388 Part III Modeling

Figure 13-39: Bevels applied to a shape can give a unique profile edge.

Summary

As this chapter has shown, there is much more to splines than just points, lines, and control handles. Splines in Max are one of the fundamental building blocks and the pathway to advanced modeling skills using NURBS.

This chapter covered the following spline topics:

Understanding the various shape primitives

Editing splines

Working with the various spline subobjects

Applying modifiers to splines

The next chapter continues our voyage down the modeling pathway with perhaps the most common modeling types — meshes and polys.

Working with Meshes and Polys

Meshes, or — more specifically — polygon meshes, are perhaps the most popular and the default model type for most 3D

programs. You create them by placing polygonal faces next to one another so the edges are joined. The polygons can then be smoothed from face to face during the rendering process. Using meshes, you can create almost any 3D object, including simple primitives such as a cube converted to a mesh or a realistic dinosaur.

Meshes have lots of advantages. They are common, intuitive to work with, and supported by a large number of 3D software packages. In this chapter, you learn how to create and edit mesh and poly objects, and you also get experience using some mesh object modifiers.

Creating Editable Mesh

and Poly Objects

The Create panel has no method for making mesh objects — mesh objects must be converted from another object type or produced as the result of a modifier. Object types that you can convert include shapes, primitives, Booleans, patches, and NURBS. Many models that are imported appear as mesh objects. Most 3D formats, including 3DS and DXF, import as mesh objects.

Note You can even convert spline shapes to editable meshes, whether they are open or closed. Closed splines are filled with a polygon, whereas open splines are only a single edge and can be hard to see.

Before you can use many of the mesh editing functions discussed in this chapter, you need to convert the object to an Editable Mesh object or an Editable Poly object, collapse an object with modifiers applied, or apply the Edit Mesh modifier.

Converting objects

14C H A P T E R

In This Chapter

Creating Editable Mesh and Poly objects

Working with the mesh and poly subobject modes

Editing meshes and polys

Learning to use the different mesh modifiers

To convert an object into an Editable Mesh or an Editable Poly object, right-click the object and choose Convert To Convert to Editable Mesh or Convert to Editable Poly from the pop-up

390 Part III Modeling

quadmenu. You can also convert an object by right-clicking the object within the Modifier Stack and selecting one of the convert options from the pop-up menu.

Collapsing to a mesh object

When an object is collapsed, it loses its parametric nature and the parameters associated with any applied modifiers. Only objects that have had modifiers applied to them can be collapsed. Objects are made into an Editable Mesh object when you use the Collapse To option available from the right-click pop-up menu in the Modifier Stack or when you use the Collapse utility.

Tip	You can also collapse objects using the Collapse utility found in the Utilities panel.

Most objects collapse to Editable Mesh objects, but objects with the Select Poly modifier applied collapse to Editable Poly objects.

Applying the Edit Mesh modifier

Another way to enable the mesh editing features is to apply the Edit Mesh modifier to an object. You apply this modifier by selecting the object and choosing Modifiers Mesh Editing Edit Mesh, or selecting Edit Mesh from the Modifier drop-down list in the Modify panel.

The Edit Mesh modifier is different from the Editable Mesh object in that as an applied modifier, it maintains the parametric nature of the original object. For example, you cannot change the Radius value of a sphere object that has been converted to an Editable Mesh, but you could if the Edit Mesh modifier were applied.

Note	There is no Edit Poly modifier.

Editable Mesh versus Editable Poly objects

At this point, you may be asking yourself what the differences are between an Editable Mesh object and an Editable Poly object. Editable Mesh objects split all polygons into triangular faces, but the Editable Poly object maintains four-sided polygon faces. Another key difference is found in the subobjects. Editable Meshes can work with Vertex, Edge, Face, Polygon, and Element subobjects; and Editable Poly objects can work with Vertex, Edge, Border, Polygon, and Element subobjects.

The majority of features are the same for both Editable Mesh and Editable Poly objects, but some features are available only for one of these. These differences are highlighted in Table 14-1.

Note	Many of the Editable Poly buttons have a Settings dialog box available. Clicking on the small
	icon to the right of the button opens a dialog box where you can interactively change the set-
	tings and see the results. All features in the Table 14-1 that have a Settings dialog box avail-
	able are indicated by an asterisk (*).

Chapter 14 Working with Meshes and Polys 391

Table 14-1: Editable Mesh and Poly Features

Feature	Editable Mesh	Editable Poly
Vertex, Edge, Polygon, and Element subobject modes	X	X
Face subobject mode	X
Border subobject mode		X
Selection by Vertex, Ignore Backfacing	X	X
Ignore Visible Edges, Planar Threshold, Show Normals	X
Hide/UnHide All	X	X
Hide Unselected		X
Shrink, Grow, Ring, Loop Selection		X
Copy/Paste Named Selections	X	X
Soft Selection	X	X
Shaded Face Toggle		X
Repeat Last		X
Create	X	X
Delete/Remove	X	X
Attach/Attach List	X	X*
Detach		X
Break	X	X
Turn	X
Extrude	X	X*
Bevel		X*
Chamfer		X*
Connect		X*
Split		X
Insert Vertex		X
Edit Triangulation/Retriangulation		X
Cap		X
Outline		X*
Inset		X*
Flip		X
Hinge from Edge		X*

Continued