rich_is_bored@Posted: Sat Jan 29, 2005 4:28 am :
I've been working on modeling the low poly model of a pilaster. You know what I'm talking about if you read the D3CDIT section.

I haven't done much in the way of low poly modeling but apparently smoothing groups play a very fundamental role in the appearance of low poly models in game.

When I was working on the fountain model, I was advised to use smoothing groups to create hard edges. But having no prior experience with them and there being no mention of "smoothing groups" in the manual I assumed the the smoothing angle in the surface properties was what was being refered to.

I left it at that because i couldn't see how changing the smoothing angle for an entire surface would help me in creating smoothing groups.

Anyway, since then I've run across a few tutorials focused on other 3D packages and seen what a smoothing group actually is. It literally is a group of polygons that have been designated to smooth into each other. All polys outside this group are not blended with those within the group. Therefore creating hard edges.

The manual and help files turned up no information on this type of functionality within Lightwave, so I began to suspect that Lightwave doesn't deal with smoothing groups.

After doing some searching on newtek.com I found that was indeed the case. There is no smoothing group functionality in Lightwave. Smoothing only occurs on a per-surface basis.

What this means is that in order to create hard edges, without increasing the polycount or unwelding vertices, you have define each group of polys as a completely different surface.

I don't care for the way that works because that means you'll need to create god knows how many duplicates of the exact same material shader in Doom 3 to compensate for the lack of smoothing groups in Lightwave.

If anyone knows a workaround or something I'd appriciate it.



BNA!@Posted: Sat Jan 29, 2005 8:12 am :
Nah, only unwelding the edges does it for me.



fault_line@Posted: Sat Jan 29, 2005 11:27 am :
BNA! wrote:
Nah, only unwelding the edges does it for me.


Yeah, same here.. at least for the little game engine content ive created. Lightwave isnt used too much in the game industry - mostly because they lacked UV's until around version 6... by then 3D games were already commonplace. They missed the boat.. badly. Still dont have n-gons or edge controls either... still waiting on those features :?

faultline
http://eammon.endysis.org



rich_is_bored@Posted: Sat Jan 29, 2005 11:42 pm :
Okay. But if you leave the edges unwelded won't that cause sparklies in game?



fault_line@Posted: Sun Jan 30, 2005 1:28 am :
rich_is_bored wrote:
Okay. But if you leave the edges unwelded won't that cause sparklies in game?

Possibly, i havent toyed with animated models from lightwave yet though... Static models haven't been a problem though using this method.

faultline
http://eammon.endysis.org/



GuyBrave@Posted: Sun Jan 30, 2005 5:09 am :
Have you tried seeing what happens when you model something in say Max, which does do smoothing groups, then converting it to lightwave format with something, then loading it up in lightwave? Would lightwave handle it by making each smoothing group a different surface or something? or would the the smoothing info just get canned in the conversion?



rich_is_bored@Posted: Sun Jan 30, 2005 7:56 am :
I tested the newly cut up model and sparklies don't show up. Luckly this is going to be a static mesh.

I don't believe smoothing groups will work even on objects that are converted over and that kind of defeats the purpose anyway. If I had Max available to me, I'd use it over Lightwave for the smoothing group support.

Perhaps another option is to export to obj and import in blender?



oDDity@Posted: Wed Feb 09, 2005 10:49 pm :
fault_line wrote:
BNA! wrote:
Nah, only unwelding the edges does it for me.


Yeah, same here.. at least for the little game engine content ive created. Lightwave isnt used too much in the game industry - mostly because they lacked UV's until around version 6... by then 3D games were already commonplace. They missed the boat.. badly. Still dont have n-gons or edge controls either... still waiting on those features :?

faultline
http://eammon.endysis.org


Lightwave does have n-gons, you just can't convert them to subpatches, but everything is triangles for game eninges anyway, so it's a moot point.
They also have a lot of edge plugins these days, you can extrude and add edges.
I think you'll find lightwave is used a lot for modeling in the games industry, its just that animation is usually done in other packages, so that's what the various exporters are written for.
For all it lacks, I still choose it over any package for modeling.

Anyway, I think you're making a mountain out of a mole hill with this 'no smooth groups' thing. I can't see how giving a model two different surfaces and having it use a differently named (but duplicate) shader would use more resources in doom, and even if it did it wuld be minimal, AND you hardly need different smooth group settings on many models anyway - that's you solution right there.
Looking at all the doom lwo models, they nearly all have two or three surfaces anyway.



rich_is_bored@Posted: Thu Feb 10, 2005 12:53 am :
I never started the topic because I felt like bashing Lightwave. No need to get defensive.

IMHO, it is a great package and it's the only modeling package that's been intuitive enough for me to make sense of.

In the last two years that I've been learning the ropes of modeling I've been hearing repeatedly about smoothing groups (not ever really understanding what it was) and just recently found that Lightwave did not support the feature.

The reasoning behind this thread was first, to point out to others who find themselves wondering about smoothing groups, that it's a feature not applicable to Lightwave and second, to stir up discussion about the topic in hopes that we could talk about solutions.

The result is that we now have two solutions. That's all I was after.



Petter@Posted: Thu Feb 10, 2005 6:21 am :
Unwelding vertices is to literally break polygons!
Sure... One could merge the vertices for each mesh after that.
But you wouldnt be able to animate the object and hope for a good outcome.

IMHO, that technique sounds like a big Nono to me.

On the other hand, for static meshes I guess the technique proves usufull indeed.
In other words... For static meshes, issue solved.

------------

3D Studio Max definitely is the software to use when creating Smoothing Groups. I can't emphasize enough on how well 3ds max handles this.

Francly, I'm not afriad to say that 3ds max probably is the only software to my knowledge that does Smoothing Groups, In a good way anyway.

Maya has something that works simular to 3ds max's smoothing groups.
Havent tried to find the option yet due to my enormous polishing of models respect for 3ds max.

And Lightwave doesnt even have anything in the likes you say?

Imo, Smoothing Groups is a prior in modelling for games.
I bet alot of game companies create their own inhouse tools for Smoothing Groups purposes.
Hell... I insist on it!

Just found this with a google, I would read this if I were you!
http://www.scifi-meshes.com/forums/showthread.php?p=268690240

Heh, found this quote pretty amusing, minding my own thoughts about Lightwave.
Quote:
The beauty is that Maya offers an abstraction of what actually happens beneath the surface...while other programs (specially lightwave) tries to explain stuff through a closed interface.


cheers



Petter@Posted: Thu Feb 10, 2005 7:08 am :
Quote:
I took the time to make a simple Smoothing Group Tutorial for 3D Studio MAX 7.0 (Will work for other MAX versions aswell).

This tutorial is very week, and need some work!
I'd love to make it a indept with step by step n all!
But my train is departing in just a few hours, so I gtg!

The tutorial is less than 800 kb big, so it wouldn't be any bigger problems keeping it here?


Quote:
So!
Let us begin with showing a mesh that has unwelded vertices (broken polygons).

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This is after I welded the vertices! (Weld/selected*0,1*)
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This is how the mesh looks when it share one single smoothing group over the whole mesh surface.
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And this is what the mesh looks like without no Smoothing Groups!
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A close up on that one, without faces still selected!
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Close up on mesh without any faces selected, with one smoothing group.
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Now, I give the whole mesh one smoothing group to share!
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I press F4 for Wireframe, so that i can see what faces I select better.
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Here i select faces that I want to share smoothing group channel 2.
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This is what my mesh looks liek with two smoothing groups!
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And a small render!

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EDIT:
pfft. Useful my ass!!!
I'll upgrade it later.



fault_line@Posted: Thu Feb 10, 2005 11:06 am :
oDDity wrote:
Lightwave does have n-gons, you just can't convert them to subpatches,

yes, i apologise for not being clear enough, but the lack of ngons+subpatches shows lightwave has long been falling behind the times. I'll agree with your "moot point" comment about game engines, but i'll reiterate that ive done little with such tech. And edge plugins, well, i believe they should be included as they're standard within other packages.
oDDity wrote:
I think you'll find lightwave is used a lot for modeling in the games industry, its just that animation is usually done in other packages, so that's what the various exporters are written for.

Theres little to suggest that, at least here in Australia. Maya and Max are the staple software, dont even try entering the workplace without knowledge of these packages.
oDDity wrote:
For all it lacks, I still choose it over any package for modeling.

No disagreement there, maya's modeling environment is IMO pretty horrid, been years since ive touched max, but XSI isnt too far from LW.

BTW, thats some nice model renders on your site :)

-faultline
http://eammon.endysis.org



oDDity@Posted: Sat Feb 12, 2005 8:11 pm :
Thanks)
Im not a mindless LW fanboy either;) I agree there are many areas lightwave could and should be improving. Newtek seems to have been twiddling their thumbs for a long while now. THis is due in part to internal disputes and upheavals. A lot of the Newtek team left and formed a new company which recently released Modo.
I'd love to see ngons, subpatchs, history (especially spline history)and a 100 other little things in LW, and I hipe it happens soon, I really dont want to move to another modeling package.