headus 3D tools

[dresdenwitch]

I've finally started on my first attempt at 'cutting' something up.
I've watched the first video on how to do this and the one thing I can't seem to do is to move the cut piece away.
I know the video says.. space and middle mouse button.. but it's just now working.

I'm using a mac laptop 10.6.8 and a mouse with two buttons and a wheel.

What am I doing wrong??

[dresdenwitch]

Got it working....

[headus]

Can you remember what the problem was? Don't worry if it sounds stupid, because I can put a note in the documentation for future users.

Phil

[dresdenwitch]

Yes.. Phil.. I was wanting to move a piece (shell?) away after I had cut it up.. and had to try a few combinations before it got the right one... LOL

>shift and right mouse button<

I'm slowly getting the hang of UVLayout and it seems so easy once I know what I am doing. Trouble is that I'm having to do it with 'baby' steps. If you remember I couldn't get it to work on my desktop so am having to do it on the laptop then move it back into the desktop.. but I'll get there. LOL

I've got to the stage where I now have the whole thing cut up and arranged in the 'red' box and I've saved it as .uvl so I'll see the next time I open UVLayout.. as to just what I have saved.

For a change I have started with something that I thought would be very simple.. it's suppose to be a birdbath.

[GeoffRiley]

Hi,

Just popping in with my tuppence worth - two of your shells, the upper left rectangular one and the lower middle 'line' - have blue edges. I don't if you are aware of what that indicates, so just in case...

When you create you mesh, if you have any 'holes' in the mesh where you reach an edge which is joined only to a single side, then you'll see these blue edges. It's not necessarily an error, but it alerts you to the fact that nothing joins to that particular piece of mesh from anywhere else.

If, on the other hand, you think that you have created a mesh with no holes, then the presence of a blue edge is something to make you think about where it has come from on the model. It is sometimes simply a matter of welding the appropriate points within your model editor, but it can also be an indicator of other faults that you might not have noticed - for example, if you have any manifold edges (that is, edges with more than two faces joining) you need to be sure that the appropriate faces are the ones that are being identified as joined. UVLayout, gives a warning about manifold edges, I think, when you attempt to load such a mesh.

Hope that's useful for you, if not - someone else browsing might find it such.

Kind regards,
Geoff

[dresdenwitch]

Thanks for that Geoff... that part is.. I think.. the cylinder that holds the birdbath and those edges I noticed when they were cut.. sort of folded in a bit on the corners. I'm not too sure what I can do as it's only a tube with no top or bottom. The thin ..what should be round.. bit with the blue line doesn't join anything at that edge so I guess that's right.

As I said.. I thought I was starting with something simple... maybe I should have started with a box.

[GeoffRiley]

Yup, an open tube makes sense - the chances are you need do nothing about it - if it is as I visualise, then it is part of the stand, and therefore there will be no camera angle that should be looking 'into' the tube.

As for the thin strip, I'm not exactly sure where you are placing it - is it the dish or the base? In either case has the element of the birdbath got thickness, or is it just a flat mesh lain over the top, or base underneath?

[dresdenwitch]

Hummm... the basin really has no thickness other than the rim. I changed how I packaged it and it doesn't look too bad in Poser.

I'm just now asking how to make a .jpg so that I can put a texture on it... see new post.

[GeoffRiley]

Ah, I see how that fits in now.

I haven't used Poser for a while - I lost my installation files in a disk failure but it was after Content Paradise had been absorbed by Smith Micro and they wouldn't entertain giving me a replacement download... I only had the option of upgrading from Poser 7 to Poser 9 at some exorbitant cost.

Anyway, that aside: I can't remember how Poser handles single sided faces. If the base of your dish has the normals pointing down, then you may find that the base of the dish vanishes when you view from above, and if the normals are pointing up, then the dish may vanish when views from below.

It would be better to complete the mesh by closing that face and then you can have all normals pointing outward, so that you can be sure of having visible faces from all angles.

[dresdenwitch]

Ahhh... so that's the reason when I look from above.. the 'water' or base of the dish area is invisible... but it shows up when I render it in Poser.

So what you are saying is that I need to make the dish thicker eg.. have a top and a bottom to the dish.

hummmm.... more work to be done.

[dresdenwitch]

O.K. have made it thicker, but now I can't separate them. I've tried all different ways of cutting it up.. but when I either click 'D' to move just one part of the basin into UV..eg .. the inside.. the whole thing goes.. same when I try to highlight just one of the bits of the basin that I have separated... the whole basin lights up. It's like they are still attached.. but I've look hard and can't find anything. The only thing I can think of is because it has that curve that.. like in real life.. one wouldn't be able to separate them... or is it something I'm not doing.

Thanks Geoff... I did a very simple texture following what you wrote.. it all worked.

think I worked out why they wouldn't seperate.. I had to get rid of some polys underneath that looked like they were joined somehow to the top.

[dresdenwitch]

and now to the next problem... I 'packed' up all the bits.. and saved as .tiff.
Went into photoshop and gave it a quick texture just to see how things were going... and this is the result.. what happened and how do I fix it?? I thought that if the UVLayout 'packed' the birdbath than that's how the textures would be. *sigh*

[GeoffRiley]

Possibly stupid question: Did you resave the .obj file with the updated UVs? ..and then copy that into the appropriate geometries directory?

Assuming you're using a personal runtime for this, it's good practice to build the geometries, props and textures directory structures: even if it seems overkill, it's good practice.

What modelling program are you using? If it's one that I'm familiar with, I might be able to help there too. If not, you're welcome to send me the .obj for me to take a look at if you want a second opinion (use: geoff dot riley at dazfool dot com). I'm sure Phil would do the same, but he takes a well earned rest at the weekends.

My suggestion was meant to be to put a cap on the hole that remained in the base of the dish rather than just applying thickness, but both methods should achieve similar results.

Kind regards,
Geoff

[dresdenwitch]

Having read what you have said.. I'm thinking that I probably mixed the old with the new.
So.. what I'll do is.. Remake the .obj with just a second skin on the basin where it's invisible.. cut and repack.. SAVE... then have a look again in Poser. That should do it??

The program I'm using is Cheetah3D and I'm only learning that too.
UVLayoutPro
PoserPro2012
Photoshop CS2... this is the one I can't afford to update..

[GeoffRiley]

Cheetah 3D... ah! Mac only package.

I know very little about Cheetah 3D I'm afraid, pity that, however... what you're suggesting sound about right: get used to the work flow so that it feels gets to be a natural progression.

When I'm showing people how to start out I very often start with cubes and then extrude those cubes into more interesting blocky structures, then I move on to things with curves.... as soon as a curve in introduced and you start getting involved with balancing stretch with compression people seem to start to worry about it. I have found it's a lot more difficult to keep someone concentrating on the work flow when all the time they're just trying to get absolutely everything white. I've known people virtually divide an entire object into pairs or triplets of faces just to get everything white.

Keep it simple for now - don't get overly worried about things. Perfect your work flow: that is what will stand you in good stead in the long run.

Your birdbath is a pretty good starter - nothing too complex, but enough to give you something interesting at the end of it. Don't forget that the UV map is also used for the bump map too, so you can add texture to your birdbath by adding in a desaturated image for that (I think Poser uses offset from rgb[127,127,127], 50% key, for it's bump texture map).

There now, I've waffled on long enough again... hope it helps.

Kind regards,
Geoff