Here's how I do it on Maya: To move the UVs one unit on maya you can just use polyEditUV -u 1 -v 0 ; or just use a custom script like I do (Nightshade UV Editor). Not sure how to do that on Blender or any other software, sorry ):
Hold CTRL (or is it alt?) when you click remove and it will remove the edge and the verts at the same time. http://www.scriptspot.com/3ds-max/max-retopo If you're going to build a low around a high this little script is pretty awesome. If your using polyboost or max2010 there are some nice tools like this also.
@P442- have you tried the rigomatic rigging scripts for maya? You can set up any amount of additional appendages with IK chains automatically- I reckon this would make those pipes fairly painless- it's exactly what I plan to do with my current project's piping! ~P~
miauu's Scalpel version 1.4 is available. Changelog: + added Snap Step in Scene Units + added viewport marker that shows the starting point from which the script measures the percentage/Distance1 along the snapped edge + added "D" key to change the starting point https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAVEf57DliI
Ok... I think I'm getting to where I want to be now. I have code, but it's only for testing, and is really messy. I'm going to try writing the full script for what I want to do now. Hopefully, it works out. I'm having a much easier time referencing things.
There are scripts (or feature included by default in some softare), make different UV islands from hard edge or smoothing groups with 1 click. Like "flatten by smoothing groups" in 3ds max. It's faster than manually splitting edges (only on cylinders need to split, because they're 1 smoothing group)
if you want to build a new set of storyboards for a portfolio, how do you pick out your subject matter, how do you decide what to board? do you look up a script on google? pick something out of a comic book? reboard something you saw on TV?
I've been using Super Clay every now and then. SuperClayMode http://cganimator.com/superclaymode-v1-1/ https://vimeo.com/189495312 I used to use PowerPreview for rendering anims, but I haven't done that for a while. PowerPreview: http://www.scriptspot.com/3ds-max/scripts/powerpreview-high-quality-nitrous-previews
Oh man this looks great! Pity I've gone to the dark side and use Maya at work now. You've got a tonne of cool scripts that would be great in Maya to improve the under-developed modelling tools - are you going to continue to focus on Max or is there any chance of Maya ports of some of these ever?
Funnily enough, it's a little haphazard.. I've found that for instance "Realtime" lights get baked into lightmaps as well and I do seem to remember it occuring the other way around as well. I basically disable/enable Realtime lights per script before I start the long, long, long bakes ;)