Hello chrisd,

Honestly, you really don't need to convince me of anything. If you're being treated the same way by multiple shops you have to at some point step back and reevaluate your questions and requests especially if you're getting similar responses. I'll admit that it takes patience to deal with the challenges associated with fabrication markets, but that time can also afford you some benefit by exploring your manufacturing options.

Wow Max, that looks amazing! Are the generated surfaces actual NURBS surfaces? Or just the wireframe as curves?

>>Are the generated surfaces actual NURBS surfaces? Or just the wireframe as curves?
At this moment it's just a subdivided mesh. All lines is polylines, not even curves. But it's a just a first step. I've found the algorithm which can produce exact seamless nurbs-surface based on subdivided mesh.
So, stay tuned :)

Very impressive !
eric

Cool!
So what will be the export ? If you export in OBJ : object will be segmented again by the MOi mailer ?

Max, do you have a link to the algorithm?

I came across this: http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/techreports/UCAM-CL-TR-773.pdf

Thank you,
- Brian

Hi Brian!

I've read a lot of documents about this. The most interesting is:
http://www.dgp.toronto.edu/people/stam/reality/Research/pdf/cc.pdf
http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/people/cloop/qteg.pdf
http://www.eecs.berkeley.edu/~sohamum/files/cs284_f12_project_report.pdf

Hi Max, the difficulty comes with the "extraordinary vertices" - vertices where other than 4 edges are coming off of it.

The subdivision surface behaves somewhat differently in those areas and those are the problematic parts to put NURBS surfaces on.

- Michael

Hi Michael.
I am not confident of success, but I'll try to implement Jos Stam's method of calculating the surface exactly.
----

[added] open mesh support

Hi Max,

> I am not confident of success, but I'll try to implement Jos Stam's
> method of calculating the surface exactly.

Ok, but evaluating the subdivision surface exactly does not really solve the problem of conversion of the surface into a different form...

I think what you will end up finding is that regular areas of the mesh will convert quite nicely but that there will be difficulties in the areas of extraordinary vertices.

But I'm looking forward to seeing what you come up with anyway! :)

- Michael

Michael,
Could the "extraordinary vertices" be easily identified beforehand? This tool, even if there were parts that had to be "left out", would be very cool. Then using other tools to handle the extraordinary part...

Hi Burr, yeah the extraordinary vertices are pretty easy to identify, they're just vertices where there is some other number than 4 edges coming off of the vertex, see here:
http://www.multires.caltech.edu/teaching/courses/subdivision/intro/sld012.htm

- Michael

This is early beta version of my subdiv script. I'll add more features later. High precision mode (for extra smoothing around an extraordinary vertices), per edge sharpness, and more. Script supports 3- 4- and 5-sided polygons.

Hi Max, Which scheme are you using?

http://www.holmes3d.net/graphics/subdivision/

Is it going from Nurbs to Nurbs or ?

- Brian

Hi Brian, I using this one

Fast Parallel Construction of Smooth Surfaces from Meshes with Tri/Quad/Pent Facets
A. Myles and T. Ni and J. Peters
https://www.cise.ufl.edu/research/SurfLab/papers/08poly.pdf

It can use any solid object with flat faces, which can be created in MoI, or imported using my importobj script.

P.S. Also you can read this document: Smooth Surfaces from 4-sided Facets
T. L. Ni, Y. Yeo, A. Myles, V. Goel and J. Peters.

Wow Max..... Wow.

Your importobj script? Did I miss that one or is it part of this project?

I second that Wow!

-

Ops.. I forget to share it here :)
Yes, I wrote it as a part of this project, but it can be used separately.

Really cool stuff Max!

- Michael