PolySmoother
polycounter lvl 6
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=depFDNRCPJs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GlKcsMUuykcPolySmoother is a professional tool to efficiently work with Smoothing Groups.
It allows you to visualize and manage the Smoothing Groups in a quick and easy way. You can set Hard and Soft edges, select edges by convexity, copy, paste, modify and optimize Smoothing Groups, as well as convert them from and to UV mapping, among many other features.
http://www.polytools3d.com
Replies
Supported 3ds Max versions
2014 - 2018
P.S keep up the awesome tools!
@chrisevansart: What would a fair price be in your opinion?
I was thinking around 20-ish, and then I saw your bundle deal. Super awesome of you to do. Snatched it up!
What's New:
+ NEW Selected edges are now displayed when Preview Edges is enabled
+ NEW Isolate now works in Vertex and Edge modes too
- Improved Display Edges is now up to 300% faster
- Fixed critical bug that would cause smoothing color to not update on Max 2018 Windows 10
- Fixed blinking edges when first display Hard Edges
- Fixed bug where undoing after disabling PolySmoother could crash Max
- Fixed bug in converting specified edges for some imported models
- Fixed several minor issues
What you would like is to select the UV Shells based on the Smoothing Groups using something like the PolySmoother list of Smoothing Groups?
Before using your script, this method was a pain because I could never easily visualize the smoothing groups.. Now its very efficient and easy thanks again man!!
What's New:
+ NEW Select Convex and Concave edges by angle
+ NEW Create UV Shells from Smoothing Groups
+ NEW Create Smoothing Groups from UV Shells
+ NEW Create Multi-Material from Smoothing Groups
+ NEW Now Smoothing Groups List update selected faces with Key imputs
+ NEW Select all faces using a given Smooth Group Bit
- Improved Callback Mechanics for faster feedback
- Improved Face/List syncronization up to 20 times faster
- Improved Smoothing Groups list autoscroll
- Improved buttons icons now display correct in Max 2017+ all buttons states
- Improved Optimizer automatically switches to level 4 if some elements fails
- Fixed bug in Convert Specified Edges
- Fixed bug in Set Soft wedges where intersected hard edges would get smootheed
- Fixed bug when setting sub-object level to 0 that left the scene redraw in an unstable state
- Fixed bug when enabling caddies would constantly cast events
However, is there any way to Enable polysmoother when using modifiers in the stack? I seem to only be able to use it with an editable poly and nothing else.
If you need to preserve the modifiers stack, you could clone and collapse your object. When you are done setting the Smoothing Groups in this new object, you could transfer them to an Edit Poly modifier on the original object with the help of a script.
That's the best I can think of right now.
Thanks for the reply!
In the next update I will include a function to copy the Smoothing Groups to a new EPoly modifier, so once you are done with the collapsed object you simply click on a button and then drag/drop the new EPoly modifier to the original object.
Or perhaps it will have a feature to decide to which object to add the EPoly modifier, and so avoiding one step.
That would help to keep the original modifiers stack and simplify the process.
What's New:
- NEW Select Edges by Convexity now can select both Concave and Convex Edges
- New optional Angle Range can be provided to Select Edges by Convexity
- NEW Send Smoothing Groups to a new Edit Poly Modifier
- NEW Check for Updates
- Improved code to work with Referenced nodes
- Added icons to Select Edge by Convexity buttons
- Fixed "blinking" dialog when opening PolySmoother
- Fixed bug in random seed
- Changed Clean up undo stack when PolySmoother is disabled
- UI redesign
Fully functional 15 days Trial Version
The problem you see if that for some reason (a bug that I have not been able to fix yet), the channel used for the colors is not released. This happens randomly and I suspect it is caused but some undelivered notification.
There will be an update soon that includes the option to always overwrite the channel used for colors, but meanwhile you can go to the Channel Info utility and delete the channel you used.
By default the channel is set to Color Channel, but you can specify any other channel up to 99, or let the program find the first available one.
If you find a solid procedure to reproduce this problem, please send me an email with the details. I will greatly appreciate it.
Best Regards!
A new demo version will be available with the release of the next update.
Regards
@hansolocambo
Thank you for your comments and feedback.
Having the possibility to modify the color palette is absolutely useful, not only because the colors may be too similar, but the artist should have the possibility to work with the color palette they like, moreover when the same color palette might be used for other purposes like the material's ids. I will add it to the TODO list for the upcoming release.
Regarding the issue with the mapping channel being already used, the option to force the channel has already been implemented and will be part of the next version.
What's New:
+ NEW Added Support for 3ds Max 2019
+ NEW Optimize Smoothing Groups you can now decide to clear Isolated faces or not
+ NEW Set Hard/Soft Edges you can now decide to clear Isolated faces or not
+ NEW Set Smoothing Groups from UV Shells you can now decide to clear Isolated faces or not
+ NEW Optimize can now work on the selected elements only
+ NEW Previewing Channel can now be forced
+ NEW Support for modifying Edges Weights
+ NEW Support for modifying Edges Crease
+ NEW Colors for single Smoothing Groups can now be customized
- Changed Color Palette has been optimized for 128 colors
- Fixed bug Deleting faces and issuing an undo would throw an exception
- Fixed bug in Set Soft Edges where faces with more than 30 neighbors would fail
+ NEW Added Support for Vertex Weights
+ NEW Optimize SG when Creating SG from UVWs is now optional
- Improved performance of Optimize Selected Elements for large faces selections. Up to 200 times faster for 20K faces elements (exponential)
- Fixed bug closing PolySmoother while previewing would not release the preview channel
- Fixed bug that could save the toolbar position out of screen size
- Fixed set Edges and Verts Weight lower limit to 0.0001
- Fixed Create UVW Shells from Smoothing Groups where objects with dead verts would produce corrupted UVWs
Haven't you received the latest update email? Could you please email me so l can send you the latest update?
Thanks,
Jorge
I define all my smoothing groups. Export as fbx. Re-import the same fbx object. Then if I try to edit the smoothing groups again, to modify something, I get the aforementioned error message and all my smooth groups are erased if I press "Yes" to be able to use Polysmoother again O.o
It's been like that for ages. Would there be a way to code a wrokaround that issue to provide a less destructive workflow ? I mean 3DS Max smoothing groups sucks for decades, but at least I can define smoothing groups without any weird "channel" error that reset everything.
What does channel '0' mean anyway ? Material channel ? Map Channel ? I don't see any "channel" in the 3DS Max 2021 manual when it comes to smoothing groups ?
Can I manually set this "channel" to something else than "0" in order to further edit my smoothing groups using Polysmoother without loosing them all ?
Please advise.
EDIT Solution : Damn... It's a Vertex "Channel".
Enabling, in Polysmoother Settings, the "Force Channel" option fixes that issue.
This option should be ON by default as I don't really see how setting it OFF could be useful to anyone.