The equivalent of poking ones self in the eye...

[+Zurawski]

Just need to vent to people who might understand... (Mrs. Z has absolutely no frame of reference nor appreciation.)

 

Is it just me or does everyone else who works on 3d models find it absolutely frustrating to take a beautifully laid-out mesh where you've carefully positioned quad seams to avoid pinching where you know you have to cut say... a air-brake door, only to watch in horror when you start actually cutting and your mesh smoothing starts to go to hell in a hand basket!

 

Finally got it but MAN... nothing like wasting 2-to-4 hours cutting and snapping verts because you're anal-retentive and refuse to let the bastard pinched surface smoothing beat ya!

 

WHEW! Thanks that I feel better already!

Edited December 19, 2011 by Zurawski

[+Wrench]

if it's anything like I go through with terrains ... oh, yeah. I feel for ya, brudda!!

[+76.IAP-Blackbird]

Cutting stuff is the sum of all fears for poly modelers! Damn the smoothing is always gone, and you have no idea what gone wrong! Have to cut some gun bays but .. damn "I don`t like it"

[+Zurawski]

 

Go ahead... ask me how many hours and revisions I went through to cut these ports. What sucked is the area where the ports crossed was not planar and it only consisted of four quads. Eventually ended up doing subdivisions to get enough quads to avoid pinching, which then created the task of snapping verts to various border verts until I found the right combination to have a clean smoothing.

 

I'd hazard roughly 6 hours, 1 bottle of Jack Daniels and the death of approximately 100 to 200 hair follicles...

 

That said... There is almost nothing more gratifying than taming the smoothing beast!

[+EricJ]

It also makes me glad (though jealous) that I gave up on 3D modeling, one can only have one forte :)

[+Zurawski]

It also makes me glad (though jealous) that I gave up on 3D modeling, one can only have one forte :)

 

Don't be jealous... Though occasionally cathartic, 3D modeling is hours of tedium braced by brief moments of euphoria and or raging fits of frustration.

 

... If I had the skills, I much rather be a texture artist. Sadly, in that particular niche I'm bested by 3 year-olds with fat crayons.

[+EricJ]

Oh I know though from OFP/VBS1 modeling. Strange thing is that I could build a lot of stuff in Oxygen Light but never grasped 3DSMax (had 3.1 around... 2002-03 or so) so I wish I could use that instead of 3DS Max but I'm a bit behind the power curve with all that...

[+76.IAP-Blackbird]

That looks great Zur, could you please post a pic with a wired smoothed area around the guns, would realy help me out!

 

Do you plan to smooth the intake also? I know its just WIP but sometimes I can learn from another 3D artist ;)

 

thank you in advance.

 

[+SkateZilla]

my CRTL and Z buttons on my keyboard are worn off from 3ds and photoshop.... make some changes... stare at it... notice it dont look right... CTRL-Z to undo, repeat from beginning a few times.

[+Zurawski]

my CRTL and Z buttons on my keyboard are worn off from 3ds and photoshop.... make some changes... stare at it... notice it dont look right... CTRL-Z to undo, repeat from beginning a few times.

 

I'm right there with you... I feel bad for anyone who uses my PC if they are not a touch typist and are not familiar with key placement because my Z and X are literally unreadable as well.

 

I also save revisions before proceeding onto anything that might potentially screw the whole mesh... I'm up to F86H_57.3ds right now... I started last night at 43.

[+Zurawski]

That looks great Zur, could you please post a pic with a wired smoothed area around the guns, would realy help me out!

 

Do you plan to smooth the intake also? I know its just WIP but sometimes I can learn from another 3D artist ;)

 

thank you in advance.

 

 

No problem! I'll do this tonight for you... Mind you, it's not pretty. (This is why I usually never show my wire frames.

 

What I end up with is usually the result of smoke and mirrors... and a lot of Bondo.

[+SkateZilla]

I'm right there with you... I feel bad for anyone who uses my PC if they are not a touch typist and are not familiar with key placement because my Z and X are literally unreadable as well.

 

I also save revisions before proceeding onto anything that might potentially screw the whole mesh... I'm up to F86H_57.3ds right now... I started last night at 43.

 

yeah when i work on something i usually use the date+alpha revisions.. so.... ModelName_12.19.2011.a

 

i think for my CVN there's 940+ MAX Files. and thats just counting the last 3 years of work, prior to that is all in a RAR on a backup drive.

 

i also hate now sometimes your edit or move vertices on one mesh, and another mesh effs up in 2009, sometimes i get random "Black Meshes" when i move stuff around, a random mesh will go black in max and in game, no matter how many times i apply a material.

 

i think i started abusing Boolean for rounded cuts, but over 50% of the time the smoothing gets botched, still trying to figure what causes it, as I can CTRL-Zed, and pick Operand B again and the 2nd time through will be fine with no changes.

 

if the object i need to cut has flat edges (ie speedbrake/gear doors.), i position the vertices in the corners, and detach/clone the faces for the object and its bay.

[+KnightWolf45]

im tryng to get the wings right on the mirage for two days and its stil not good

for rounded cut try proboolean but be sure that your mesh does not any holes or you will get a CTD save before any proboolean but its alot better then boolean

[+Zurawski]

yeah when i work on something i usually use the date+alpha revisions.. so.... ModelName_12.19.2011.a

 

i think for my CVN there's 940+ MAX Files. and thats just counting the last 3 years of work, prior to that is all in a RAR on a backup drive.

 

i also hate now sometimes your edit or move vertices on one mesh, and another mesh effs up in 2009, sometimes i get random "Black Meshes" when i move stuff around, a random mesh will go black in max and in game, no matter how many times i apply a material.

 

i think i started abusing Boolean for rounded cuts, but over 50% of the time the smoothing gets botched, still trying to figure what causes it, as I can CTRL-Zed, and pick Operand B again and the 2nd time through will be fine with no changes.

 

if the object i need to cut has flat edges (ie speedbrake/gear doors.), i position the vertices in the corners, and detach/clone the faces for the object and its bay.

 

Hmmm... Never has the black mesh issue. (Knock on wood!) Almost sounds like you might have polygons sharing the same plain. (This I've done...)

 

For cutting, depending on the complexity of the cut I either boolean it or snap-cut using a template. I stumbled upon this technique a few projects back and it's been a lifesaver!

 

http://www.mrbluesummers.com/1225/video-tutorials/monday-movie-45-circular-holes

 

This guys site has a lot of very useful tutorials and highly recommend it!

Edited December 19, 2011 by Zurawski

[+SkateZilla]

yeah i dunno what causes the black meshes, as CTRLZ doesnt fix it, nor does saving, closing, and re-opening. i usually have to go back to a max file before that or an autosave before it. i think its just an issue in 2009 with a few scenes I have. Max 2011 doesnt do it at all. It might actually be a UVUnwrap issue maybe the UVMap is somehow linked to the mesh i move, so when i move a mesh, the UVMap on another mesh moves or something. or Max does something to it.

 

I'll give the site a look, always looking for new techniques.

[+KnightWolf45]

for black mesh try to selecet all the polys and flip that works for me wend reset x-form truns my mesh black

[+russouk2004]

When im cutting stuff ...as per your gun ports,I copy the mesh and select the polys around it,select invert

,delete area I dont want,then edit the area,then after im happy with it delete the area of the original mesh and attach to the new part.

Edited December 19, 2011 by russouk2004

[+SkateZilla]

i was actually looking at quicker ways to produce models.

 

but 1:6th scale models online, assemble, and greendot scan, but that doesnt give the LOD we need unless you place A LOT of dots.

 

Maybe I should go the Microsoft/Turn10 Route, and Laser Scan , walk into the air and space museum and start laser scanning jets.. rahahaha

 

Then again I've seen some incredibly detailed scale models that i can laser scan and upsample to the correct size...

 

How how much would a Laser Scanner for max cost.. hrmm..

 

 

i was visiting here for a while, but most of it dont apply to exported models (the lighting and effects) as Thirdwire dont export that stuff.

 

http://www.3d-tutorial.com

Edited December 19, 2011 by SkateZilla

[+Zurawski]

When im cutting stuff ...as per your gun ports,I copy the mesh and select the polys around it,select invert

,delete area I dont want,then edit the area,then after im happy with it delete the area of the original mesh and attach to the new part.

 

I do the same here most of the time... Occasionally, I find keeping more of the mesh than you need is necessary to keep smoothing continuity... Sometimes if I keep too few polys, when I reattach and weld, it causes pinching problems with the origin mesh.

[+Spectre_USA]

 

Is it a bad thing that my mind's eye started glazing over about half-way through the thread?

 

I am starting to feel much better with my ceasing 3D operations back when I was a neophyte.

 

Yikes!

[+Zurawski]

 

As you can see... The cannon ports originally spanned across 4-5 polygons which when I attempted to cut the ports tended to flatten out and screwed the smoothing. I eventually (through trial and error) determined I has to sub-divide these 4 polygons into 16, apply my cuts, then snap-weld the border sections I was working over to fit back into the surrounding polys. Yes, it's ugly and highly inefficient and surely is not how the white-collar modelers (You know... the ones who get paid to do this stuff) would probably do it... but it works for me.

[+Zurawski]

 

Is it a bad thing that my mind's eye started glazing over about half-way through the thread?

 

I am starting to feel much better with my ceasing 3D operations back when I was a neophyte.

 

Yikes!

 

LOL! Actually... the fact that this gibberish causes your mind to seize means your a "normal" person who does not enjoy mental self-mutilation.

[+SkateZilla]

 

As you can see... The cannon ports originally spanned across 4-5 polygons which when I attempted to cut the ports tended to flatten out and screwed the smoothing. I eventually (through trial and error) determined I has to sub-divide these 4 polygons into 16, apply my cuts, then snap-weld the border sections I was working over to fit back into the surrounding polys. Yes, it's ugly and highly inefficient and surely is not how the white-collar modelers (You know... the ones who get paid to do this stuff) would probably do it... but it works for me.

 

 

TBH, i would just made a reverse template and used a boolean cut....

[+Zurawski]

TBH, i would just made a reverse template and used a boolean cut....

 

Sadly my first dozen tries were with boolean cuts... which looked fine until I tried cleaning up the 2 million errant verts.

[+SkateZilla]

Sadly my first dozen tries were with boolean cuts... which looked fine until I tried cleaning up the 2 million errant verts.

 

ok, yeah, that would have and has driven me bonkers on a number of occasions.