Make curves into lines to make surface
OrcaSoul
Posts: 119
I have two sets of curves - Lt-A-B and Rt-A-B. I need to make them into lines so I can use the Ruled Surface tool to make them into 2 separate surfaces - which will them each be placed in a separate corner so I can use the Bridge tool to make round corners inside the object on the left...in other words, make an arch at the inside top of the form.
I tried the Ruled Surface tool on the curves, but of course they are not "lines", so that didn't work.
If I try to expand the thickness of the curves, they are rounded, like a cord, which will not work since I want a smooth surface and edge inside the arch, to fit a door frame into.
The door will be a frame because the primary use of the arch is to show what is on the other side.
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In Dynamic Geometry field (bottom right side) press little lightning icon to colapse dynamic geometry, thus making lines from curves.
That worked, thanks.
Worked on it at the gallery - slow going because the laptop wouldn't scroll!
Found a new problem...I closed the form by welding an "L" made of 2 flat objects to the curves, to make a closed section that I want to fill..
See the 1st image.
When I select all 3 edges on one side, and use the close tool to add a surface between the 3 edges, the inside of the curve is closed!
Not what I want!
It appears that the tool actually filled the inside of the curve itself, iqnoring the aea outside of the curve to the sides of the "L", which is what I want.
The "close" tool is not the right one for the job - it closed in a direct line, as it is designed to do. This is a tool best used with caution - if the gap to be filled doesn't have an equal number of verts on each side, it will fill with an n-gon (a face with more than 4 sides, which must be avoided like the plague!).
I only use that tool to detect whether there are holes in the mesh, but don't use it to do the actual fill.
Suggestion for achieving what I think you want to do - draw your arc and your "L" shape - don't have the ends touching. Remember to collapse DG in each case by hitting the lightening bolt. Use the ruled surfaces tool to join the two curves with faces and give it some thickness. To complete the arch, delete the top side face where the two parts will meet, hit the symmetry tool (+ X axis), weld the two meshes and do an average weld to join them.
OK...I tried it as separate parts, no DG, add thickness - did not work.
Tried a number of other things, then moved them to contact, ran around the form in points mode recording each point- including each of the 20 in the curve - then drew a polyline around the form, resetting each point to it's proper coordinates. Then extruded that line to proper width, and closed the openings with the close tool.
Made a copy & reversed it 180.
Worked perfectly.
Moved them in place in the wall and welded the 3 pieces.
Looking good!
Then I added the left top wall: polyline, set points, extruded & close.
Great!
Then did the same on the right wall, adding a slot for the window in the polyline, set points, extruded.
All that was left is the close...
Here's the setup with the outline highlighted before the close:
And here is after I click Close, ready to hit "Close All"
The blue lines are gone, there are red corners, the edges are white.
At this point everything goes south...
If I follow the instructions in the book and click on a white line to make it red, Hex crashes.
If I click on the red corners, Hex crashes.
If I simply go to the "Close All" button, Hex crashes.
At this point all I can think of doing is construct the form out of 3 cubes:
And then slice in at an angle on the right to form the roof slope on that side.
Is this a common problem with Hex? It seems to happen on curves and non-standard shapes.
In this run alone it crashed over 20 times, didn't seem to matter if I just restarted Hex or restartes the computer - or even shut down, waited a bit, aand started up clean.
And yes, it's the latest version, the PC is a new Dell with 32 GB of RAM and 2 monitors, and lots of speed...
The main cause of Hex crashing is when it is asked to do something it wasn't designed for - it doesn't have an efficient error catching to tell you - "Hey, you can't do that!". :)
What you have there is a combination of the two dealy sins - n-gons and non-manifold edges - a sure-fire way of inviting a crash.
A non-manifold edge is one where an edge is connected to more than one face - usually an internal face. Difficult to tell exactly in smooth solid mode, but looking at close-1.jpg, you have a face or faces on the open side of the roof triangle. Adding a face/s to that would result in both n-gons and non-manifold edges.
In my example, delete the two highlighted faces before connecting the unconnected strip - close will then work. There are far more efficient methods of building this mesh - I'm only showng an example of how the close tool could work.
To detect whether you have bad geometry; with your mesh selected in object mode, go to the top menu "Selection -> select over-4- points faces". If anything gets highighted, it needs to be fixed right away. Do the same for "non manifold edges". This is a good diagnostic tool, pretty much unique to Hex until very recently - make use of it.
I also suggest that when you pose questions, give us screencaps in "smoothed solid and edges" mode - see the arrow on my pic, or
flat solid and edges". That way we can see the geometry, which makes it a lot easier to detect problems:)
Set the mode as "smoothed solid and edges".
Deleted the two faces on the inside that connect to the left segment.
Note: The images are removed from the model to show the effect better, but the result is the same on or off the form.
Selected "Close", then hit "Close All".
Note the following:
From the rear the surface is at an angle inside the form - it is attached to both edges of the roof slope AND the vertical side.
Fllipping the view horozonally, we can see that the surface is NOT attached to the back corner of the form...
Oh, and the window area is covered.
So...I went with 3 cubes and a tesslerate...works fine.
Thanks for your help - while I appear to stumble I am actually learning what I can do - and how to do what I need when the "obvious" way doesn't work.
OK, I see your problem - the close tool is intended to close holes in a closed mesh which has holes in it. It will build a face between edges which make up a closed loop. In your example, there are so many combinations of which edges to connect to close it, it makes a complete hash of the job. If you, for instance, take a sphere and delete a few random faces, it will close those faces. This is what it is intended for. See my pic - it works fine under that configuration because the edges make closed loops.
In your example, the bridge tool is what you are looking for - it will bridge across gaps. It can't be used to build a face to close a triangle, because there are no gaps - that is where the close tool would work. In my example, I could use either the close tool (all) as a single operation, or use the bridge tool twice to accomplish the same result.
So, if I had welded the left and right upper walls together, the close would have worked?
Well, it's been a hard test, but I think I am starting to get the gist of this thing. I have a few more details to finish on the walls, add the entrance trim and the window (already made) and maybe take a look at the materials for the wall. Then move it to VUE and add some vegitation.
I've appreciated the hilp - and may be back with anther project at some point.
I do think - if this wall finishes as nice as I hope - to take a look at doing the entire structure as a medival stone house with a courtyard behind this wall...should be able to use what I've learned here to do most of that.
Yes, it is a bit of a learning curve:)
Just to give you an idea of how such a structure could be done - this was all extruded from an arc. All one piece and quads.
Extrusion is the most commonly used and very important skill to learn in 3D modelling.
Good luck with the project:)
All from an arc...
Yeah...I have to try that..."But but but...the sun is shining, there is yard work to do!"
OK, a follow-up on the project.
I finished the wall, exported it as a 3DS file (OJB did not work in either DAZ or VUE - the openings were not open).
Imported it into VUE, here is the model with a test material applied:
Look at the "raised" area at the top of the lower wall...where does that come from?
By "raised area" I take it you don't mean the parapet over the lower wall, but those triangular shadows?
Difficult to say without seeing the wires - at a guess, I'd say that was the importing applications effort to triangulate the n-gon caused by the arch - which would explain why it imported into Studio with the opening closed.
Have you tried applying the diagnostics I referred to in my post of 18 March?
Things coming in strangely into Studio is almost a sure sign that you have n-gons in your model. Most programs don't like n-gons :-). You can triangulate n-gons in Hexagon before sending to Studio.
OK, I went back to the HEX model, made sure that "Selection -> select over-4- points faces" and "non manifold edges" were selected and running in "smoothed solid and edges" mode.
As can be seen, nothing is selected, it passes that test.
I did add the window feature and extended the entrance to make it more prominent.
Then I exported it into VUE (as a 3DS):
Using a differant material.
No strange raised areas...
I then reloaded the original file, changed the old material to the new one, re-rendered to model - and no aboration.
Then - to be sure it was not a one time fluke, I reloaded and rendered it...and the raised surface returned...
So, it apparently was due to the specific material "Dull Pebbles". Something to file for attention in the future,,,
Thanks.
Glad you got that sorted:) I try to avoid the 3ds format because it triangulates everything.
Did you UV map the model before exporting? Normally procedural textures do not require UV maping, but if they are image-based, they do need it.
No, I didn't - haven't got to that page yet...
Do I need to do that on this?
That depends on the texture you put on it - for simple colours or procedural textures not image-based, no. For image-based or 3D painted textures, yes:)
Should be fine then, for this project.
Time to move on to VUE...
Thanks for your help.