Simple, Direct Method For Smoothing Creases Options

[Greg Smith]

I really like Free Dimension, primarily because of its n-sided patch support. I've tried various spline based patch modelers and they all seem to suffer from the same set of weaknesses - difficulties in making perfectly smooth blends, (as seen by the renderer) from patch to patch.

Now I did a series of tests using Free Dimension, starting with the default shape and adding a simple curve from top to bottom. Immediately, the default renderer "sees" the curve and it can be readily noticed from various angles. I've tried adjusting all of the various handles, both curve and surface, without total success. The difficulty is propagated as more curves are added.

To clarify the difficulty I mention a similar problem encountered with the Animation Master spline based patch modeler. It is not sufficient merely to adjust the bias handles or eliminate 3 and 5 sided patches to get a perfectly smooth, blended, organic surface. The developers had to release a custom "material" called "porcelain", which minimizes the "creasing" or hard edge patch rendering by adjusting the specularity and ambiance of the rendering engine. So, you can see this unpleasant phenomenon is not unique to Free Dimension or any other patch modeler.

What is the simplest solution to solve this difficulty for application within the Free Design environment?

Since I model mostly organic characters and need perfectly smooth facial contours without the appearance of any seams, I absolutely must solve this difficulty if I am to proceed in using Free Dimension for character design and and export.

Thanks,

Greg Smith

[Dick Sowar]

I really like Free Dimension, primarily because of its n-sided patch support. I've tried various spline based patch modelers and they all seem to suffer from the same set of weaknesses - difficulties in making perfectly smooth blends, (as seen by the renderer) from patch to patch.

Now I did a series of tests using Free Dimension, starting with the default shape and adding a simple curve from top to bottom. Immediately, the default renderer "sees" the curve and it can be readily noticed from various angles. I've tried adjusting all of the various handles, both curve and surface, without total success. The difficulty is propagated as more curves are added.

To clarify the difficulty I mention a similar problem encountered with the Animation Master spline based patch modeler. It is not sufficient merely to adjust the bias handles or eliminate 3 and 5 sided patches to get a perfectly smooth, blended, organic surface. The developers had to release a custom "material" called "porcelain", which minimizes the "creasing" or hard edge patch rendering by adjusting the specularity and ambiance of the rendering engine. So, you can see this unpleasant phenomenon is not unique to Free Dimension or any other patch modeler.

What is the simplest solution to solve this difficulty for application within the Free Design environment?

Since I model mostly organic characters and need perfectly smooth facial contours without the appearance of any seams, I absolutely must solve this difficulty if I am to proceed in using Free Dimension for character design and and export.

Thanks,

Greg Smith

Hi Greg,

Sorry for the long delay, but we have been in the middle of development that addresses the problem you have highlighted. The normal fix for such visible edge effects has been to manipulate surface boundaries and perhaps insert a surface handle to get everything to look ok. For nice looking organic shapes, such editing is nice to have in your back pocket when necessary, but users shouldn't have to resort to such editing continually. Although we haven't settled on the exact blending functions we want to employ, we are very close and will update the software when we have nailed it. I include three images below that show the current release on the left side and the development version on the right side.




Hope this helps a little,
Dick Sowar