Surface capping

# 1 03-01-2006 , 03:28 PM

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I'm just learning to use nurbs and i have a major problem when it comes to capping surfaces. I tried for instance to make a hexagonal bolt as dilberts briefly explained it in a thread but i just can't seem to get it right.

What i did was made the rounded hexagon, duplicated it, lofted it. Then i made a plane and created a circular fillet between the plane and the lofted surface (which of course were interesting). I trimmed the unwanted parts, but the problem is that there's no tangency between the top of the bolt and the body. How can i achieve that tangency? And is there a way to make the bolt just one continual surface?

I'd appreciate any help i can get as this issue has really been troubling me lately.

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# 2 04-01-2006 , 12:42 AM

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it allready is tangential, but it simply doesn´t show. do a quick render and you will see. if the edge is still cracked have a look at: window - general editors - attribute spread sheed.
make explicit tessellation "ON", set curvature tolerance to "Highest Quality [0]" and you might set Mode U and V to '"Best Guess Based on Screen Size". if all that doesn´t help, I guess I don´t know myself.

kind regards!

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# 3 04-01-2006 , 10:19 AM

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I tried, but it still doesn't get the job done. There is an obvious improvement, but full tangency is still not obtained...

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# 4 04-01-2006 , 12:40 PM

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I have exactly the same problem when reconstructing your hexagon thing. that´s why I don´t like nurbs modeling. in addition I don´t know how to rebuild nurbs with shape of either curves or surfaces is being preserved. I think, but probably be wrong that those little gaps result from diverse surface parameterization between lofted and trimmed surface.

sry I couldn´t be of much help.

cheers!

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# 5 09-01-2006 , 10:30 AM

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No problemn Falott... but this is still eating me and there doesn't seem to be anyone else around here who wants to help user added image

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# 6 09-01-2006 , 04:43 PM

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ok buddy, experimented a bit. try setting the option for "smooth edge" to ON in the Attribute Spread Sheed.

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# 7 09-01-2006 , 11:57 PM

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Howabout a loft between that cap and the bolt? or scale the cap back and use a freeform fillet?

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# 8 10-01-2006 , 02:40 PM

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Loft won't do because the problem is i can't get the right cap in the first place. As for the freeform fillet it's basicaly what i did from the start. Off to try the smooth edge option now Falott. Hope it works user added image

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Edit: Actually i did a circular fillet... but i don't see how the freeform one would help exactly... the problem is with the cap tangency, so i wouldn't blame a fillet tool.

Last edited by cris007; 10-01-2006 at 02:44 PM.

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# 9 10-01-2006 , 02:48 PM

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Falott did it work for you because i tried turing on the smooth edge option ( even played with the smooth edge ratio slider) but it doesn't seem to do much... it's just weird... These nurbs are really giving me a headache. Btw, is there a difference between the attribute editor and the attribute spread sheet?

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# 10 10-01-2006 , 04:08 PM

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first of all - yes. the attribute spreadsheed is just representing all available options from the attribute editor. like anything else with maya you can get access to the same thing in 10 different ways.

A) all surface options are at their default settings. (gaps can be seen clearly.)

B) turned Smooth Edge to ON.

C) all "good" settings turned ON. which are -

Explicit Tessellation Atributes "ON"
Curvature Tolerance to "High Quality"
Smooth Edge "ON"

ModeU and ModeV set to "Best Guess Based on Screen Size "

D) all surface options are at their default settings again.

A,B,C rendered with Maya Software Renderer. D rendered with Mental Ray.

hope that helped.

cheers!

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