How else can you identify the parent circle from a group of 30 circles when you open the file a week after? Maybe there is a way with a command like "find parent" but this is not the issue, I think what I say is the only way. And yes, I know that MAX does that.

There are things I like and things I hate in MAX but I'm afraid this is my only experience from advanced 3d modelers

Hexagon allows bilateral cloning from parent to child (or vice versa). But it's limited to direct editing and transofrmations of the poly mesh. In regards to editing the input curves, that can only be done on the parent object and the changes will carry to the child objects...

jonah



"Aha! You want to have a way how to change every other clone by manipulating not only the "parent", but also any other clone. I am afraid that there can always be only the relationship between parent and child (clone).
Do you know any application which works in this manner?

Petr "

My wishes (some of them have been mentioned in other threads already)

Illustrator Import/Export. (I hope it will be in with V. 1)
Some sort of boolean operations on closed planar curves (for example union ten overlapping circles would be easier than using the trim command)
Text tool
Curve projection (again, we can use the trim option as a workaround but if find this quite tedious...)
Coons and Gordon surfaces.

I think I would be more than happy with these features... ;-)

Then maybe some parametric presets for "special" curves (cogs, stars, flowers, and of course spiral and helix...)

And I agree 100 % with the following :
Object groups, names (and colours !) + option to unhide only selected objects and not all at once...
Closed loft...

So Michael, As you can see, there are a few things to keep you busy for the coming months... ;-)

> With history update feature, as I discovered you have to know or remember
> which was the first object because you can only change this, the others are
> not connected.

Some programs use a more formal mechanism for making clones, called "blocks" or "instances", where you define a group of objects as a type of master object, then you can insert an "instance" of that block which is treated as a clone of it. This kind of clarifies the relationship and there are usually some kind of special tools that let you browse through the master objects, and handle updating them, etc.. This type of mechanism probably would solve what you are asking for here. I can see doing it eventually but it is probably going to be quite a while, I would think maybe like V3...


> Anyway, I was expecting that kind of answer, that there are some CAD-like
> modelers that do what I want. The reason I like MoI is exactly this, that with
> a simple UI, no commands, just use a mouse or tablet, and simple dragging
> you can do almost everything and have a fast and good quality 3d preview.

Well, you could use a combination - use MoI for the early stages of a design when you want to have the quick and simple environment, and then bring that design into one of those fancier CAD programs for handling the later stages.


> My ideal MoI future would be the current UI, with the MAX modifiers stack
> (sorry don't know how Inventor works) and some AutoCAD detailing (dims, hatch etc) <...>

It will probably get pretty close to that eventually. But it will take quite a few years before all of that type of stuff is in place. Many pieces will come in rather slowly and carefully to make sure that they don't add too much complexity to the current system.

- Michael

Michael, thanks for your answer, I can't do what you suggest because I can't afford to buy software like MAX because I don't really need it.
What I could do is use moi for modeling, export to obj for Maxwell rendering and use AutoCAD with 3ds export from MoI to make some detailing and dimensioning.
I believe this is easy.

Please let me add to small things.
I didn't write about text model because since I mention dimensioning you would do this anyway.
I would like to have dxf export too, Autodesk decided that 3ds format is limited and we can't have 3ds import in Revit and AutoCAD 2007

> I would like to have dxf export too, Autodesk decided that 3ds format is
> limited and we can't have 3ds import in Revit and AutoCAD 2007

I'm probably going to try that for V2. But it is odd that Autodesk won't support .3ds format since it is their own format, and also dxf and dwg have some even worse limitations in them for meshes than .3ds - .3ds is limited to 65535 points or faces in a single mesh object, and DXF/DWG is limited to 32767 points or faces in a single mesh object.

So if they don't want to support "limited" formats, that would mean they shouldn't read in DXF and DWG files either!! :)

It would be better if these programs supported the Wavefront .obj format, since it does not have any mesh size limits in it. I think if you look around there are some .obj importers for AutoCAD available.

- Michael

Hi JTB,

>How else can you identify the parent circle from a group of 30 circles when you open the file a week after?

You can
1) mark the parent object with a point object or
2) allocate a specific area of the modeling space for placing the parent object

I admit this may not be seem too attractive to you...


>And yes, I know that MAX does that.

There is a relationship between the parent and child and child and every child or parent in MAX?
So you can grab child's control point of object, move it and the parent object and every child updates?


Petr

It's MAGIC!
This is from MAX 's help files

Copy method: Creates a completely separate clone from the original. Modifying one has no effect on the other.

Instance method: Creates a completely interchangeable clone of the original. Modifying an instanced object is the same as modifying the original.

Reference method: Creates a clone dependent on the original up to the point when the object is cloned. Changing parameters for modifiers that were applied to the object before the object was referenced, will change both objects. However, a new modifier can be applied to one of the reference objects, and it will affect only the object to which it is applied.

I mentioned before that there are things are love in MAX and things I hate... This is absolutely a nice thing to have.
Another thing is that the copy command is in some way an array command too. For example, you make a box want to copy it 1 meter to the right. Before the command finishes, you see a dialog where you choose the method (copy,instance,reference) and a number of copies spinbox. If you set it to 5 for example you get 5+1=6 boxes each 1 meter from the other. Nice isn't it?

Max has many commands and methods because it has many capabilities. I am just trying to choose some of them that are easy to add to MoI not because they are Max's features but because I've found them useful. I would never add a wishlist item for animation because it is too early but I would like to see more flexibility like the one I just described.

More wishes...

http://moi3d.com/forum/index.php?webtag=MOI

http://moi3d.com/forum/index.php?webtag=MOI

Import SVG outlines.

Text shape support.

Drag an object over a surface, and have it snap to the normal of the surface.

Extrude relative to surface normal.
Draw a curve on a surface.

From these two, we get some common polygon modeling functionality in a CAD modeler. Draw a closed curve on a surface, and then extrude it.

From an older post... a small wish

The way we make arcs using 3 points is not the easiest. I believe it should be : 1. Start point, 2. End point, 3. Third point.

> The way we make arcs using 3 points is not the easiest. I believe it
> should be : 1. Start point, 2. End point, 3. Third point.

I can certainly change it.

If anybody likes the current way better, speak up!

- Michael

While the current mesher for obj export is nice, large flat areas get divided irregularly or not at all. The resulting mesh is a poor choice for importing into Zbrush or Mudbox if you want to detail those places.

What would be nice is a setting to allow subdivision of large flat areas. There is a option called "Avoid Larger Than", but it seems to have no effect in subdividing large flat areas. Would it be possible for there to be some method to divide a flat area into patches of quads?

Also, could we have a mesher export option to export a model as a mesh that represents x-y-z slices of a object? So I could say "Export mesh a mesh using 10 slices per x unit, 10 per y unit, and 10 per z unit"? This would give a nice regular mesh of tris/quads suitable for zbrush detailing.

Arc has Start On End

Circle Start On End or Start End On
Seems stricly the same?

Maybe something useful will be the possibility to move "one" of the 3 points before close the function Circle (or Arc)?
Because when you select "Show Points" you have many points of the "curve circle" (or Arc) !
And move a point of "Show point" of a circle is not the same than move one of the 3 points construction :)

Please change the 3 point arc, it's hard to set the curvature accurately if you set the mid point as the second step!

Star->end->point on circle would be much better! As you drag the point around, you can easily see the circle you are drawing.

Please change! :)

Seems reasonable for the circle :)

Maybe less for the arc when you draw in 2D (view Top)
when you search a good form Start On End is better as End is not yet defined :)

Maybe add an icone of choice :)

Hi Crusoe,

Re: mesher

Can you post an example file of something that is not meshing well for you? That will help me to understand your specific problem.


> There is a option called "Avoid Larger Than", but it seems to have no effect
> in subdividing large flat areas.

There actually isn't any "Avoid Larger Than", but there is a "Divide larger than", and "Avoid smaller than".

Divide larger than is the one that lets you put in a distance and will subdivide lengths larger than this value. So that's the one you want. However, it doesn't do anything to completely flat planar surfaces, it only affects surfaces that are curved in some manner. I suppose I can add in an option to include planes or not if this is causing a problem for you.

Right now you can try the Aspect ratio limit below that - try putting in a value of 4 or 3 in here and see if that helps you, this setting does work with planes.


> Also, could we have a mesher export option to export a model as a mesh that
> represents x-y-z slices of a object? So I could say "Export mesh a mesh using
> 10 slices per x unit, 10 per y unit, and 10 per z unit"? This would give a nice
> regular mesh of tris/quads suitable for zbrush detailing.

Unfortunately this would be extremely difficult for me to code except in a few special cases for stuff like boxes. Any kind of curved surfaces would involve a huge number of intersections of the surface which are slow to calculate.

- Michael

My little wish:

1) Like Cinema4D, expand the current view with Central Mouse button;
central again, to put into splitted mode! ;)

2) Great the Pen table movement view, but are great if have the possibility to use same mouse Movement like cinema4D! (into 3d View)

Tnx Michael for this great piece of software! ;)

add: arc 3pts method
  I think that Start,End,Point method is more useful.
  - I usually know end point or I can find it with a construction lines.
  - When I pick start and end point, the third point influences only an arc radius while with current method the arc radius and point location are still unknown.
  - When I have three explicit points, there is no problem with picking end point first

So if Crusoe begs for an alteration, I join him!

Petr

Hi Michael,

I'm also finding that the current settings for the 3 point arc difficult to use.
For me personally, Start>End>Point would be far easier to position correctly within a model.
But I'm only stating this as a complete novice??

regards Colin