@beanworks

> In your hollowed out oval example, what happens if you do a boolean difference
> with just the outside face and the retangular thing? Does it create a hole in just that face?

Yeah it will cut just the outside face, but then you'll be left with a somewhat weird result where the part of the box that was towards the inside of that face will be connected to it but that box piece will just be overlapping with the other inside pieces. It would look like this, where the only common edge between the box and the oval will be at that outside face:



You would not want to leave the object in that state because it's self-intersecting with some of its surfaces just sticking into each other instead of coming to common edges.

If you wanted to cut just the outside face and not leave any part of the box behind at all, that would mean the end result would not be a solid anymore. But you can get that type of result if you want by using the Edit > Trim command instead of a boolean - Trim only cuts the surface skin of objects and it already allows you to trim a face sub selection, using Trim would give this type of result:




If you want to cut an object and leave no pieces of the cutting object in the final result (no "side walls" or anything), then Trim can do that. The difference between Trim and Booleans is that booleans try to combine pieces of both objects together in the final result, to try and make the end result a solid.

- Michael

@Danny

> I assume the regular Boolean function will still be in place?

Yup, the regular Booleans are same as they were - this is just an extension to them for the case where face sub-objects are selected.

Previously booleans just did not work at all when only faces were selected, they worked only on an entire object selected.

I think I'd still like to add in something for "depth limited" booleans when using curves as cutting objects, but I think this method of limiting by face selection will probably be more convenient in many cases because there's no options to set, just make a face selection before doing the boolean.

- Michael

@Mike K4ICY

> This is right up there with the essence of MoI's intuitive nature.

Yup, it's a perfect example of the type of thing I'm always shooting for - adding more power to existing tools without gunking up the UI.

This type of thing where there's not any UI added at all is getting harder to come by!


> When I think about it, I'm always separating/re-joining and "pre-trimming" objects due
> to selective trimming issues.

Yup, I'm hoping this will help to avoid that type of prep work. The tricky part might be just remembering that you can do it this way instead.



It also really fits in nicely with the overall strategy of focusing on building simple extended shapes... So overall just a great fit.

- Michael

Tricky!

Another example:

A hollowed box with cylinders sticking through it:



With the inner faces selected:



Then boolean union will generate this:



With the outer faces selected:



Then boolean union will generate this instead:




Basically by making a face selection of just the outside it lets you make the booleans temporarily disregard the inner hole. And with a face selection of just the inside part it makes the booleans temporarily consider the outside to be extremely thick. But all just by making a selection.

- Michael

What happen if only 3 faces of the box are selected ?

Great Idea! This will be very useful.

It might not be very obvious without knowing about it though..
Maybe a message while doing the operation?

Marc

We need this out in the wild ASAP :)
It's a great feature to have on board!


Martin.

@Pilou,

> What happen if only 3 faces of the box are selected ?

If one side of the box was not selected then the cylinders would not be cut on that side, and the result would be some pieces still just sticking through the object, similar to what's described here: http://moi3d.com/forum/index.php?webtag=MOI&msg=6663.10

- Michael

@ Marc,

> Maybe a message while doing the operation?

I don't know... I just so dislike that type of "in your face" message in general...

- Michael

Hi Michael, I was thinking of an "inline" info, something like this:




Marc

Hi Marc,

> I was thinking of an "inline" info, something like this:

Yeah in the prompt is not bad... But I also tend to worry that if I put too much stuff in a prompt then it kind of decreases the "at a glance" readability.

Probably with the regular prompt font size that would take up another line and maybe even more when translated into some languages that have long words...

I think it will probably be one of those more advanced usage things that people will have to read the help file to discover.

Someday I'd like to try and figure out a separate place in the UI where some longer text messages could be printed with various additional information like error messages and maybe some tips like that could then go there too...

- Michael

I totally agree about not cluttering the dialogs.
Having help in context (while using a command and pressing help button) makes it also easy.

But then again many users don't read the documentation, especially when the program is so easy to use.
A couple of videos and off you are running in wild modeling land!


Marc

Hi Marc,

> But then again many users don't read the documentation, especially when the
> program is so easy to use.
> A couple of videos and off you are running in wild modeling land!

Yeah but that's ok - maybe later on they will ask questions here in the forum and learn about new techniques then or read the documentation when they want to push their skill level up a notch...

I've come to kind of regard that as the main type of thing to shoot for - keeping things simple and approachable at the initial level but having more things under the surface that you can uncover.

Of course if there is a way to make something more discoverable without as much of a negative side effect like excess clutter, then it's good to do that as well. But it can be pretty difficult to make that happen in all situations... It's very easy to have complexity result as a side effect by trying to make everything initially discoverable and end up just smacking people in the face with too much stuff.

- Michael

MoI's forum. A real time help system that answers "your question". Not expect you to look up a pre-defined answer somewhere.

You cant beat a healthy, well conceived and monitored forum.