Frosty Posted January 21, 2004 Share Posted January 21, 2004 I just bought another plugin for Cinema yesterday that I thought everyone should have a peek at it. I picked it up primarily for my Thesis work (every surface of my design is a curved mesh). The plug is called Mesh Surgery by Paul Everett and Per Anders. I've done beta testing and developement with Paul in the past and his tools have always been top notch. This one is no exception. Every part of this package should have been built into Cinema and the way the plug has been developed it is almost fully integrated - almost like a Maya hot box. Anyway, heres the link>> http://www.tools4d.com/toshop/goshop.htm Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
STRAT Posted January 22, 2004 Share Posted January 22, 2004 yeah, this recently has been well published within the c4d community. it really does look an invaluable modelling tool. im more interested in the 3rd one down tho, sniper. it really looks the mutt's nutz http://www.tools4d.com/toshop/goshop.htm Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted January 22, 2004 Author Share Posted January 22, 2004 I did some testing with Paul on Sniper, before it was sniper - it was just some weird live update window and not as fast. Sniper works well, but you need a really fast machine and it doesnt like GI too much Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
STRAT Posted January 22, 2004 Share Posted January 22, 2004 interesting. well i just d/l'd the demo and will try out a.s.a.p. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
archrendr Posted January 28, 2004 Share Posted January 28, 2004 I am using both these plugins - I use sniper pro repeatedly for test renders for testing light levels, composition and many other things. It is my most used plugin - I think of it as invaluable. I am still trying to get my head around the Mesh Surgery Plugin but it certainly seems useful. I have some true beginner questions about a specific method in Mesh Surgery. If anyone would care to help with a solution, I'd appreciate it. thanks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
STRAT Posted January 28, 2004 Share Posted January 28, 2004 Originally posted by archrendr: I am using both these plugins - I use sniper pro repeatedly for test renders for testing light levels, composition and many other things. It is my most used plugin - I think of it as invaluable. is it good for giving quick test renders to gauge GI settings? is it fast? how about give us a quick report on it with some piccys if you got time? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted January 28, 2004 Author Share Posted January 28, 2004 archrendr, ask away. i have a pretty good grasp on many of the tools in mesh surgery now. strat, grab the demo from pauls site and give it a whirl. i believe you can launch it 3 times. in my tests i felt it was too slow for high poly GI scenes - but that really didnt shock me. it does work really well for fakiosity style work though and if you run dual monitors its pretty slick Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
archrendr Posted January 28, 2004 Share Posted January 28, 2004 Very nice offer and I'll take you up on it (to get me started with Mesh Surgery) I'll post a seperate question after this one. Sincere thanks. Now about Sniper Pro - yes, it might be 2 or 3 times as fast even for radiosity while it uses the render settings already entered in cinema for stoch samples and others. The best of it for me is that I can control pixel size and level of detail in the Sniper interface if all I want to see is my lighting effects. It will crank out a very crude render quickly. Dial up those things in Sniper and it will take a while - but never as long as the Cinema render. It does seem to take equally long to calc shadows - I sometimes use a light dome nowdays and sniper takes nearly as long as Cinema to find all the shadows - with 70 or 100 of them it takes a while. I dont have a way to post my images except that I have put up about 20 of them at renderosity.com as 'archrendr' You could find me there if you care to. Best wishes, arch Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
archrendr Posted January 28, 2004 Share Posted January 28, 2004 I am still very new to the actual organic modeling in Cinema but now I have some time to learn. Most of my work has been with architectural shapes rather than organic ones and with the renderer. I got Mesh Ssurgery because it seemed to think like I do as far as I can tell. It is as deep a software almost as Cinema itself and I am really impressed so far. What want to do is to hinge extrude a shape on a (mostly accurate) radius. The radius would be on the corner or edge of ANOTHER object - or nearby anyway. This is an old adobe building, so accurate machined accuracy is not needed - or wanted. I would hinge-extrude in steps from one radius then drop into a hypernurbs for a smoother radiused shape. This can certainly be done with a loft nurbs or lathe, but I am trying to get it in MS so I don't have to constantly change tools. I cant figure out how to get the hinge point located off the object accurately. I'm sure it is something simple.......Thanks for any help here. Best, arch Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted January 28, 2004 Author Share Posted January 28, 2004 Well, I think you've asked for something that is "technically" impossible with MS. However, as like the Matrix we can bend the spoon and twist reality. This work around is ugly but it will work. 1) select the object which will get hinged and the object you are hinging around 2) select connect from the function menu and hide the original objects 3) complete your hinging exercise as normal on the newly connected geometry....youwill be able to hinge around the point you wanted now. 4) highlight a couple faces on the properly hinged object. choose select conected from the select menu 5) choose split from the structure menu, edit surface sub-menu (Structure>>edit surface>>split) 6) delete all the extra crap you created and duplicated to get to the correct shape. If you need a demo file let me know. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
archrendr Posted January 28, 2004 Share Posted January 28, 2004 Frosty! Thanks very much! I guess I had not got around to that one but it does make sense. Might be more work than changing tools, but I am going to give it a try just to begin to get used to MS! Best, arch. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
STRAT Posted January 29, 2004 Share Posted January 29, 2004 thanks for the info guys i'll try the demo asap and probably purchase it. it's only cheap anyway Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
STRAT Posted January 29, 2004 Share Posted January 29, 2004 hmmmmmm. not too impressed. i just loaded in a few typical models to test. pretty average in gi and model size. i made the snipper window a comparable size to my viewport window to compair things. with snipper's settings set low it wasn't much faster than the normal viewport rendering with AA switched off. only about 10% faster. with snipper's settings all on high, it was even slower than the normal viewport render. and the viewport render gave much clearer results in all tests. mind you, i do have twin xeons, so that probably accounts for the speed. i cant see where it would work to my advantage really [ January 29, 2004, 03:22 AM: Message edited by: STRAT ] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted January 29, 2004 Author Share Posted January 29, 2004 I think tthe advantage is after the initial render strat. Its my understanding that sniper doesnt re-render the entire scene. As you make adjustments to your lights ect, sniper updates the render in real time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
STRAT Posted January 29, 2004 Share Posted January 29, 2004 i appritiate that. still wasn't up to much. but as i say, a single processing pc may find it more advantagous. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
archrendr Posted January 29, 2004 Share Posted January 29, 2004 Ahhh well Strat, what can I say lad? I struggle along with a measley little 1.33 Athlon. Sniper Pro renders easily 2 times faster than my machine with radiosity and, yes indeed, the renders are grainy and lousy -- just terrible in fact! But then, I have no intention of putting them into a portfolio - only using them to judge lighting and composition - as I said before. It works well enough for me and it is fast for me. I guess you have purchased the ultimate plugin - another processor. Best, arch Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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