Spline-Surface

[flingster]

no replies...strange...i'll take a look...thanks for sharing...

[bigbackcomics]

I downloaded it earlier this morning and played with it briefly.

It seems to bring to a true spline patch modeller to c4d which is something I have missed coming over from Lightwave.

Do-it could you be a bit more specific as to the rules regarding the sorting the direction of the points? Or any other rules this plugin requires. I know with Lightwave there are some rules to follow to get correct patches. For example, in Lightwave you need to ensure points are welded together at cross sections.

I echo Flinster. Thanks for sharing this.

Cheers,

[do-it]

you can download a sample-file to get a default plane for easier handling ;o)

http://www.motion-gimmick.com/downloads/test-splines.zip

It is now also included in the pluginzip.


thank you for feedback

best wishes
do-it

[Newstream]

Wow :bounce:
I don't know about you guys but this little gem just made my day!
Excellent for rolling landscape, sloping grass patches etc. within arch-viz projects.
This saves me from having to precision model them in Rhino using the...

http://photos15.flickr.com/20277949_8ae978eb54_o.jpg “Surface from 2, 3 or 4 Edge curves”
&
http://photos17.flickr.com/20277950_ee32c00da6_o.jpg “Patch” commands before exporting them into C4D.

Hey Do-it.... A BIG THANK YOU! for sharing this!


Kind Regards / Alex

[Katachi]

Wow :bounce:
I don't know about you guys

You should know them. It´s motion gimmick => Add the Sea. Very friendly guys (and gals) with good tools. :)

[bigbackcomics]

Well the plugin looks to be good. :) Yeah! spline patching in C4d.

Thanks for the sample file do-it.

I have a question. It seems like you must have 4 splines in the patch for it to render which begs the question can you have 1 spline surface or patch object with a grid of splines? Meaning is it possible to build continuous patch meshes from 1 spline surface object? So if I had 7 splines with 1 spline to be shared between patch sections can I continue to build patch meshes in this continous manner?

Am I making any sense? :)

Or is it restricted to having 4 splines per spline surface object which would then require stiching together patches?

A mighty thank you again for this!!

Cheers,

[duderender]

is this an enhanced "patch-it" ?

[govinda]

So we've had months of fanfare about a nurbs patch from another group and now with zero fanfare, this appears. Bizarre. Is it the same thing? I'm on a mac and so can't test it.

[do-it]

@bigbackcomics: With this mathematical solution there is no serious way to use more splines,
but wait a little - we are not in a death end with this theme ;o)

@duderender: No it is not an enhanced Patch-It. Patch-It is a polytool, no Nurbs.
Patch-It is a little bit more like a brainstorm-modelling. You use all different objects (Splines, polys, cubes or...... in cinema, you have - put it in this tool and build something new from the points you choose ;o)

There are now two Spline-Surface tools:
1. In latest one you can download now - you only can edit the subdivisions of the patch.
2. My own Spline-Surface (may be someone was fast enough to download it ;o)) has
some undocumented parms to manipulate parts of the patch in attributemanager.

I will document and name this parms a little userfriendly in the next week and update
the Spline-surface - if you like ;o) and certainly mac-Version follows soon.


There is another programmer (Mandrake) working at the same theme, may be he finds another good solution and enhanced options für Nurbspatches.

---------------------
BTW. next week we update Add-the-Sea, with some nice new features:
More editing options in AM - Starting the waves in mainmenu, editing in AM.
Shader now will work in batch- ann netrendering and Particles are now able to create waves.

Thank you for your kindly postings.
best wishes
do-it

[Newstream]

Just a quick test to see how it could handle 4 splines twisted around in strange positions.


// Alex

http://goto.glocalnet.net/newstream/examples/surface.jpg

[peXel]

oh i like that plug very much

i need a option for control the surface itself for weight it + 0 -

have a look at my attached example


cheers
peXel

[bigbackcomics]

@bigbackcomics: With this mathematical solution there is no serious way to use more splines,
but wait a little - we are not in a death end with this theme ;o)


Hey do-it I am not complaining believe me. This is more than we had before and is still very great for a number of uses.

I cant wait to see what else you guys will do to make it even better.

I have alot of experience with spline patch modelling and if you ever would like some suggestions for future implementations please email me and I would be glad to do whatever I can to help out.

Cheers,

[Cybergooch]

Hey, thanks! Very cool....it's full of spline-patchy goodness!


http://www.cybergooch.com/cgtalk/patch.jpg

[do-it]

but I think Mad Mandrax is on a very cool way with his splinepatcher. I saw a screenshot of his tool and when he does it like he promises his solution for Splinepatching is very professionell.

Take a look at this thread:

http://c4dtreff.de/c4dforum/read.php?f=3&i=191604&t=191472

So we will do another modeller with other options and other results.
We have so much ideas and we are coding the whole day long.
So our next tool will be ready very fast and I hope you like it as much as this little
spline-surface.


best wishes and good luck to mad mandrax
(but if you will wait too long, we will code it ;o))

best wishes
do-it

[Petticoat Gal]

hello,
I have tried the plugin, but whatever I do the shape comes out like a mess.
Any tut how to get the splines all in the right position so that it works with the plugin?

[do-it]

load the testspline-file included in this little tool and add points to the splines.
Than move the additional points in any direction and you will see it works.

Each spline can have different numbers of points and different interpolation - it doesn´t matter.

cheers
do-it

[c4dportal]

hello,
I have tried the plugin, but whatever I do the shape comes out like a mess.
Any tut how to get the splines all in the right position so that it works with the plugin?

That is because you have to use the option "set first point"...for each spline you have to choose a specific order for a first point. It is explained in a tutorial in this thread:
http://83.217.81.28/portal/forum/showthread.php?p=368#post368

You can find it halfway down the page.

[Petticoat Gal]

thanks a lot for all the advise.
I will try that out now :)


Edited: that set first point did it.
Now I can make it smooth.
Thanks.:bounce:

[Kirl]

Very cool, thanks for sharing!

[RangTang]

For us spline lovers this is helpful, and fun. It is what the default C4D Bezier Nurbs patch should be. An addition I would like to see, for a quicker setup, is a button to add four splines with x-amount of points.

[c4dportal]

thanks a lot for all the advise.
I will try that out now :)


Edited: that set first point did it.
Now I can make it smooth.
Thanks.:bounce:

No problem :)

[Petticoat Gal]

to show you that I finally managed to set my splies straight.
here a piece of ducting I have made :)

[Zendorf]

BTW. next week we update Add-the-Sea, with some nice new features:
More editing options in AM - Starting the waves in mainmenu, editing in AM.
Shader now will work in batch- ann netrendering and Particles are now able to create waves.




Very cool to hear that you are changing the ui for ATS ! It is a great plugin, but I haven't used it much, beacause everytime I come back to it, I seem to have forgotten how the arcane interface works....it is truly mystifying. Will this be a paid or free update? Any more details about the particles ot waves feature...sounds extremely interesting...

[developer]

@govinda "So we've had months of fanfare about a nurbs patch from another group and now with zero fanfare, this appears. Bizarre. Is it the same thing? "

No, it is not. It is from different people in different companies.
It is not a modeler yet, but a way of generating a non-editable single patch based on 4 Cinema4D splines. They are working towards a modeling solution.


@do-it: "There is another programmer (Mandrake) working at the same theme, may be he finds another good solution and enhanced options für Nurbspatches."

@do-it: "With this mathematical solution there is no serious way to use more splines,
but wait a little - we are not in a death end with this theme ;o)"

This is obviously not NURBS what you are talking about.
Please dont get me wrong. I do not doubt your honesty or good faith. But the point is: you are simply wrong if you use the Term NURBS which stands for NonUniform Rational B-Splines and is a well defined de facto standard that is industry wide used as a Brand for this technology. It is part of many national US and international standards.
You might get in trouble if people buy your plugin who are in need of true NURBS. Although for a professional it might be obvious that a 30 Euro thing cannot be true NURBS, to many others it is not.

This is what Mandrake wrote as an answer on the german C4D-Forum:
"Hi Chris,
ich weiß ehrlich gesagt nicht, was du mit Trimming meinst! Kannst du das mal erklären?
Und Blending? Für Löcher gibt's doch Bool. Oder meinst du die Glättung der Kanten von aneinandergrenzenden Patches?"

Translation:
"Hi Chris, honestly i do not know what is meant by trimming. Could you explain? And Blending? For Holes there is Booleans, no? Or do you mean smoothing of borders of adjacent patches?"

I know it might look mean to some of you to translate this here, but i am convinced that there is enough confusion about Patches, NURBS modelers and Plugins to make it crystal clear to everybody who is doing what on which technological level.

regards
Peter

[Erik Heyninck]

Thanks for clearing that out, Peter. Yet, Maxon (and other companies) also use the word "nurbs", so the confusion is about as deep-rooted as the ppi-dpi-lpi confusion.

You are right of course that if, for example, I buy a ruler that should be 50cm long but infacts weights 50 kilos, I can complain about it. Yet I think here we use the Maxon/Cinema terminology. Inprecise perhaps, but the one we know.
I have no real Nurbs experience so I can't comment in depth, only wanted to sketch the situation.

[do-it]

Instead of Nurbs, we should say: Cinema-"Nurbs".
But anyway the minimum effect will be a nice solution for creating additional Cinema"Nurbses" like Loft, Sweep etc. ;o)

So I am looking forward to Mad Mandrax new modelling option positiv.


nurbs or not nurbs - that is the question ;o)

best wishes
do-it

[peXel]

every 3d program has nurbs and hasn't nurbs !
so we should call them nrbs what might be correct, but it's not really a word
you need the u for right spelling.
so everybody will call it nurbs anyway if it's nrbs or nrs or ...
they are called nurbs. i do, everybody else :)
nobody call them non uniform rational b-splines or does anybody know (without searching in google) what LASER means !?

so i don't think there will be any problems for anybody, if the programmers call them nurbs instead of nrbs.

maybe on or two programs will rename them, but i don't think so :)

so what i really need is input:

i see do-it 2 year old kewl plugin.
is see mandrakes spline-patch nurbs plugin, which is nearly that, what i need if i hear spline patches.
but what i really want to see is, how "real" nurbs are look like in cinema4D!
do you have some screenshot from the plugin you are currently working on?
that would be very nice.

best regards
peXel

[duderender]

Instead of Nurbs, we should say: Cinema-"Nurbs".
But anyway the minimum effect will be a nice solution for creating additional Cinema"Nurbses" like Loft, Sweep etc. ;o)

So I am looking forward to Mad Mandrax new modelling option positiv.


nurbs or not nurbs - that is the question ;o)

best wishes
do-it

They already have names. I wrote an article where I talked about this in HDRI magazine. Maxon uses the term "hypernurbs", Newtek uses the term "metanurbs" and this means is they apply a smoothing algorithm to develop a smooth looking surface that mimics what you might achieve with NURBS modeling.

To facilitate nurbs surfaces, the program applies mathematical formulas to derive the surface and in doing so you achive an exact surface whereas the polygon smoothing 'nurbs' are simply approximations.

@Developer, are you creating a NURBS engine within Cinema or is there provision already within Cinema. Also do you plan to have the curves linked to the surfaces so that the nurbs patches update as you modify the curves? Lastly are you utilzing only bezier type splines or multiple order splines?

[acmepixel]

After looking at the examples on treff.de I am reminded of Hash Animation Master's spline patches. They are definitly not standard NURBS. But have an interesting "hooks" feature for connecting low density patches to high density patches.

This system is a much friendlier method for artists. NURBS are mainly for Engineers and technical types. I have FormZ, Rhino and the now defunct Electric Image Modeler which all use standardized NURBS. I really did not like using them, personally. If folks need true NURBS, there's always Rhino.

So I'm hoping we can get a friendlier system like Hash or Lightwave spline patches. The samples shown are very encouraging.

[duderender]

After looking at the examples on treff.de I am reminded of Hash Animation Master's spline patches. They are definitly not standard NURBS. But have an interesting "hooks" feature for connecting low density patches to high density patches.

This system is a much friendlier method for artists. NURBS are mainly for Engineers and technical types. I have FormZ, Rhino and the now defunct Electric Image Modeler which all use standardized NURBS. I really did not like using them, personally. If folks need true NURBS, there's always Rhino.

So I'm hoping we can get a friendlier system like Hash or Lightwave spline patches. The samples shown are very encouraging.

@acmepixel, why formz and rhino?

[acmepixel]

@acmepixel, why formz and rhino?

Well, at the time, Electric Image had no modeler and the the most popular choice was FormZ. It's the only software program I actually felt the need to take a course in. (yikes!) Even though Rhino is a surface modeler, it is much easier to use, probably the most friendly of the high-end NURBS programs. But I never really needed all that technical power. So I switched to C4D and never looked back. (OK, I did look back at all the wasted time and money). Funny thing is I bought Rhino instead of OKINO's Polytrans. Because i thought it was more bang for the buck. I mostly use Rhino as an IGES translator to get .obj into C4D.

But once I got the hang of HyperNurbs I couldn't find anything I couldn't model. And the C4D-BP-Zbrush combo is everything I always wanted.

Getting easy-to-use Spline Patches in C4D would be icing on the cake.

[duderender]

Well, at the time, Electric Image had no modeler and the the most popular choice was FormZ. It's the only software program I actually felt the need to take a course in. (yikes!) Even though Rhino is a surface modeler, it is much easier to use, probably the most friendly of the high-end NURBS programs. But I never really needed all that technical power. So I switched to C4D and never looked back. (OK, I did look back at all the wasted time and money). Funny thing is I bought Rhino instead of OKINO's Polytrans. Because i thought it was more bang for the buck. I mostly use Rhino as an IGES translator to get .obj into C4D.

But once I got the hang of HyperNurbs I couldn't find anything I couldn't model. And the C4D-BP-Zbrush combo is everything I always wanted.

Getting easy-to-use Spline Patches in C4D would be icing on the cake.

I design with Pro/ENGINEER and so high order nurb surfaces would be welcome in C4D for me. Adding Rhino was for my own modeling benefit and I already own Nugraf (Polytrans with Render engine).

[Petticoat Gal]

nurbses can be quite interesting :)
I have just downloaded the Amapi designer software.
To tell you frankly, thats an absolutely impossible to work with piece of "I uninstall it asap".
I find Cinema the most user friendly and it can all I want to do.

[moka.studio]

Real Nurbs, or otherwise (...) it would be nice to have some of the features supported by Nurbs Modelling programms, in Cinema4d. The polygonal/ SubDiv. modelling has been greaty improved lately, now it is the turn of the spline based modelling IMO. Options such as trims, blends, bi-rails, Coons... , fillets would be truly welcome, as there are times when it is hard to model curved surfaces in C4d... It is on of those things where a lot of C4d users who have not modelled in something esle might not see the advantages, but they will as soon as a serious implementation is there ... remember Ngons, and how many people questioned their use, ... whoe would want to go back to just tris and quads now...
I definitely welcome any development, and Dagamar's little plugin is great, will come handy in many situations!
As far as modelling in Rhino or other, and importing, sure it can be done, but it greatly reduces the workflow, an dis limited also by the fact that C4d can only at present import surfaces conveted ot polygonal meshes, which is not very flexible....

btw, I also found teh Amapi interface awkward, but it does have some nice little tools, and some form of construction histrory, which Rhino lacks ( however the tools are much more straightforward in Rhino, and more extensive IMO)
jp

[AdamT]

FWIW, Rhino 4 (already in beta) will have construction history for most things.

[duderender]

FWIW, Rhino 4 (already in beta) will have construction history for most things.

I still have to get a grasp on this as you seem to have to 'turn it on' when you want it. Not a true feature based history. However, it is on their list to develop so maybe a version 4 service release.

The fact you can save out as v3 Rhino is great so in case I get a hiccup in v4 I can continue on in v3.

Re: Amapi, it is a truly love it or hate it interface. If you were trying v7 you are using the 'best' version. I don't know if anyone else remembers v3 to v5 but it was uttery horrid.

Re: import from Rhino, that is what @developer is doing... a native .3dm import so other than being native in C4D there isn't much of a workflow issue. At least not from my designer POV.

[Petticoat Gal]

this plugin is really nice, once you know how to handle it.
Here is an america flag I have made with it .

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