Maya MEL Script help needed (UV border edges)

MoP

So I'm starting to get into MEL script, spent about 20 minutes tonight trying to make this script, and for the most part it was a success, and actually easier than I thought it would be, which is nice.

Script overview:
For any arbitrary object, find any UV border edges, and make those all Hard Edges, while leaving all other interior edges as Soft Edges.

It works 99% of the time, but will not work on UV shells which only have border verts, since the way Maya converts UV verts to edges means that it will select ALL edges attached to each selected UV vert, rather than just edges shared by selected UVs.

People keep telling me how flexible and awesome MEL script is, so now's the time to show me

Here's an image demonstrating the problem, and the solution I'd like to reach:


You'll notice that the UV shell highlighted on the left does not get its interior edges softened, because they are all attached to UV border verts. The other UV shells all work out correctly.
The lower part of the image shows what I want to achieve (basically just making the edges highlighted in red soft like the other interior edges).

Here's what the script does so far (yes, I'm aware it could probably be optimised a bit, this is my first MEL script ever, so go easy on me! )

<font class="small">Code:</font><hr /><pre>changeSelectMode -object;
string $objList[] = `ls -sl`;
for ($subObj in $objList) {
select -r $subObj;
polyNormalPerVertex -ufn true;
polySoftEdge -a 0 -ch 1 $subObj;
select -r $subObj.map["*"];
polySelectBorderShell 1;
textureWindowSelectConvert 2;
PolySelectTraverse 2;
invertSelection;
polySoftEdge -a 180 -ch 1;
}
select -r $objList;</pre><hr />
Basically it's just stepping through what I'd do if I was going to do this manually, so it's probably possible to condense this down to just one or two lines instead of this many, but I haven't got around to that yet.

Here is an OBJ file of my simple test object, if any MEL gurus here would like to have a crack at this problem...
http://www.greveson.co.uk/dump/script_test_object.obj

Any help or advice would be much appreciated. It will be good if it's just a flag or option somewhere that I have missed...

rebb

*fingers crossed*

string $objList[] = `ls -sl -o`;
string $uvBorder[];
string $edgeUVs[];
string $finalBorder[];

for ($subObj in $objList) {
	select -r $subObj;
	polyNormalPerVertex -ufn true;
	polySoftEdge -a 180 -ch 1 $subObj;
	select -r $subObj.map["*"];

	polySelectBorderShell 1;

	$uvBorder = `polyListComponentConversion -te -in`;
	$uvBorder = `ls -fl $uvBorder`;

	clear( $finalBorder );

	for( $curEdge in $uvBorder ) {
		$edgeUVs = `polyListComponentConversion -tuv $curEdge`;
		$edgeUVs = `ls -fl $edgeUVs`;
		
		if( size( $edgeUVs ) > 2 ) {
			$finalBorder[ size( $finalBorder ) ] = $curEdge;
		}
	}

	polySoftEdge -a 0 -ch 1 $finalBorder;
}

select -r $objList;

MoP

You are the winner, rebb ... nice one, muchos gracias

That's the solution I had in the back of my head but I was wondering if there might be a more simple way (a command or option I'd missed maybe). Fair enough!

funshark

Nice idea to optimize meshes !

EarthQuake

Digging this up from the grave i know, sue me.

I tried running this script and all i get is a syntax error, is there a special way i need to run this or something like that?

MoP

Yeah it looks like the old forum code has thrown a > in there.
Replace it with > , the greater than sign.

8th line from the bottom, should look like this:

if( size(  ) > 2 ) {

Edit: wtf - every time i try to post this the boards go batshit...
Edit2: inside the size( ) is meant to be $edgeUVs, I have no idea why it's stripping it out... PHP?

if( size( $edgeUVs ) > 2 ) {

EarthQuake

Awesome, seems to work perfect now, thanks a lot man.

EarthQuake

Just wanted to link to the working version of this script:

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/499159/UVShellHardEdge.mel

nullfed

I've just been using this script over the last couple of days and realised I forgot to post and say thanks! its a great time saver especially with more complicated objects or tight bevels that make it a pain to select. Great stuff!

Grimm_Wrecking

mop thank you :: eq thank you for the link

dproeder

Loving this script.

Gheromo

thx for the script guys.

raven9

sorry for posting in this given it's so old but every time i try to use this i get this error

// Warning: Some items cannot be moved in the 3D view. // // Warning: Some items cannot be moved in the 3D view. //
// Warning: Some items cannot be moved in the 3D view. //



anyone know why?

passerby

does the script still do what you expect it to do?

those are just warnings, not errors, so the script very well could still be working as expected.

raven9

nope, i still get artifacts and black edges

passerby

prolly more to do with your UV layout and having sharp angles that are on soft edges, rather than the script than.

since i personally use python version that does Exactly what this script does and it all works great for me.

raven9

hmm ok thanks. Could you give me the python script tho?

passerby

ya i can post that later, i have it as part of all the other scripts i wrote atm, so will have to separate it out and the functions it depends on too.

though like i said, it takes almost the same approach as the mel one so the issue you got is prolly elsewhere.

Harbinger

That warning is completely normal. You get it any time you select UV's, which the script does. Maya does this because you can select UV's in the 3D viewport, and it's just telling you that you can't manipulate them there.

As for your black edges, you probably have one of two situations:
1) Try unlocking your normals (in the Normals menu) and then running the script.
2) You have edges that are > 90 degrees that are soft and they are getting really poor lighting. In this case, and I'm assuming you're baking normals, that edge should be a UV boundary and made hard.

If those don't fix it, post a pic.

raven9

thanks so much for your replies! How do i make the UV edges hard tho? does this all have to do with UV placement?

oskarreftel

Thanks for the script!

Anuxinamoon

This is s great script and I was just thinking the other day if there was one available, since I was selecting my uv border edges manually.

Thanks so much guys!

werkvoll

Nice Script .

Tobbo

I want to start by saying that I find this script super useful. Thank you!

But I can only get the script to work if I manually load and execute it via the script editor. When I try and call it via the MEL command line I get:

// Error: Cannot find procedure "UVShellHardEdge".

Any idea what I'm doing wrong? Or is that just the way this script is setup.

Sorry if this is a noob question. I'm pretty new to running scripts inside of Maya.

passerby

make sure the file name is identical to the proc name, or source the script first.

Alphavader

THanks alot for the script - was looking for this
a long time

Script should be added to the Wiki - thanks for the thread

Bartalon

I tweaked the code so it won't error out if you are running it on multiple objects at a time, and one or more of those objects happens to not have any UV seams

string $objList[] = `ls -sl -o`;
string $uvBorder[];
string $edgeUVs[];
string $finalBorder[];

for ($subObj in $objList) {
    select -r $subObj;
    polyNormalPerVertex -ufn true;
    polySoftEdge -a 180 -ch 1 $subObj;
    select -r $subObj.map["*"];

    polySelectBorderShell 1;

    $uvBorder = `polyListComponentConversion -te -in`;
    $uvBorder = `ls -fl $uvBorder`;

    clear( $finalBorder );

    if (`size $uvBorder` > 2) {

        for( $curEdge in $uvBorder ) {
            $edgeUVs = `polyListComponentConversion -tuv $curEdge`;
            $edgeUVs = `ls -fl $edgeUVs`;

            if( size( $edgeUVs ) > 2 ) {
                $finalBorder[ size( $finalBorder ) ] = $curEdge;
                polySoftEdge -a 0 -ch 1 $finalBorder;
            }
        }
    }
}

walter

Useful, Thanks !

huffer

Very cool! Would it be possible to achieve the reverse in Maya? Create UV shells based on hard edges (like textools does)?

GuerillaTactics

I've actually been working on a script that does just that. I'll post it in a day or so when I get a chance to finish it.

beefaroni

Bump, any news on the opposite? Would love to create UVs from hard edges.

passerby

I could pretty easily create it, but it dosnt seem very practical at all to me create UV seams form hard edges. UV borders to hard edges make way more sense.

JohnnyRaptor

for hard edges to UV islands, try this, works with multiple objects.

run it with your objects selected.

string $currentSel[] = `ls -sl`;
int $selSize = size($currentSel);
for ( $i=0; $i<$selSize; ++$i) {
    select $currentSel[$i];
    performPolyProjectionArgList "1" {"0", "Planar", "ls -selection", "0"} "";
    polySelectConstraint -m 3 -t 0x8000 -sm 1;
    polySelectConstraint -m 0;
    polySplitTextureUV;
    changeSelectMode -object;
    performUnfold 0;
    changeSelectMode -object;
    polyMultiLayoutUV -scale 1 -rotateForBestFit 2 -layout 2;
    changeSelectMode -object;
}

Rofnald

Thanks for the script!

deohboeh

Thank you for the script!

HiernauxNicolas

Thank you! It very useful !

Biomag

Thanks for the script - saved me already hours of work!

N-gon

Hey i just wanted to thanks you guys for your hard work on this! this script is going to save me lots of time!

Gibbons3D

This script has helped me allot and felt I needed to say thanks.

Polynaut

sorry to revive from the dead, but I need help turning this code into python.. getting an error here: 

finalBorder [ len( finalBorder ) ] = curEdge

# Error: line 1: IndexError: file <maya console> line 20: list assignment index out of range # 

Here is the code so far:

import maya.cmds as cmds

import maya.mel as mel

objList = cmds.ls ( sl=True, o=True, fl=True )

finalBorder = []

for subObj in objList:

    cmds.select ( subObj, r=True )

    cmds.polyNormalPerVertex ( ufn=True )

    cmds.polySoftEdge ( subObj, a=180, ch=1 )

    cmds.select ( subObj + '.map[*]', r=True )    

    mel.eval ( 'polySelectBorderShell 1' )

    uvBorder = cmds.polyListComponentConversion ( te=True, internal=True )

    uvBorder = cmds.ls ( uvBorder, fl=True )

    del finalBorder [:]

    for curEdge in uvBorder:

        edgeUVs = cmds.polyListComponentConversion ( curEdge, tuv=True )        

        edgeUVs = cmds.ls ( edgeUVs, fl=True )

        if len(edgeUVs) > 2:

            finalBorder [ len( finalBorder ) ] = curEdge

    cmds.polySoftEdge ( finalBorder, a=0, ch=1 )

        

cmds.select ( subObj )

any help would be greatly appreciated.

gilesruscoe

Polynaught, i believe this should work for you. We can just set finalBorder to be an empty list instead of deleting it, and also use the .append function instead of using finalBorder[index]. Famous last words - it works on my machine!

import maya.cmds as cmds
import maya.mel as mel

objList = cmds.ls ( sl=True, o=True, fl=True )
finalBorder = []

for subObj in objList:
    cmds.select ( subObj, r=True )
    cmds.polyNormalPerVertex ( ufn=True )
    cmds.polySoftEdge ( subObj, a=180, ch=1 )
    cmds.select ( subObj + '.map[*]', r=True )    
    mel.eval ( 'polySelectBorderShell 1' )
    uvBorder = cmds.polyListComponentConversion ( te=True, internal=True )
    uvBorder = cmds.ls ( uvBorder, fl=True )
    
    finalBorder = []
    for curEdge in uvBorder:
        edgeUVs = cmds.polyListComponentConversion ( curEdge, tuv=True )        
        edgeUVs = cmds.ls ( edgeUVs, fl=True )
        if len(edgeUVs) > 2:
            finalBorder.append(curEdge)
    cmds.select(finalBorder)
    cmds.polySoftEdge ( finalBorder, a=0, ch=1 )
        
cmds.select ( subObj )

Polynaut

that's it!  I was trying to figure out how to work the .append in and couldn't figure it out.  I had something like... finalBorder.append [ len( finalBorder ) ] = curEdge

obviously that didn't work...  thanks for the help, it is much appreciated.

also, it looks like I don't need the fist finalBorder = [] anymore.

Justo

Oh nice a thread from way ba-

MoP said:

So I'm starting to get into MEL script 

holy moly this is old

2bytes

select hard edges then cut UVs?   should be a simple copy paste from the script editor

Travis C

sorry for the necro. but does this still work? all it does for me is freeze maya

walter

Working for me in Maya 2016.

LVL45

Just wanted to say thank you for this script, it's really time saver!
Cheers!

Lokthar

Working on Maya 2017.
Thanks for both script! Save me a lot of time

CJE

Anyone have a new link for this script? The dropbox link is dead and just inputting the script doesn't seem to work for me. Maya 2016.2

beefaroni

@CJE

This: http://jonathonstewart.blogspot.com/2012/10/script-harden-edges-of-all-uv-borders.html

CJE

@beefaroni Awesome, works great, thanks!