When I do shapes like that I actually use a circle (no bevel), then attach it. You need to figure out the radius and center first.
I see, so what you do is: you put the circle on the surface of the panell and combine the objects. Is that right? And then you create edges between the panel's- and the circle's vertices and merge them?
Sounds like a good way of doing it - going to try it out next time i modell something like this Thank you for your advice!
Sorry if this has been asked before, I could not find an answer for this.
When working with SubD models in Maya, is there any "select edge loop" functionality when in SubD mode? It is very tedious to manually selected long chains of edges when editing full/partial/no creases.
When working with SubD models in Maya, is there any way to display just the polygon proxy without the SubD version showing as well?
Maya 2009, double click an edge to select edge loop.
shortcut keys to switch btw subd and base mesh are on the 1 / 2 / 3 (one is shaded on / off IIRC) numeric keys above QWERTY (or nearby that, cant remember on the top of my head).
Hope that is what you were looking for.
Maya 2009, double click an edge to select edge loop.
shortcut keys to switch btw subd and base mesh are on the 1 / 2 / 3 (one is shaded on / off IIRC) numeric keys above QWERTY (or nearby that, cant remember on the top of my head).
Hope that is what you were looking for.
I know of this Edge Loop select method you are mentioning, but this only works on polygonal objects. Unfortunately not in the SubD edge mode.
The 1/2/3 method does not help to hide the SubD representation in this case.
Not sure if the title is worded correctly, but here's my issue.
I have a spline in the shape of flames from Illustrator that I need to use to create geometry to add onto a simple drumstick model. One of my restrictions is that I can't alter the original spline, except to help bend/wrap it around the cylinder. If I convert it to an Editable Poly, there is no real poly flow (and I would like to keep it in quads) if at all possible.
The end result needs to be a drumstick with the flame geometry extruding from it. Think of a Wacom pen: You have the basic cylinder for the shaft of the pen, but then you also have the additional softer 'grip' part where your fingers grasp it which is raised up slightly from the base shaft.
The only other example I can think of would be a toothbrush. Instead of just one solid piece of flat plastic, many have the extruded-out 'grip' areas that raise up just a tiny bit from the base plastic piece.
I've tried several methods, including converting the spline to an editable poly and then extruding downwards into the cylinder. I've also subdivided the spline several times and used the Bend modifier in Max to make it fit the curvature of the drumstick as well, all of which look..well, shitty.
That's the best I can explain it. I'm attaching some photos to help show what I'm working with.
Hey guys, I hope someone can give me sum help in this particular matter.
I have the following situation:
So what I want is straight holes in the drum-shaped object on the exact location of where the cube objects are. I could just cut the holes out with the cubes with booleans, but the problems is that I later want to create smooth edges in subdivs and I will have to keep consistent edgeflow cause I will most likely be taking the object to mudbox to add more detail.
I have been thinking and trying stuff for over an hour but it just doesn't come out the way I want.
So this is what I want (but then with the consistent geometry):
Make a NURBS Circle, make it fit the circular faces at the top of that cylinder thing of yours. Reconstruct those 3 rectangle shapes with CV/EP curves. Project those curves on the NURBS shape, trim away the "holes". You might need to rebuild the surface after that. Then when you are all set, Modify > Convert > NURBS to Polygons.
Make a NURBS Circle, make it fit the circular faces at the top of that cylinder thing of yours. Reconstruct those 3 rectangle shapes with CV/EP curves. Project those curves on the NURBS shape, trim away the "holes". You might need to rebuild the surface after that. Then when you are all set, Modify > Convert > NURBS to Polygons.
I'm not rly good with NURBS. Havent done alot with it in the past. And it doesn't really sound like a good solution to me, since you mention that I prolly need to rebuild the surface. While the building of the surface is exactly the problem. I don't know how to do it.
this is an excellent thread, just what I've been looking for, you guys are a wealth of generous info, many hours spent investing and then sharing with everyone else.
I'll be checking back on this one regularly for advice.
you could try something like this
in planar areas, doesnt really matter how the topology is, as long as it smoths nicely.
edit: here is the obj http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/93793/stuff.obj
yes you can do it, but its a pain. and rather inexact by the most straight forward method There are a few better ways I can think of with the side bits either via temporary bone deformation, or just more tweaking of the ffd cage during the path deform. However anyway you slice it this particular set of deformations isn't simple in maya, which is disappointing.
I tried the very same method last week, trying to mimic the same tutorial. Tricky part that I couldn't get to work well was matching the rotation/banking on the Extrude vs the Flow Object. You could probably get it right at all spots by tweaking the Lattice, but it would be nice with a better non manual tweaking method.
mutantspoon's was max specific I think, funny thing is a buddy of mine was trying to do this exact style stuff in maya the other day, ill pass it on to him for sure. thanks.
Well yeah and no matter what Maya will still refuse to let you edit the base shape properly without making a mess of the final result . Even on a simple extrude it fails...
If I understand correctly the reason behind this not being flexible in Maya is because the app only edits vertices tables really. There is no notion of a modifier being applied on an object as a whole. Because of that, vertex orders get fucked if a base level mesh gets edited. Max simply reapplies the modifier to the whole thing. (except if applied specifically to components)
So annoying!!! I model all my highpoly stuff pretty much that way so it's very frustrating to try and emulate that in maya. It's funny tho, it's a very common practice amongst max users but it looks like voodoo to anyone only familiar with Maya, Xsi and the likes!
What would be nice if you could use several instances of the profile curve along the path curve to control the rotation/banking yourself. Didn't seem to be any options for that which I could find.
Vassago: Yeah it is. A couple of people on page 11 or 12 asked how to do some of those steps in maya and no one answered so I threw it together as a sort of modeling warmup.
Some of the Max type workflow can be easily duplicated in Lightwave as well, but for maya, this specific thing seems to be quite a task. Same with duplicating a number of objects along a curve. I mean lightwave had that functionality in version 5 and I know max has had similar things for a long time.
I'm pretty sure I can get even closer results, just have to change the approach.
Some of the Max type workflow can be easily duplicated in Lightwave as well, but for maya, this specific thing seems to be quite a task. Same with duplicating a number of objects along a curve. I mean lightwave had that functionality in version 5 and I know max has had similar things for a long time.
Yeah, the last place I worked had a really nice script set up for doing that sort of thing, but it sometimes exploded if your curve wasn't rotated just right. You often had to rotate it 90 degrees, do your duplicate-along-spline, then rotate the object back.
Working on this space cargo ship..thing and I'm having troubles with pinching and what not, small subtle things that annoy me. I'm mainly unsure how to go about certain things. It's meant to be rendered in the end, so I want it nice and detailed, so it should work for close-ups etc.
The way I do it now is I try to model it all with quads as much as I can, because I've heard it will smooth best that way. But the topology looks pretty funky at places. :poly122:
edit: Never mind. More geometry, pushing vertices and using my brain seems to do the trick.Not perfect, but better. :poly142: This thread is gold, btw!
edit: Never mind. More geometry, pushing vertices and using my brain seems to do the trick.Not perfect, but better. :poly142: This thread is gold, btw!
Yeah i was just going to respond and say this, in a lot of cases its just a matter of adding more geometry, more accurate to the surface. I think we sometimes have a tendency to follow lowpoly rules when doing sub-d stuff, so you have to break that thought process, and concentrate more on the forms than how efficient your model is.
Wow I should've put my question on here. Didn't realize this was a question and answers thread on sub-D. I'm definitely going to be coming back here within the next couple of days since I'm going at sub-d's in Max.
From the little I've read on the thread, it seems easier to do sub-d modelling in Max than in Maya. True or am I sounding biased here? Lately I've actually leaned a little more towards Maya than Max but Max is always my number one when it comes to doing anything in 3D.
Wow I should've put my question on here. Didn't realize this was a question and answers thread on sub-D. I'm definitely going to be coming back here within the next couple of days since I'm going at sub-d's in Max.
From the little I've read on the thread, it seems easier to do sub-d modelling in Max than in Maya. True or am I sounding biased here? Lately I've actually leaned a little more towards Maya than Max but Max is always my number one when it comes to doing anything in 3D.
SubD is pretty reliant on polygon modeling tools, and last time I used Maya (5.5 I think? a couple of years ago) Max seemed to have some stronger poly-modeling features than Maya. Of course standard Max (except 2010 where it is integrated as "Graphite") benefits greatly from Polyboost for additional SubD tools.
Here's 2 quick ways I did that (still new at this and my mesh sucks, but you get the idea). On the left, bumps modeled out of the plane, and on the right a lenghtened cylinder to get the same shape. If you want I can provide the OBJ to see it better.
Just do the bumps as floaters, like slightly squashed halved cylinders as in the example above to the right, but extrude the open edgeloop (where they touch the body) outwards so it lies flat against the surface of the gun. Less messy than modeling them into the body, and more flexible, but still smoothing as if they're apart of the gun. Get it? Not on my work comp right now so I can't do an example right this second...
He's talking about the circular button to the right of the capsules.
Honestly when you have a pattern like that I find it easier to paint it into the normal map rather than modeling it - you don't really get anything by modeling it and you can adjust the pattern to make sure it matches your texture resolution if you're hand-painting it. If you remove the grip texture then modeling the cylinder with floaters becomes trivial.
OMG is so nice to see another Lightwaver - I thought for sure I was the only one here who uses it - woot
Hahaha!! I only use it for stuff like this though.
Here, got rid of those sharp edges. If you are worried about viewport, just make a stand in proxy mesh after you are done modeling it, then at render swap it out. Would make a much better normal map now.
Continuing my high poly work right now as I go forth in that area when I get the chance. So I just ran into a strange problem. When I res this thing up, I get that pinching there at that spot. Can anyone elaborate on a fix for this? It's odd that it'd be doing it since I have ti all quad up and the verts are lining up with each other if you saw it from the top view.
I would like to add that there are no infinitely sharp edges. Let me redo this model correctly.
If this was for a normal map, the anti-aliasing would soften it up enough without needed to add anything more. Generally i would just do this sort of detail in photoshop/crazybump tho, as it would be quicker and easier to edit.
Yeah, as a model to texture I would have modeled one row to source from then dupe in Photoshop. But since he asked to model it I just went the whole nine .
So it seems that some pieces should just be done in PS or CB and not modelled out crazily? I mean I take it small items like screws or what not could probably be replicated in photoshop easily and be given a normal through there.
I've almost always see people just sub-d model almost every piece in their assets, characters. Probably not the most efficient way of doing things right?
Oh and Lamont, the verts are on the same plane in the Y and X axis, of course on the Z they're moved. Could it be that the I've run into the famous N-edge problem? There's 5 edges collapsing onto one point. I think that's what happened.
Anyone know of a way to to fix that realy easily just for that one part?
Replies
I see, so what you do is: you put the circle on the surface of the panell and combine the objects. Is that right? And then you create edges between the panel's- and the circle's vertices and merge them?
Sounds like a good way of doing it - going to try it out next time i modell something like this
Sorry if this has been asked before, I could not find an answer for this.
When working with SubD models in Maya, is there any "select edge loop" functionality when in SubD mode? It is very tedious to manually selected long chains of edges when editing full/partial/no creases.
When working with SubD models in Maya, is there any way to display just the polygon proxy without the SubD version showing as well?
Thanks.
Maya 2009, double click an edge to select edge loop.
shortcut keys to switch btw subd and base mesh are on the 1 / 2 / 3 (one is shaded on / off IIRC) numeric keys above QWERTY (or nearby that, cant remember on the top of my head).
Hope that is what you were looking for.
I know of this Edge Loop select method you are mentioning, but this only works on polygonal objects. Unfortunately not in the SubD edge mode.
The 1/2/3 method does not help to hide the SubD representation in this case.
Thanks anyway.
I have a spline in the shape of flames from Illustrator that I need to use to create geometry to add onto a simple drumstick model. One of my restrictions is that I can't alter the original spline, except to help bend/wrap it around the cylinder. If I convert it to an Editable Poly, there is no real poly flow (and I would like to keep it in quads) if at all possible.
The end result needs to be a drumstick with the flame geometry extruding from it. Think of a Wacom pen: You have the basic cylinder for the shaft of the pen, but then you also have the additional softer 'grip' part where your fingers grasp it which is raised up slightly from the base shaft.
The only other example I can think of would be a toothbrush. Instead of just one solid piece of flat plastic, many have the extruded-out 'grip' areas that raise up just a tiny bit from the base plastic piece.
I've tried several methods, including converting the spline to an editable poly and then extruding downwards into the cylinder. I've also subdivided the spline several times and used the Bend modifier in Max to make it fit the curvature of the drumstick as well, all of which look..well, shitty.
That's the best I can explain it. I'm attaching some photos to help show what I'm working with.
I have the following situation:
So what I want is straight holes in the drum-shaped object on the exact location of where the cube objects are. I could just cut the holes out with the cubes with booleans, but the problems is that I later want to create smooth edges in subdivs and I will have to keep consistent edgeflow cause I will most likely be taking the object to mudbox to add more detail.
I have been thinking and trying stuff for over an hour but it just doesn't come out the way I want.
So this is what I want (but then with the consistent geometry):
I'm not rly good with NURBS. Havent done alot with it in the past. And it doesn't really sound like a good solution to me, since you mention that I prolly need to rebuild the surface. While the building of the surface is exactly the problem. I don't know how to do it.
You mean a .OBJ?
http://rapidshare.com/files/217775063/stuff.obj.html
I'll be checking back on this one regularly for advice.
in planar areas, doesnt really matter how the topology is, as long as it smoths nicely.
edit: here is the obj
http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/93793/stuff.obj
here you see the mesh subdivided. looks nice
yes you can do it, but its a pain. and rather inexact by the most straight forward method There are a few better ways I can think of with the side bits either via temporary bone deformation, or just more tweaking of the ffd cage during the path deform. However anyway you slice it this particular set of deformations isn't simple in maya, which is disappointing.
I tried the very same method last week, trying to mimic the same tutorial. Tricky part that I couldn't get to work well was matching the rotation/banking on the Extrude vs the Flow Object. You could probably get it right at all spots by tweaking the Lattice, but it would be nice with a better non manual tweaking method.
Still nice to know another way of doing something
If I understand correctly the reason behind this not being flexible in Maya is because the app only edits vertices tables really. There is no notion of a modifier being applied on an object as a whole. Because of that, vertex orders get fucked if a base level mesh gets edited. Max simply reapplies the modifier to the whole thing. (except if applied specifically to components)
So annoying!!! I model all my highpoly stuff pretty much that way so it's very frustrating to try and emulate that in maya. It's funny tho, it's a very common practice amongst max users but it looks like voodoo to anyone only familiar with Maya, Xsi and the likes!
Some of the Max type workflow can be easily duplicated in Lightwave as well, but for maya, this specific thing seems to be quite a task. Same with duplicating a number of objects along a curve. I mean lightwave had that functionality in version 5 and I know max has had similar things for a long time.
I'm pretty sure I can get even closer results, just have to change the approach.
Yeah, the last place I worked had a really nice script set up for doing that sort of thing, but it sometimes exploded if your curve wasn't rotated just right. You often had to rotate it 90 degrees, do your duplicate-along-spline, then rotate the object back.
Man I really don't miss maya.
Working on this space cargo ship..thing and I'm having troubles with pinching and what not, small subtle things that annoy me. I'm mainly unsure how to go about certain things. It's meant to be rendered in the end, so I want it nice and detailed, so it should work for close-ups etc.
The way I do it now is I try to model it all with quads as much as I can, because I've heard it will smooth best that way. But the topology looks pretty funky at places. :poly122:
edit: Never mind. More geometry, pushing vertices and using my brain seems to do the trick. Not perfect, but better. :poly142: This thread is gold, btw!
Motionpaths + Animation Snapshot under the Animate menu.
Yeah i was just going to respond and say this, in a lot of cases its just a matter of adding more geometry, more accurate to the surface. I think we sometimes have a tendency to follow lowpoly rules when doing sub-d stuff, so you have to break that thought process, and concentrate more on the forms than how efficient your model is.
From the little I've read on the thread, it seems easier to do sub-d modelling in Max than in Maya. True or am I sounding biased here? Lately I've actually leaned a little more towards Maya than Max but Max is always my number one when it comes to doing anything in 3D.
SubD is pretty reliant on polygon modeling tools, and last time I used Maya (5.5 I think? a couple of years ago) Max seemed to have some stronger poly-modeling features than Maya. Of course standard Max (except 2010 where it is integrated as "Graphite") benefits greatly from Polyboost for additional SubD tools.
Wot I meant:
[img]http://www.razkun.com/Stuff/SubD floaters.jpg[/img]
Honestly when you have a pattern like that I find it easier to paint it into the normal map rather than modeling it - you don't really get anything by modeling it and you can adjust the pattern to make sure it matches your texture resolution if you're hand-painting it. If you remove the grip texture then modeling the cylinder with floaters becomes trivial.
The images below are pretty straight forward:
OMG is so nice to see another Lightwaver - I thought for sure I was the only one here who uses it - woot
-N
Here, got rid of those sharp edges. If you are worried about viewport, just make a stand in proxy mesh after you are done modeling it, then at render swap it out. Would make a much better normal map now.
Continuing my high poly work right now as I go forth in that area when I get the chance. So I just ran into a strange problem. When I res this thing up, I get that pinching there at that spot. Can anyone elaborate on a fix for this? It's odd that it'd be doing it since I have ti all quad up and the verts are lining up with each other if you saw it from the top view.
Wire
Material only
If this was for a normal map, the anti-aliasing would soften it up enough without needed to add anything more. Generally i would just do this sort of detail in photoshop/crazybump tho, as it would be quicker and easier to edit.
I've almost always see people just sub-d model almost every piece in their assets, characters. Probably not the most efficient way of doing things right?
Oh and Lamont, the verts are on the same plane in the Y and X axis, of course on the Z they're moved. Could it be that the I've run into the famous N-edge problem? There's 5 edges collapsing onto one point. I think that's what happened.
Anyone know of a way to to fix that realy easily just for that one part?