wow, I've checked the link you provided me... awsome improvement !! I haven't read all down yet but there are some pretty cool new things like the Scene Browser helping organising the scene. Good point here ;)

Anyway, I'll try the technic you spoke earlier and I'll tell you if it works.

I think you may actually have a case here where the fillet mechanism does not know how to handle this corner juncture with multiple fillets running into there.



It can do any one of those, like this:








But I don't think it knows how to handle all of them being filleted at once.

In fact, it's not very clear to me how that would actually work, I've combined those pieces together and it's something like this:






I guess it would ideally put a kind of rounded rail on the top or something like that... I'm pretty sure it does not understand this kind of corner condition, so this piece is probably just not going to get automatically filleted by MoI's fillet mechanism.

You probably will need a more "heavyweight" CAD program to do that one, something like SolidWorks or Pro/E maybe...

I think it looks like you would have to do some manual trimming and managing of the individual fillet pieces to make that happen in MoI, that's how I assembled the piece in the screenshot above. But then you've also got to figure out exactly how that corner should actually behave.

- Michael

yeah i see what you mean, well I tried your technic and it's okey I've got the volume but can't really fillet edges the way I would like. It's a pitty, there's apparently no other turn around. That's kind of sad :(

However, why wouldn't it work to apply a fillet function on the edges I've selected ? (as seen on the screenshoot) Ho yes, I first filleted the problematic edge so that it's more "smooth". By now it doesn't seem to work but is there something I'm doing wrong ?

And yeah, I'm afraid to switch to those kind of heavy CAD package... those software are more likely for engineers and well, I'm more "design oriented" artist though... I don't know if I could learn as easily and as fast as I learnt MOI. Moreover, prizing isn't obviously the same huhu :)

But good friend of mine who's studying architecture in University in Switzerland spoke to me about Rhino or something. He told me it was great for modellisation. In your opinion, is it more likely to work with this software for that kind of fillet task ?

So I guess the corner juncture area is supposed to look like this:



MoI's fillet mechanism does not know how to do that though.

The one here I did by importing the MoI model into ViaCAD which is a different CAD program that has a more robust filleting mechanism than MoI. It can come in handy to use alongside MoI for fillet cases where the geometry engine that MoI uses is unable to figure it out.

- Michael

> In your opinion, is it more likely to work with this software
> for that kind of fillet task ?

No, not really - filleting is not a particularly strong area of Rhino either.

I tried Rhino on this case and it's slightly better in that it doesn't make as much of a mess as MoI (in MoI v2 the filleter will return partial results if it was not able to calculate the full result, unlike MoI v1 where it will just do nothing) but just leaves an open hole in that juncture area.

ViaCAD is much better to use for more difficult filleting than either MoI or Rhino, it's actually very inexpensive ($99).

- Michael

ho okey so there is some fillet improvment to do then hehe ;)

it's weird because I managed to get this kind of "triple" edges fillet in the bottom of the piece, but can't manage to get it done in the same way for the top. But that's indeed like you say maybe a limitation of Fillet mechanism in MOI (by the way, filleting looks nice and easy but i can imagine how complex it really is underneath to develop algorithmes that works with such kind of surface)

It might be something really cool to improve for users in v.3 :D

the screenshoot of the bottom part:

> However, why wouldn't it work to apply a fillet function
> on the edges I've selected ? (as seen on the screenshoot)

In your last screenshot you mean?

For the model that looks like this? :



That one has a problem with the curved surface, in this area:



If you go in there and move some control points around you can see that the surface actually folds back over top of itself:





If you use that boolean technique that I wrote about, it will make a better model, and then every other edge in there should fillet, except not all 3 of them going into that one particular corner.

- Michael

> it's weird because I managed to get this kind of "triple" edges
> fillet in the bottom of the piece, but can't manage to get it done
> in the same way for the top.

Yeah that one is a different case which is handled - the main difference there is that the corner does not have to try and cross multiple other surfaces, the one that causes the problem has to kind of bend around and travel across more than one surface in the bending part...


> It might be something really cool to improve for users in v.3 :D

Unfortunately it may take longer than that for some things like new corner cases... Those are pretty hard.

I do hope to get at least some improvements to filleting for v3 though, but it depends on how much time is invested in it by the company that makes the geometry library that I use - the fillets in MoI come from a geometry library that I license, I did not code that part directly myself.

- Michael

ho okey, anyway thanks for your feedback ! It was a pleasure talking with you ;)
I'll let you know if things get better and well, let me know if in other versions of MoI you happen to solve that kind of problem !
I would be pleased to use MoI in my workflow if I get hired in some kind of Design company that would need to have a modler/render/designer guy ^^

Thanks again for all your responses ;)

Anthony

Hi Anthony and welcome to MoI :)

I always like a challenge and I always push MoI to find the best solution, hope you don't mind.
I've probably mentioned this before, but I always tend to start off modeling with simple geometric shapes, where possible of course, like arcs, circles and primitive solids, not only in MoI but in all 3d solid modelers, I feel the software has an easier time calculating stuff out and achieving what you want, like Michael has mentioned already, bigger is better, starting off with a nicer larger surface and trimming to shape is the way to go with NURBS.

Anyway, I usually take the solid modeling approach and use surfaces, curves and other solids to carve things out a bigger solid, like Michaels example here
I've attached a version of your model taking this approach and left all the entities that I used to create it, they are hidden, unfortunately it's in colour, V1 demo won't see the colour it's just easier to see what was used for what.
Is this what you were looking for? any questions, feel free.

Cheers

@Danny seems you have a very little blue glitch ;)

Hi danny !

Thanks for your enthusiasm ! It's a pleasure to get some external feedback and you apprently rock at modelling !
And all your mod matches quiet perfectly the "blue print" I joined, that's insane :D

However, as you told me to feel free to ask for anything : It would be great for me and for other users to see precisely the workflow you've used to build the "boiteaproblem" :D
I mean if you've got a bit of free time (I know it can be time consuming huhu) if you could take some screenshoot along the way it would be REALLY nice :D

PS: I guess you've used v.2 beta ? Because I've got the v.1 (...) ^^
EDIT: Pilou's right, what about the glitch ? Is that okey for rendering with Mental Ray back into 3dsmax for instance ?

This glitch for rendering is nothing ;) (not visible)
It was just for the perfection :D

Thank you Michael for providing explainations and examples for problems like these, I learn so much about modeling with MoI from these kinds of posts - especially since these are very common problems for a lot of the modeling I do.

If possible, please consider collecting up these tidbits - especially the GIFs and create perhaps a Troubleshooting / Best Practices wiki area or perhaps a section in the User's manual or a seperate manual on tips, troubleshooting and best practices. ;-)

NURBS modeling is IMO, way easier than SDS, BUT if you don't know how to troubleshoot your objects (especially the way you do), it still makes it hard to become successful creating the shapes you desire.

Posts like these go beyond teaching you how to use a particular function within MoI, they teach you solutions and techniques which a lot of times you just don't learn from reading the docs on the individual tools themselves...


-Will

I agree. And if I'm succesfull Ill make a full tutorial speaking about tips and tricks I've discovered throughout this post thanks to MoI users and it's creator ;)

.

Hi,
My solution to fileting issues to to try and remove the seame edge from the area that has problems. So MoI will produce the same result as the ViaCad Model if you can eliminate that seam edge in the top surface:



My method was to replace the point in the profile of the part. I could either "RebuildCurve" or "Add Point"



My question regarding "Add Point method, is how to get the point added to be the same distance from the point to be removed on both sides? I could, for this model just copy or mirror, but in the case of to different sides, I couldnt do that. Trying to keep both of those the same through the add point/remove point op. (The other side meaning the opposite side of the model)






Also, what is the best "position" for the 2 points added, to try to maintain the original curves shape?

If this is not clear question, let me know and I will illustrate better.

Thanks,
Burr

Also, in regards to the output looking just like the ViaCad one, looks like they may have a mechanism to ignore those inside surface boundries? I wonder if the geometry guy's have been looking at this? (Yeah right, Burr knows what they dont know) Anyway....So maybe if there is an explanation as to why ignoring those interior surface boundries is bad, then that situation would have the ViaCad filet'r fail? Or the hard part is writing the "ignore interior Surface boundries" part.

Hi Anthony,

> It would be great for me and for other
> users to see precisely the workflow
> you've used to build the "boiteaproblem" :D

No problem, as soon as I have a chance I'll post a few steps.

> Pilou's right, what about the glitch ?
> Is that okey for rendering with
> Mental Ray back into 3dsmax for instance ?

Looks like Pilou has answered that already, I was actually quite pleased that MoI got that result, otherwise I had to resort to low level modeling where you seperate the surfaces and start trimming and joining, which involves a pretty high degree of accuacy and time to get things to join up again, anyway, that area will be covered by the knurled ring as well so for rendering I don't think it will be an issue.

Cheers

Hi Will,

Actually, there is already a section in the wiki for that, it's the tutorials section here:
http://moi3d.com/wiki/Resources#Tutorials

That's essentially all that a tutorial is - an illustration of best practices and a solution to a specific modeling problem.

That tends to be the best way to illustrate things, because it just does not work very well to try and discuss the "best practices" in isolation, it tends to make more sense when you see them in action working on a particular model, which is a tutorial.

Over time I do intend to add additional tutorials, I hope I will be able to do some additional ones when I switch focus to documentation after the last v2 beta is complete.

- Michael