like that
I ll be really thankful.

I do appreciate it

passerby

ya pretty busy this weekend, but might get it done one of the evenings next week, just need to do a little research, on maya's tool contexts but the rest is easy.

passerby

i have made a very very primitive version sofar, haveing a little trouble with one of the contexts needed, so im using the more simple dragAttrContext, which only supports working with 1 attribute at a time.

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/2360554/Fourms%20Stuff/polycount/scripts/pbTool.py

add that file to your maya scripts path.

than make a new shelf icon with this python code

import pbTool
pbtool.pbTool( 'bevel' )

it works just like it does as if you selected the offset channel after doing a bevel, "MMB" changes offset, than you can add "control" to make it adjust in finer values, or shift for larger values.

i still plan and improving it, and making it work with other tools such as extrude, once i figure out the draggerContext and python issue, and if that doesn't work, i could always make it work how it does in max, with the pop up caddie.

EDIT: also it is possible to edit the mel fine that defines the shift+rmb marking menu if you wanted to replace the default bevel with this.

haiddasalami

Been trying to figure out how Maya does their little pop up thing for 2012+. No examples in the Maya API too and doesnt help I have no experience there haha. Passerby have you tried using the draggerContext? Seems like it would give more control especially with undo and history. No idea if dragAttrContext uses history and the undo queue.

passerby

@haiddasalami was having a few problems getting draggerContext working under python, so just dropped this as a little quickie for him to use than i will sort out draggerContext when i got more time.

also ya the popup thing for extrude i really got no clue how it works, but i guess it would be possible to use hudSlider to create controls near the cursor.

haiddasalami

Yeah I think for handling a single attribute it should be fine. I think the viewport thing may be a QT thing called up or atleast i think it is. Wish I could get more info as its definitely a faster way of doing stuff or messing with tool settings.

passerby

ya i really have been avoiding getting deep into qt and maya, or even pymel and using more of a object orientated approach, really think if i had time ot learn it all it owuld open up a lot of possibilities

maze

Hey passerby, thanks a lot dude! That ll surely help out. Just tried it out and works fine!
Thanks again!!

By the way, does any of you guys know how to toggle "toShell" component mode in maya, I want to assign it to "5" hotkey as its by default in 3ds max. but cant see to find it in the hotkey options...

maze

the problem is that when using "toshell" from the hotbox, allows you to only select one shell at the time and I want to be able to be in some sort of "Shell" mode to select multiple shells at the time.

Another problem I have is that in xsi I can select multiple objects and insert edge loop at once to all of them. Maya seems to allow me one at the time.

Lets say I have a cylinder, inside a cylinder inside a cyl... and I want to slice all of them by two at once, Normally I select all of the cylinders and insert an edge loop to all the ring selections of each of the cylinders so I could do multiple ring selections and then apply the insert edge only once to all.

JohnnyRaptor

not sure if this is what your asking for, but double clicking when in face selection mode in maya will select the "element" or poly island.

maze

Hi Johnny, yeah thats ok, but how about selecting multiple "poly islands" inside the same mesh?

JohnnyRaptor

in poly selection mode, hold down shift, and double click on each poly island should do the trick.

maze

Thanks for your help! I tried out and it looks like its working, but still I kind of feeling I'll like to have that mapped to a hotkey if possible!

thanks again!

sheckee

BARDLER wrote: »

For the bevel tool, or anything in maya, you can select the value in the channel box and while holding middle mouse in the view port drag to change the value. I do not know if that is the function you are looking for, but that usually works well enough for me.

I am not sure what you mean by polygon island, do you mean drawing custom polygons?

To expand on that, once you have middle mouse held down, hold onto CTRL to slow down how fast the edge / bevel moves.

haiddasalami

Sent a pm to Maze but might as well put it down here for future Google searchers. You can hotkey polySelectBorderShell 0; to select the element or shell.

passerby

finnaly got a day off work and worked a little more on the script, now works with bevel offset on lmb and bevel segments with mmb, and shows the current value of the attribute on the hud.

just extract this into your maya scripts dir.

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/2360554/mayaScripts/pbTools.zip

and make a button that executes this python code

import pbTools.pbinteractivetools as pbt
pbt.pbTool('bevel')

still need to do a few thigns like have it detect when a vertex is selected and not a edge and do a chamfer instead of a bevel, but otherwise it works pretty good, thinking i might expand the concept to more than just the bevel tool.

also if i got more time thinking off add features such as having it remember the last used bevel offset, so you can just activate the tool and not drag and you get the value of the last time the tool was activated. hoping i have time for it remembering the values between activations tonight, since without that it does not work as intended if repeated with the g key.

maze

Hey Passerby,

Thanks a lot mate, just saw your post. Really appreciate your time getting your hands on this, I was exactly in the need of something other than maya's default for bevel.

for me thats enough man, again really appreciate it!

cheers!!

maze

@Haiddasalami, thanks again man!

passerby

ya thanks once i get a day off, so maybe on Sunday, i will do a few bug fixes, and modifier for adjusting values in smaller increments, and will add some optional scripts that will make it override the bevel, and chamfer in the shift+rmb marking menu.

also i did end up making it work with the reapeatLast command, so you can just tap g to repeat it on a new selection.