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Mastering
3D Studio MAX R3 |
Table 4.2 is a catalog of common modeling modifiers and their uses. See
Chapters 5, 6, and 7 for more information on many of these.
Table 4.2: COMMON MODELING MODIFIERS
AND THEIR USES.
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| Modifier
| Use
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| Affect Region
| Gives you the ability to “pull”
a selected region of geometry. Handy for making bulbous areas like
cockpit canopies, bulging muscles, etc.
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| Cap Holes
| Creates faces over openings in your geometry
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| DeleteMesh
| Deletes faces as a modification so the
deletion can be undone or adjusted later
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| Edit Mesh
| Provides editing access to all vertices,
faces, edges, polygons, and elements
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| Face Extrude
| Provides Parametric extrusions. Used in
conjunction with the Mesh Select modifier, this modifier is the cousin
to the Face Extrude feature found in an editable mesh or the face
or polygon level of edit mesh.
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| FFD (all)
| Free-form deformation; surrounds your
mesh with a lattice (a 3D grid). You then pull on the points of the
lattice and your object deforms to the pulling and pushing of these
points.
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| MeshSmooth
| Takes the mesh data and adds polygons
to sharp-cornered areas to round them off. It is a “smart”
tessellate. The nice thing about MeshSmooth is its many options for
various face characteristics and the ability to “dial in”
as much or as little complexity as you want.
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| Normal
| Controls the direction of a face’s
normal (used with Mesh Select)
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| Optimize
| Optimizes the geometry by reducing the
number of faces, based on an arbitrary angle between adjacent faces
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| Relax
| Rounds off the hard edges of objects (also
located in the MeshSmooth modifier as one of its settings, and serves
the same function there as it does here)
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| Slice
| Gives you the ability to cut your model
along any plane
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| Smooth
| Enables you to assign different smoothing
groups, or “smoothing assignments,” to different faces of
the geometry; technically not a modeling modifier.
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| CrossSection
| Creates spline cages from splines
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| Surface
| Creates a patch surface from a spline
cage
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| XForm
| Provides the ability to transform parts
of your model in object space, not world space—a very functional
and versatile modifier
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Why and When to Use Modifiers
Table 4.2 breaks down the essence of what the modifiers provide. Here
is additional information about why and when to use them.
- DeleteMesh Including a DeleteMesh modifier in the stack—instead
of simply deleting—gives you the ability to (1) change your mind
about the actual faces selected (and thus deleted), and (2) animate
the selection of faces to be deleted. That’s right: you can change
the actual deleted faces over time. Use DeleteMesh in conjunction with
Mesh Select or Volume Select.
- Edit Mesh The Edit Mesh modifier is a workhorse modifier. This
modifier gives you the most fundamental control over virtually every
aspect of your geometry. The best thing about this modifier is that
it contains many of the same features as the editable mesh tools that
really make polygon modeling fast and easy. See the sidebar “Meshing
Around” (below) for more on when to use Edit Mesh vs. editable
mesh.
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| WARNING The Edit Mesh modifier
takes up the most memory in the modifier stack. It can also preclude
you from going beneath it in the stack to change another modifier.
Use it wisely.
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- Face Extrude Face Extrude is the staple of the low-polygon
modeler. Nothing beats it for almost “doodle”-like flexibility.
There are two major differences from the Face Extrude feature found
at the editable mesh sub-object level. First, this is a modifier in
the stack. If you don’t like it or you made a mistake, you can
pull it out. Second, it is parametric; if you extrude a face by 20 units,
the modifier retains the unit value. In the editable mesh Face Extrude,
this isn’t true; once you put in the value of 20 units, for example,
the spinner is reset to zero. You can undo it, but you can’t refine
it as easily as you can with the Face Extrude modifier.
- FFD FFD stands for free-form deformation, an extremely useful
modeling tool. It also is a great animation tool! You will notice that
there are several types of FFD modifiers: 2x2x2, 3x3x3, cylinder, etc.
This is because the modifier is used frequently and speeds up configuration.
Basically, this modifier surrounds your mesh with a lattice (a 3D grid).
You then pull on the points of the lattice, and your object deforms
to the pulling and pushing of these points. It can also be used at the
sub-object level. This is very handy with soft selection.
- Optimize Although at first glance this tool may seem like the
panacea to high-polygon optimization, you must use extreme caution when
using it. The low polygon counts are great, but the trade-off is a lack
of control over vertex and face placement.
- Slice The Slice modifier is an extremely powerful tool that
gives you the ability to cut your model along any plane. You can cut
away unnecessary sets of faces and leave a clean edge. In addition,
you can use the cut plane to generate a single, contiguous edge along
an axis. This is very useful for generating a division in sections for
your model for material mapping purposes or face extrusions.
© 2000, Frol (selection,
edition, publication)
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