
	Polymesh Edit

The Polymesh Edit window provides you with a handful of tools that can be used to prepare polymeshes for patch fitting or slicing. At this stage, polygon reduction and multiplication are the only tools available within CySlice itself. Others, such as hole filling and smoothing, are part of the CyEat polymesh editor.

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Figure 19. Polymesh Edit Tools

To activate the Polymesh Edit tools, click on the white right arrow after the Polymesh Edit label in the main CySlice window.

Fill and Smooth

As mentioned above, if you want to fill holes and smooth parts of a polymesh, then you need to load that PLY file into CyEat. Click on the Fill and Smooth arrow to bring up a file selection window, select the PLY file, and click on Edit to run CyEat with that polymesh loaded.

For directions on how to use CyEat, consult the CyEat Editing User Guide.

NOTE: to save filled and smoothed polymeshes, use the <.> key in CyEat. The Polymesh Edit save buttons only apply to polymeshes loaded in CySlice.

NOTE: not all CyEat tools are available to users with just a CySlice license. For access to the 3D cut and paste and sculpting tools, a CyDir or PlyEdit license is required.

Loop Subdivide

Each click of the Loop Subdivide button quadruples the number of vertexes and faces in the polymesh. Its fairly slow, so to be prepared to wait a while (many minutes) for larger polymeshes to be subdivided.

Figure 20. Loop Subdivision

Figure 20 shows the original polymesh on the left, one level of subdivision in the middle, and a further subdivision on the right. You can see that the Loop subdivision (similar to Catmull-Clark subdivision, but for triangles not quads) does a fairly good job of reducing the polygon facet look while retaining edges and texture.
The reduction of the faceted look can be important when extracting displacement maps. If the resolution of displacement maps are higher than the polymesh point density, they will begin to capture the flat faces and you'll see them in the final renders. By Loop subdividing the polymesh before calculating the maps, you can reduce this effect.