Deforming a plane to fit geometry

Soccerman18 · Mar 2007

Is there an easy way to deform a plane to have the same shape as another piece of geometry?

I have an object that needs to have stickers on it. The mesh is really ugly and it'd be a pain to try and map or use part of it for the sticker, so I am using a simple plane. But the area of the object that the plane needs to be put on to has a lot of curves.

Thought of using some sort of cloth modifier, but there's a bit of guessing and checking going on with that to get it to fit right. So that might work, but is there an easier/quicker way of doing it?

rooster · Mar 2007

since you said modifier I guess you're in max? maya has a transfer vertex positions deely that sounds like itd be useful here. maybe silos surface snapping w/soft selection too?

Sage · Mar 2007

you can use a lattice to do this. In max they are called FDD modifiers.

Another way is to draw a spline and then use the path deform modifier on it.

This may work but cause a crap load of stretching. Select the faces were the maps is supposed to be, detach as clone to a new object. Make a copy of it by hitting shift click and clone it in the same spot. Select by element then do a view align so it's flat like a grid. Planar map and add a morpher modifier to this. Pick the unmodified copy as a morph target and the plane will deform and you have your decal. You can then optimize this if needed by selecting edge loops and hitting crtl backspace, which shouldn't affect your uv coordinates. it might look nice or it might look pretty bad, but using relax might fix it.

Alex

poopinmymouth · Mar 2007

Tim's Scripts > conform wrap

www.scriptspot.com

motives · Mar 2007

couldnt you just make a copy of the object and delete the faces u dont need? and slap the alpha on that piece?

Mark Dygert · Mar 2007

^ Thats what I would do.^

Tumerboy · Mar 2007

or just select the faces you do want, copy them to a new object, and extrude them out slightly, then delete any leftovers.

Bryan Cavett · Mar 2007

You can conform it in max under compound objects... no scripts or anything. Its very simple to use. Set it to vertex normals and set the standoff distance then add a shell modifier to your plane for thickness. I do this all the time.

Not sure what poop suggested but it might be worth a look too.

Soccerman18 · Mar 2007

Gonna have to try that conform script, hopefully that'll give better results than what I've currently go going. The mesh was imported from Pro-E, so it's very dense and very ugly, and with the way it's layed out, and the fact that max kept crashing on me every few minutes when trying to clean up the geometry, I pretty much just wanted to leave that alone and use something a little cleaner.

Deforming a plane to fit geometry

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