Drill tool and subpatching?

[SplineGod]

I think its better to wait until you have the base object laid out using Subpatches and frozen before usiing booleans or soild drill.
Your other option is to model the hole or shape while in Subpatch mode rather then relying on drilling.
Another option is to turn off subpatches, do your solid drill then use a plugin that comes with LW called metaform plus. It will Subdivide your object including any ngons. Everything is converted to quads. Do it at a low Subdivision level and then turn Subpatches back on.

[hrgiger]

Depending on what it is you're trying to drill, you may want to model the shape into the base object to begin with and avoid the drill tool all together. Of course, if you're talking about drilling 1,000 depressions into the side of an object, then I say freeze it and drill away. But generally, I try to keep everything subpatch friendly in case I ever want to increase the subdivision later.

[webshot]

I think its better to wait until you have the base object laid out using Subpatches and frozen before usiing booleans or soild drill.
Your other option is to model the hole or shape while in Subpatch mode rather then relying on drilling.
Another option is to turn off subpatches, do your solid drill then use a plugin that comes with LW called metaform plus. It will Subdivide your object including any ngons. Everything is converted to quads. Do it at a low Subdivision level and then turn Subpatches back on.
That metaform way sounds like a plan. Basically what I am doing is carving a logo into a bar of soap that has a slope (like dove soap). It is just a still for print so no animation is necessary. But all Ihave been hearing since I started using LW is to avoid ngons at all costs. But when I do my drill after freezing I get some strange polys. Dont know how to prevent that. I have not tried to render with the ngons yet, But I heard LW rejects them.

[SplineGod]

Ngons work fine as long as you keep them planar (all the points sit on a sngle plane). Non planar polys can cause rendering errors. If you create text in modeler and extrude it the sides will be composed of 4 sided polys but the faces of the letters will be ngons. Again, keep them planar and they will render fine. The same holds true when making gears, the front and back faces will be ngons.

When using SubDs you can only use 3 or 4 sided polys. The 4 sided polys can be non planar but will work fine in subpatch mode.

The problem that can occur when using booleans or solid drill is that many of the polys along the cut will become n sided polys AND non planar polys. In those cases you will probably have to convert those polys to triangles since they can never be nonplanar. You can do that with the triple tool in modeler. After tripling the non planars the polys will also work in subpatch mode. You may get some strange artifacts where you have multiple triangles in the same area close together. In those cases I may try and convert every 2 triangles into a quad poly. I also try and constrain boolean or solid drill operations in such a way to control this sort of problem in some kind of predictable way.

Metaform plus is another SubD algorythm thats been in LW for awhile. It works with ngons but is not interactive. In pre LW6 days you could animate SubD cages that had ngons using a plugin called metamate. It worked in conjunction with metaform plus.

[webshot]

many thanks SG

Makes alot of sense and actually helped clear up a few things that were on my mind... Being that the surface was curved that I used the drill on. I have alot of clean up to do. Thanks

Wheres my manners....Thanks hrgiger as well.

[SplineGod]

Glad it was helpful :)

[hrgiger]

Webshot, another suggestion I have is to build the text first so that it's subpatch friendly meaning all quads. Then you can use tools like bend to confom the text into the shape of the front of the bar of soap. Then you can just extend your text out to make up the front side of the bar of soap. Then you can just extrude your text down into the soap to make the depression and forget that crappy drill tool all together. But then again, that's probably how I would do it because I like the option of using subpatches.

[webshot]

hhmmm... I think that just flew over my head..lol. What i am trying to do is cut an .eps logo made in AI into the soap. Wait as I was typing I think I understood. Let me see if I follow you correctly. Start off with my logo, then model out from there to make the bar of soap? Kinda like box modelling but starting from the logo?

Sorry if I just stated the obvious, but still working the kinks out on modelling.

[hrgiger]

Yeah, you have the general idea but you might be making it a bit more complicated then it has to be. I would model the rest of the bar of soap like you normally would with the exception of the face that will have the text on it. Then I would make the text like I was saying, bend it to conform to the front of the soap, and yes, extrude out from the text to the edges of the soap bar. Less like box modeling and a little more like point by point. It might be a little messy if you have a lot of points for you text and not a lot of points on the edge of your soap so obviously, the simpler you could make it the better. But again, that's how I would do it but I certainly wouldn't be opposed to drilling it in if it was going to be much easier.

[hrgiger]

Come to think of it, it might even be easier to just make your text, and then draw some polygons around it to make the round soap shape. This whole thing will be flat on one axis. Then you just bend the whole thing, extrude that shape into a 3D bar.

[webshot]

aaahhhh.....then weld my points (more along the lines of spline modelling kinda?). That could possibly work. The logo is not terribly intricate. I cant believe this little thing is posing such a problem.. I guess it is part of the growing pains. Man I wish my Uni offered 3d classes. (kinda learning on my own trial and error style)


Thanks for the gems of knowledge.

[hrgiger]

Here's what I mean. First lay out your text, and extrude it out into a round shape like your soap bar...

Sorry, I have to make these small to post on CGTalk...

[hrgiger]

then bend it....

[hrgiger]

extrude it...(I also bandsawed in a few lines to tighten it up)

[hrgiger]

and then extrude in your text.... This is overly simplified but you get the idea...

[hrgiger]

Of course, I might also spline model the soap and drill the sucker....

[webshot]

aahhhhh.....I see said the blind man. That is indeed a nice technique. I will try that as well. Many many thanks for taking the time to help me understand.

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