[Vasudan Admiral]

Not a clue sorry - never even seen the basic layout, though I have tried out and was very impressed with bodypaint 3d - which I understand is based on C4D.

[pecenipicek]

yes. bodypaint is from what i've gathered basically C4D without the modeller, renderer (not sure) and without support for cinema4D modules.

and i know this doesnt make sense to anyone who didnt try c4d

[Vasudan Admiral]

Then my *guess* would be that it could probably equal max's smoothing systems. Bodypaint is very impressive in terms of flexability and functionality, so C4D is probably moreso.

[pecenipicek]

well, yes, but so far as smoothing goes, i didnt play much with it, too lazy

[chief1983]

While looking around for Blender smoothing information with google, I ran across a few Blender-centric sites where someone would mention Max's smoothgroups, and then immediately be told that those smoothgroups are terrible and lead to a bad workflow.  Any idea what that means to a non-modeler?

[pecenipicek]

that blender users on those sites are idiots with extra certificates?




from what you said... it could be meant to say that applying smoothgroups in 3dsmax can disturb your workflow and make you repeat the painfull process over and over again.

the sentence confuses me. bad workflow is if you make a uv map and texture for a model, then revise the model and attempt to apply the same uv to the model.

[Vasudan Admiral]

the sentence confuses me. bad workflow is if you make a uv map and texture for a model, then revise the model and attempt to apply the same uv to the model.

Indeed - the smoothgroup systems in max seem to me to be rather good in that you can easily reselect and change them as needed without the setup affecting the mesh's continuity in the way this technique in blender does. Ie, the mesh is no longer one continuous solid object, so selecting weird composite areas becomes a *little* annoying. Max doesn't have that problem.

That said I never got enough experience with the max workflow to know for sure what those people would be talking about.

[KewlToyZ]

All I know is TS 7.6 is a major kick in the jollies to try and manipulate the UV mapping in.
I can't even find a scale or move button anywhere in that convoluted mess of an interface when I have the UV editor open.
It only wants to rotate the selection. 

Sorry, tried Blender too and couldn't get it to select the part to even begin mapping... sigh.....
Going to try GMax and the POF export for it tonight instead, hope I find the interface a bit less obfuscated.

[pecenipicek]

the sentence confuses me. bad workflow is if you make a uv map and texture for a model, then revise the model and attempt to apply the same uv to the model.

Indeed - the smoothgroup systems in max seem to me to be rather good in that you can easily reselect and change them as needed without the setup affecting the mesh's continuity in the way this technique in blender does. Ie, the mesh is no longer one continuous solid object, so selecting weird composite areas becomes a *little* annoying. Max doesn't have that problem.

That said I never got enough experience with the max workflow to know for sure what those people would be talking about.

i dont think that experience has anything to do with that... the more i think about it the more it sounds like someone talkin outta their asses...

[Vasudan Admiral]

All I know is TS 7.6 is a major kick in the jollies to try and manipulate the UV mapping in.
I can't even find a scale or move button anywhere in that convoluted mess of an interface when I have the UV editor open.
It only wants to rotate the selection. 

The Truespace UV mapping toolest is appauling. It is horrendusly slow and clunky to use and manipulate and has none of the typical auto-unwrap, pelt mapping, auto layout arrangment, smart projections, pinning, distortion highlighting and auto reduction, linked selections, alignment tools etc that real modelling tools have.

Sorry, tried Blender too and couldn't get it to select the part to even begin mapping... sigh.....
Going to try GMax and the POF export for it tonight instead, hope I find the interface a bit less obfuscated.

I take it you actually tried 10 seconds in google looking for tutorials on the subject then?
Blender is well known for not having a friendly looking interface, but it's not actually all that hard to get to know. The true workflow is simple and fast - based primarily around hotkeys, and the controls are all very consistant usage wise. The main problem is learning those keys for those controls - and that's really just something that affects how fast you model/UV map rather than the capabilities of the program. There are hundreds of tutorials of varying quality all over the net.

[KewlToyZ]

Thanks Vasudan, I read a few of your posts today on the subject actually and started looking at the tutorials.
I want to work on it just having some neck problems right now so my patience has been really short.
Just wanted to stop by and thank you great guys for all the advice and help.
I have a vertabrae out in my neck from spending too much time in front of the PC I imagine.
Between work and home 12-16 hrs is too much, so I'm waiting for my Thai massage appointment on Friday.
Nothing like a 90 lbs Thai girl working you over like WWF to fix what ails ya
Actually she is a licensed Osteopathic Dr. and a friend of my girlfriends so I always have to joke around with her.
When I was in Thailand I could spend $50 and get worked over by them for hours, really an awesome experience to be in that region. You ever get the chance, do not even hesitate! A truly wonderful country and culture!

Anyway back to the topic, I just got Maya 6.5 installed so I'm going to check it out as well for texture mapping.
I'm just going to do each part individually in separate files then bring them into one model before I start on hierarchy.
Still itching to try the POF export script on Gmax too.
Have a great evening!

[Joey_X]

Heh, I typed in bs contact info and a bs email address and it took me right to the download page.

I never was good at modeling but at least it's something to play with.

Free = good

[redsniper]

Actually you can do selective smoothing in blender now. Just mark whichever edges you want to be sharp and apply an Edgesplit modifier.

[Water]

Actually you can do selective smoothing in blender now. Just mark whichever edges you want to be sharp and apply an Edgesplit modifier.

Thanks    - just what I'm needing. 
Also under "mesh tools more" clicking on Draw Sharp will show those edges in red.

[Vasudan Admiral]

Actually you can do selective smoothing in blender now. Just mark whichever edges you want to be sharp and apply an Edgesplit modifier.

Oh, so that's the actual 'sharp' edge support I saw people talking about. Seems to work perfectly.

I assumed they were talking either about the old autosmooth or the edge splitting method I described. Well that certainly brings blender a lot futher up in the smoothing game. I'd say it either equals or surpasses Max now.

Thanks man.

[chief1983]

So it's like the opposite of a smoothgroup?  You make sharp 'groups'?  Except they don't have to be groups since they're not sharp in relation to another set of edges.

[KewlToyZ]

I just finally figured out Lithunwrap 
Man I jave been going about this all wrong. Finally this stuff works!
(or at least I finally got my head around how it works.)
Has anyone else had trouble with the TrueView plugin with TS 7.6?
It seems to arbitrarily disable selection and renaming on items until I change their hierarchy?
I wish I could actually export the Weighted Paint image as a UV bitmap from Blender?
The color ranges could really do some cool stuff in PSP 7.
Regardless I finally figured out how to map just about anything with Lithunwrap, now just to begin painting my textures with fills gradients and weathering....
I managed to get Deep Exploration for $89 on student discount too so I'm pretty happy right now.

[chief1983]

Which version of the plugin are you using?

[pecenipicek]

the trueview plugin often does not display the most up to date names in its interface.

[KewlToyZ]

TrueView 1.5
I'm using Vista Ultimate 32 bit also, so there is potential for odd bugs in the gui.