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View Full Version : Dealing with Nurbs or Hi-Res head

Keithtron
02-28-2008, 04:10 AM
Ok, so I've got a nurbs patch modeled head that I need to rig. I normally wouldn't have to, but I'm repurposing a head from an old model for my thesis character. Don't have time to model a new head, and I like the old one anyways.

In any case, not only is a nurbs patch model head a pain to rig, but it's hard to get it to render nice and without seams. I'd like to somehow generate a high-res poly version and a low-res proxy, and just use that.

I thought it would be easy to convert it to pollies, with a high tessellation, and then bring that into Z-brush to export a caged version that would function as a low res proxy. It looks like in order to do that, I'd have to go through the whole Zbrush re-topologizing thing, which I don't know how to do. Maybe I'm wrong, but that's my understanding.

So yeah, any suggestions would be much appreciated, thanks!
Keithtron
02-29-2008, 01:44 AM
Another option I'm considering is just going ahead and rigging the patch model head, then using that as some sort of wrap deformer on the hi-res poly head. Not sure how successful that will be, but if I wind up doing that, I'll let you folks know how it goes.

For what it's worth, I'm planning on doing a bone-based setup for the lips/mouth/jaw. Probably blendshapes for the brows, and I'm not quite sure about the eyelids. After my thesis is over, I'll probably drive a displacement map for some creases in the forehead. This is a robotic character though, so it won't really need those creases for what I'm doing. It'll probably be good for the reel down the road though.
Keithtron
03-10-2008, 03:55 PM
Problem solved.
:-)

What I ended up doing, which I probably should've thought to do right off the bat, was just convert the patch model to pollies using CV's as the polygon vertices. Maya can't automatically attach the output meshes when you do that, so I just had to go in and attach them all and clean up a couple places where I down-res'ed my nurbs patches and where my patches didn't have enough resolution. The resulting low-poly mesh might not smooth EXACTLY into the original patch modeled form, but it's definitely close enough! I wanted to tweak the head anyway, and it's better that it's not exactly the same as the original. (Especially since the original was a muscular dude, and this is a feminine robot!)
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03-10-2008, 03:55 PM
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