cool unique everyday polymodeling tools in all packages

[wesserbro]

Hi all! Recently i've been poly-modeling in blender and it stuck me: almost always i'm using 'looptools' addon, that has features i dont know if any other package have, so maybe there are other cool tools for everyday modeling (not some fancy stuff you use once a week or even once) i dont know about.

So please tell me if you know any package(or addon\pluging for any package) has such a tool which most of other software don't have. To rephrase, the distinguishing modeling feature.

For example i've never used modo for modeling (only rendering), silo, cinema4d, new maya's modeling toolset, but the feature could be not so evident so you dont know about it even after some basic tutorials.

For example mentioned above "looptool" has cool relax feature which is not like softimage's relax or smooth, but more like polishing an edge loop or all parallel loops, it removes variations but really keeps the overall curvature. Or loft tool, which bridges edge loops also preserving cubic curvature of subdivision(if one specified), very neat everyday, i would say, everyminute tools.
Looptools also has other features, like "make circle" from edge loop, but almost all packages can do that, and for real, how often do you need it? so i'm not talking about something like that.

So I hope i've made myself clear (which is really a struggle sometimes ) Thanks!

[Bullit]

As strange as it is InstantMeshes which is a retopo only app has a tool that all other modeling applications should have , you draw a curve in the screen and the mesh behind gets edged.

[Mathaeus]

That InstantMeshes thing is cool. I was thinking about something alike. Max community always been able to put somehow 'mad' ideas into reality, or exactly here, modeling features that needs very very good knowledge to get it to work, all that on few levels better than anywhere else. Like well known Subdivision Reversion, I think it's still the strongest tool in category.

Looptools also has other features, like "make circle" from edge loop, but almost all packages can do that, and for real, how often do you need it? so i'm not talking about something like that.

About 'make circle from loop' yeah it's really old, based on simple method. Perhaps it depends on what someone is doing, generally purpose is to create a place for detail, screw, pipe, whatever like this. While usually the result it's not enough, so disc primitive is going to be wrapped on mesh, together with welding and such.
One nice, more general feature I appreciate in Maya these days, it's symmetry, selection, almost every mesh operator, there's option to align the sides even the symmetry is screwed up for some reason, by recognizing the topology structure. Let's call it elegant, non destructive symmetry, without deleting, copying and mirroring. Made me motivated for endless experiments with topology on organic-like models.

Anyway hard to remember anything astonishing, for years...

[Bullit]

Mathaeus the Instant Meshes is an independent free application, has nothing to do with 3dsMax, the video was just using it for a 3ds Max model.


http://igl.ethz.ch/projects/instant-meshes/


https://github.com/wjakob/instant-meshes

[rray]

Soft has this cool modeling feature where you can use the mouse wheel to change the influence radius and falloff *after* you start using a modeling tool. This seems tiny but has proved to be one of the biggest advantages over other programs.

[Mathaeus]

Mathaeus the Instant Meshes is an independent free application, has nothing to do with 3dsMax, the video was just using it for a 3ds Max model.


http://igl.ethz.ch/projects/instant-meshes/


https://github.com/wjakob/instant-meshes

Well obviously I should stay corrected...
Back to topic, when it comes to Softimage, XSI Bevel is still missing in other app, especially ability to move center of beveling, ability to bevel from borders, too. And of course, usable sliders and controlling the sliders by mouse wheel.
For small comparison, from about three ways to control some bevel or extrude value in Maya, found only the Attribute Editor to be so - so... usable for ''sliding the value" and even that only if I'm not tired. Otherwise it is a plain select and type as only predictable way. And they added a few more of clumsy and limited options in 2017. Hopefully there's broad range of possibilities, how to just disable some feature in this software, let's say new in-view caddies, as an champion of no-sense.

[Bullit]

So Maya still not has OpenSubD's ?

[Mathaeus]

So Maya still not has OpenSubD's ?

Well if we are talking about the same thing, Pixar OpenSubdivs, of course Maya has this feature for long time, after all they are developed to work in Maya, first. Implementation alone is probably best on planet, that's why this app is able to have deformation playback several times faster than anyone else - it's not only parallel evaluation that works, there are components like evaluation of deformers on GPU, *and* 'no write back' - once deformer is evaluated on GPU, result is displayed directly in VP 2 - more about all that here, together with limitations.

Another story is somehow traditional ratio, of strong engines and solvers, against.... ergonomics, interface, tons of different procedures....

By the way, for hard surface modeling, found Maya Catmul Clark subdivs still better. OpenSubdiv has a really strange way, how hard edge is working, it seems to be dependent on subd level, so in short, forget usable hard edge with OpenSubdiv, that's it.

[Bullit]

Weird. I asked because OpenSubDiv in 3D MAX is okay to work with.

[Mathaeus]

Weird. I asked because OpenSubDiv in 3D MAX is okay to work with.

Perhaps an usable OpenSubDiv hard edge in Maya is missing because of some GPU limitation, who knows. Anyway, until now, about 1/3 of my Maya time went to combinations of scripts to make the thing so so usable, or just to somehow avoid the intentional, unseen workflow 'enhancements' like this one. Still, feel enough strong to keep the tempo when it comes only to animation and rigging, a bit of organic modeling. But, in case of generalist role, I'd be complete idiot by proceeding anywhere further.
Good old Max is waiting, that's it.

[Draise]

-interjection!

A useful thing I found in trueSpace 7.61 beta 8 was.. the Quadrify Selection Tool. it would quadrify any selection you had, saving time on manually making sure your quads were good. It was really handy.

[AceMastermind]

I've always liked the "Intrude" tool in Wings 3D to punch a hole through some selected faces in the geometry and create a shell, it feels intuitive and the result looks accurate.

I've also had better experiences unifying normals in Blender than anything else by using the "Recalculate Outside" tool.

[tarkovsky]

As strange as it is InstantMeshes which is a retopo only app has a tool that all other modeling applications should have , you draw a curve in the screen and the mesh behind gets edged.

Seems the new C4D has that ;)
And nice how you can tweak the cut.

https://www.maxon.net/en/products/new-i ... /modeling/

[wesserbro]

So Maya still not has OpenSubD's ?

By the way, for hard surface modeling, found Maya Catmul Clark subdivs still better. OpenSubdiv has a really strange way, how hard edge is working, it seems to be dependent on subd level, so in short, forget usable hard edge with OpenSubdiv, that's it.

When friend of mine saw a max implementation of OpenSubDiv he thought there was a bug because it tries to recreate that hard edge on the first subD level with very few polygons
In blender introducing openSubD's only brings GPU computations, "hard-edge" really look almost identical to the old one

[wesserbro]

-interjection!

A useful thing I found in trueSpace 7.61 beta 8 was.. the Quadrify Selection Tool. it would quadrify any selection you had, saving time on manually making sure your quads were good. It was really handy.

Yeah, I remember TrueSpace )) it looked like a toy, but had some nice features though.

[Bellsey]

For Subdivs in Maya (Catmull or OpenSD), you really need to use the Crease Edge tool and Crease Sets. When Open SubDivs was added, a new Crease Set editor was also added because the 2 went hand in hand.