best way to remove these lumps from this surface in Maya

pukeanddie

I am cleaning up some models that have been scanned. There are lumps - 3 of them on each side of this surface. My client is asking me to remove the lumps so the surface is all smooth. I thought this would be easy using the smooth sculpting tool in Maya. However, it's proving really difficult. I'm just not able to even out the mesh so it looks like one smooth surface. Ideally, I'd like to raise those valleys, but anything to make it smooth is fine.  Can anyone offer a suggestion of how to accomplish this?

Alex_J

build a new low poly mesh that matches the same shape. it's just a cube with some beveled sides.

pukeanddie

well, what you can't see here is the top where it blends into another complex shape. I did just follow your advice and tried to create a low-poly version but I'm having similar issues trying to smooth and blend that geometry in. Am I wrong to think that I shouldn't be able to just smooth and work that geo into a nice even lump with the sculpting tools?

Alex_J

maya isn't so great at handling high vertex count like that. if you wanted to go the sculpting route you could pop it into zbrush or mudbox to try that. it's hard to say without seeing the whole picture, but still seems like low poly modeling would be the simplest thing. no need to make all the topology work perfectly, just rough in basic shapes and then you can figure out how to connect them together as needed later. Maybe things don't even have to connect necessarily - but again you got to see the whole thing and know the project to make thos ejudgement calls.