modeling suggestions

[cocolas]

hello all:

I was going to model something like this chair to improve my modeling skills, so I was wondering if you can give any pointers to which method to use and/or you think would be best:
i was thinking either nurbs or mesh modeling the general form and the using FDD controls for small tweaks + mesh smooth. however I'm fully open to suggestions -

please help!!!
here is the real chair:

http://store6.yimg.com/I/akaristore_1739_4379110
http://www.merchantmanager.com/ita63...ASP?pageno=792

in here it's the second one from the left on the top row - the profile view
http://www.scandinaviandesign.com/ee...nen/index1.htm

thanks in advance!!

paul.

[geenyus]

Hmmmm... There's really not one best way to model it . . . or most things, for that matter. Personally speaking, if I were modelling it for work, then I would use poly's + meshsmooth because I'm more efficient using that technique. If it were for pleasure or in my spare time, I'd probably use nurbs, b/c I'm still not very good with them in max.

Now that I look at it again, it's not much more than a wineglass with some time spent pulling cv's (or verts).

[mzmeskal]

Try to use PowerSolids and PowerBooleans...its very powerfull, though costly, but it just helps big deal when modelling.....

[cocolas]

Try to use PowerSolids and PowerBooleans

hmmm....never used/heard of them - I mean I used booleans in max extensivly ....but what do you mean by PowerBolleans?? and what do you mean by "costly"???...you mean in terms of poly count?

Personally speaking, if I were modelling it for work, then I would use poly's + meshsmooth because I'm more efficient using that technique. If it were for pleasure or in my spare time, I'd probably use nurbs, b/c I'm still not very good with them in max.

I have more experience w/ nurbs....and probably they may give more control.....maybe transform a rough mesh into nurbs and go from there ....
thanks for your suggestions guys...


paul.

[Psy]

powerbolleans and powersolids is a plugin for max, costly was meant in terms of purchasing them i believe.

[jujubee]

My first method would be to use circles and loft them around a bent spline following the general contours of the chair. Increase the interpolations. Cap. then go into subobject mode from there and refine the vertices. Use the ffd modifier to shape it if necessary (dont forget to make copies of the object if all else fails.)

As for a nurbs approach, I'd do a two-rail sweep in nurbs following the entire outline- use two splines and a circle. Then adjust the curves at the top once it's outlined so that it's indented. if the indent doesnt work, then I'd make it a mesh then perform a ffd on the top vertexes. If the results aren't right from that, I'd use a boolean to chop the mesh out- powerbooleans prefered. For the final I'd run a meshsmooth or HSDS modifier on that. The cushion is a walk in the park- i wouldnt be too concerned about using that to cover up some mistakes.

http://www.lunarstudio.com

[cocolas]

powerbolleans and powersolids is a plugin for max, costly was meant in terms of purchasing them i believe.

yeah, I just looked them up - damn, 500 bucks - that's definatly expensive....

[jujubee]

Well, it's well worth it if it's a career you are talking about. Can't say how much time I've saved with this simple yet brilliant plugin. 1000x better than default max. The one thing about using power booleans in your particular situation is that it's still not going to achieve that chamfered/smoothed edge look. You could probably use the default boolean to make a cut-out. The only difference between PB and Max is that PB works 99% of the time the way it should work!

and I believe they do have a free trial...

[mzmeskal]

Whad did you mean by "its not gouing to achive that smoothed/chamfered edge look"????

It works great with the edges!!!!! It saves me loads of time and precise work.....excellent plugin..

[jujubee]

I'm not talking about the cavity (aka- where you put your butt.) Check out the rims on that puppy. I'm dead serious- you look at that chairs rims? How on earth would you round those rims with Power Booleans (at least accurately)?

Here's an image I consider my 'most round' to date. Can't quite say that it's organic but I guess it is. The rounded edges were created using lofts and nurbs. PB was very handy for cutting out the panels- but I doubt I could've used it to 'round out' an object along any edge. If it was possible, it would have saved me alot of time (2 nights of work.) Please show me how to do this!


http://www.lunarstudio.com

[mzmeskal]

well you can round them with powersolids.....it has very extensive controls over filleting and chamfering...Believe or not I am doing this every day.....it works with BREP objec format and it is absolutely excellent, no matter how complex the object is you can give it fillet even smaller than 0.1 in radius...the problem is that thous fillets are impossible to be seen in the rendering...

[jujubee]

ah... Powersolids. I'm not familiar with that proggie as that's a step up. Nor familiar with BREP formats. How complicated is it to learn? You must do engineering type of work. I'd really like to check that out sometime. That sounds really really useful!

[mzmeskal]

Actually I do architecture stuff, but it helps me a lot when making furniture edges....it comes as a bundle with powerbooleans or you can buy it separatelly.

Once you have an object, you convert it with one click to brep than you convert the brep to editable brep and edit just whatever you want...

the difference from powerbooleans is that you can use powersolids for lofting, sweepin, extruding, etc....After you have finished with editing brep, you can convert it back to mesh or poly.

powersolids create edges that dont higher the polygon count (the objectst are defined similar to nurbs and are very precise and accurate)

you can find out more on www.digimation.com

Regards Martin

[mzmeskal]

Power Solids and Power Translators are the first products in product series of 3ds max plug-ins entitled the "Precision Modeling Plug-ins". These first products will introduce support for a new type of shape representation called a Boundary Representation (Brep). This is the representation used in most modern day CAD systems. Robert McNeel's Rhino, Dassault's Solid Works and Catia, PTC's Pro Engineer, EDS's Solid Edge, Bentley's Microstation, Nemetschek's Vectorworks and Autodesk's Inventor are among the more popular CAD systems that use Boundary Representations as their primary form of shape representation. Our Boundary Representation uses double precision NURBS-based geometry and Non-Manifold Topology.

Power Solids is specifically designed to be animation friendly. It includes high level solids modeling tools that work on a solid primitive level. Power Solids contains all of the functionality available in Power Translators plus the following:

1) Booleans with optional rounding
2) Extrusion, Revolution, Sweeping, Skinning Solid Primitives
3) Rounding of selected primitive features
4) Offset/Inset of Shape curves used in primitive creation
5) Conversion of existing MAX shapes and Editable Meshes into a Brep Object
6) Conversion of Power Solids Brep objects into Editable Polygon or Editable Mesh.
7) IMPORT, Adaptive Mesh, Material Assignment, Filleting Selected Edges & Faces, Offset/Shelling (see Power Translators Above).

What is the Difference Between Power Boooleans and Power Solids?
The difference between Power Booleans and Power Solids is like the difference between modeling with triangles in meshes or modeling with patches. Power Solids works with curved geometry much like Patches. The Power Solids BrepObjects can be tessellated at different levels during render time. For example, you might specify a 1/2 pixel chord height rendering tolerance to remove all polygonal artifacts and see very high quality smooth results. The number of polygons would then vary depending upon how close the object is in a given rendered view.

[olitech]

chair model

Hi Cocolas...
i think u should try using a lathe for the base...easy....then just use a
simple plane...collapse to a mesh...extrude the faces to give thickness, then use meshsmooth for the final shape...i think nurbs would be over kill for this...also, booleans won't give you that shape.
regards!