How to model a chain link fence?

alexk

For example...(not my pic)



I'm using 3dsMax... totally drawing a blank, especially with how the wires are twisting and connecting and the spaces are even. Is this some how done procedurally?

Cody

looks like you have it down pretty good...just bake it to a alpha plane and you're set IMO. unless that isn't your pic......

Rated Rrr

Not quite sure what type of answer you're looking for but depending on what this is for but I'd say most of the time the fence is usually a low poly plane with alpha on it.

What you got looks like a good enough high poly for baking out normals/alpha. Hope this helps.

low odor

Lofting it would probly be the easiest way....Draw out the shape with a spline ....loft the spline with the proper width elipse..then mirror

Eric Chadwick

This is super simple. Just draw out one strand, as a renderable spline, and make an array.

alexk

oh that's not my pic... i'll try your guys suggestions tommorow. I'm pretty noob hence the post

aesir

yea, it's just one chain that twists back and forth all the way up. Then copy and mirror it over, and then you have the interlocking parts. Just copy and paste yourself a whole fence.

warby

my only tip is when you render it to a alpha texture do it at a 45 ° angel so that the lines run perfectly vertical and horizontal than map it onto your geometry minus the 45° angel and you got Jaggies less alpha

Cody

dude, warby great tip! never thought of that! could waste a bit of texture space, but worth it.

warby

that trick is a classic really i just recently saw it used again in far cry 2 and it doesn't waste any texture space if the texture is made to tile anyway

Cody

word? so you would have, say, a tiling 256 map for the chain link, and another 256 for pipes and supports?

warby

i don't see any poles or anything like that on his pic ?! i thought he wanted to make a universally usable wire link texture that you could also put between 2 buildings or rolled up or anything / anywhere really.

i know batch ability is all the hot buzz right now so having as much stuff on one texture sheet is always a good thing for performance but when it comes to transparent materials you want as little as possible to use transparency in screen space so id say support poles and the likes definitely give them their own opaque material

MoP

Yep, warby is on the money here. I would just have this on its own small tiling texture, then any supporting geometry on a different sheet (tiling or unique, depends on what you're doing I guess).

Emil Mujanovic

Sweet tip, warby!

-caseyjones

Richard Kain

If you want to actually create a 3D chain link fence, than here's how. First off you need to create a spline, and then loft a circular piece of geometry along the spline. The spline itself needs to be a helix in shape. Now flatten the sides of the helix, while keeping it rounded about the ends. You should end up with something that looks like saw teeth from one side. It is essentially switchbacks in the shape of a helix. Once you have it there, just reproduce it, reposition it, and adjust it along the up-down axis. Rinse and repeat until your chain-link fence is as wide as it needs to be.

Keep in mind that this sort of method is intended to create a high-poly chain link fence. It should ideally be used for up-close shots in a high-poly rendering. It's a waste of time to create something that intricate for an in-game model. You can just use an alpha-mapped texture for that. Much faster and much better for performance.

Richard Kain

Here's an example that I built real quick.



If you look closely, you can tell that it's just made up flattened helix that are iterated horizontally. You only need to create and adjust two base helix, and after that its just copy and paste. This example was made using simple paths, and a Bezier circle as the base for the path extrusion.

Makeitcg

Hey Guys I did a tutorial on the same topic.how to model chain link fence in 3ds max. It's in 3ds max but you can follow the same procedure for other softwares. Here is the link:

http://makeitcg.com/model-chain-link-fence-in-3ds-max/287/

Thanks