A couple of questions about hard-surface best practices...

[JohnSG]

Yes you can get away with quite alot. Best way to think about it is that you are modelling with Bézier curves. The minimum amount of geo possible to create the required arc or shape.

[El Burritoh]

I've always have problems with "stars" (high-valence points) on curved surfaces. Is that a problem for anyone else?

[JohnSG]

Here is a few images showing a few tips in how to create really clean light geo.

As i mentioned the best way to think about it is Bézier curves, and the curves maya already has are great for helping to layout your geo.

Take this example, you want to cut a hole into a surface, Take a curve and using the cv points from a default circle (8 is a good number 6 and 4 can sometime be to low and stretch) using the split poly tool I cut in my points roughly and then snap them to the circles cv point, now you know that when it sub divides it will be a perfect circle.

We use this technique alot here, from circles to very complex shapes, I regularly draw the outline of the shape I want in curves to see how many point to need to create it.

[JohnSG]

Originally Posted by El Burritoh

I've always have problems with "stars" (high-valence points) on curved surfaces. Is that a problem for anyone else?

It can be down to each studios pipeline, What could be an issue for one place may not be to another. Do you have an image that would show the problem you have with them.

[rasmusW]

wow! this is exactly what i've been seeking around other forums. people, ranking high and low shareing workflows. you don't see many forums doing this imo.
i'm learning so much from this. thanks john and the rest of you guys.

here is a few of my thoughts on some of the topics covered here (in no particulare order):

at work we have used the mr bevel shader (roundcorner). though i wouldn't normally put my faith in the shader to do the work. it did work well on that particulare lego project. we did it due to time constraints and art direction.

as for apps i use for modeling. at work it's all maya and zbrush, but at home i mostly use silo. it's very basic toolset, but it just works so well. especially for organic modeling. for hardsurface modeling i'd probally lean toward maya.

-r

[JohnSG]

Originally Posted by ianucci

Nice stuff John. I have a couple of questions.

That last shot, i see you have some edge loops around some of the segments so presumably that part is not meant to smooth perfect round. Be cool if you could show some close ups of the smoothed surface.

How do you decide when you can get away with using intersecting geometry, that has always been a tough one of me. I presume on small parts you can get away with it because they wont be seen close up, does that mean beyond a certain size everything has to have smoothed edges? I'm always concerned about that 'infinitely sharp edge' with hard surface modelling.

Its a fairly small piece on the bonnet. I try not to over do it in areas that will not be seen unless it was an extreme close-up. If this was a bigger piece or seen more closely I would have increased the amount of geo around the outside, which would result in a smooth surface.

[El Burritoh]

There's also another way of putting round cylinders into meshes like that. Either as cylinders that come off, or holes that go in. You can grab those four initial polies, inset them (bevel without shifting out), and collapse them in on a single point. Then bevel that central point out and you've got a circular shape to do whatever you want with. Add edge loops as needed to tighten things up.

I don't have any examples of the high-valence point problem that I can post, the situation you have around the interior ring of your wheel rims is an area that would probably give me rendering errors. Depends on the rendering engine maybe?

[weiluntsai]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIfvbKovHWY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIfvbKovHWY

very smart way

[El Burritoh]

Arrays like that are annoying. There's no quick way to do that stuff. The snapping in that app (what app was that?) seemed very responsive!

Reminds me of a chair I did for a music video (wireframe of the seat). And then it was used as a BG object! Argh!

[weiluntsai]

Originally Posted by El Burritoh

Arrays like that are annoying. There's no quick way to do that stuff. The snapping in that app (what app was that?) seemed very responsive!

Reminds me of a chair I did for a music video (wireframe of the seat). And then it was used as a BG object! Argh!

hummm...i thought you post a picture. nice job of the chair