There's a hole in my mesh, and I don't know why. I'm working with Anim8tor (because it's FREE), and it's happily filled in everything else, but not these ones.

Is there some nice, kind person who could possibly find the time to take a look at the mesh and figure out what's the matter with it (or just fill in the holes, but the 'why' would be better so if it happens again I'll know what the problem is)? Please? It's been bugging me for hours (well, three hours at least).

I can export the thing in .3ds or .obj format, whichever's easier, or send the .an8 file.

I assume you're using the "fill holes" function from the edit menu? When you select the edges that you want to fill, they change colour, and the colour gives a clue as to whether filling will be successful. Unfortunately I can't remember the actual colours since I'm at work, but you would expect them all to be the same in the middle of a mesh. Does your mesh have thickness? I think I can see "edges" to the holes. The most likely problem is that there are in fact two vertices very close together at the corner of the holes, not just one. You can combine them, but be careful not to damage your double-sidedness. If that doesn't help, I'll take a look at the AN8 or the OBJ - come back to this thread or IM me.

I dont know if this will help but I am learning Truespace6 and in one of the popup menus(icons)there is an option for skinning so maybe that will work,But you might have to get someone who is more versed in Truespace then me....But of course this fix doesnt tell you why it did it so you can fix it next time...

LOL, sorry for not being helpful.. I just loved the topic of your post and couldn't help myself... :)

HaiGan mail it to me and i'll fix it and see if i can tell why as well....happens to me a lot but just coz i miss them out :o) steve@poserworld.com

You can mail it me too. I'll have a go at it when i get home in two hrs, with feedback of course. tony.vilters@pandora.be

I posted a reply to this, but through the wonders of modern digital technology it got eaten. :p EnglishBob, thank you for your suggestions. I think I've checked for doubled vectors, but the PC creaks and groans when I'm zoomed right in so I might have missed a couple of spots when I was merging the points at the corners. I've mailed the file to Steve Shanks, but if an answer still proves elusive perhaps I might IM you then for an email address and send you the file? Foleypro, thank you also for the idea. I don't know Truespace at all, but if everything else fails perhaps that skinning option might be something to look at. Eowyn, hi, thanks for making me grin. ;) Steve, thanks again, the file is flickering through the Internet towards you as I type. Tony, you posted while the thing was chewing up my first response. Your offer is also appreciated, I'll send you the file if I can squeeze in another five minutes online. :)

File is coming down now :o) back soon..Steve

Ditto Eowyn's post. I couln't help it. And I HATE you for reminding me of that song! LOL. mac

Perhaps the normals are facing in the wrong direction for those faces? I know with some 3D programs when you create a face, the order that you select the vertexes in will determine if the face is facing forward or backward.

Steve Shanks fixed it for me (it managed to get scrambled on the way to Tony Vilters, who I'm sure would have been able to fix it too if he'd been able to open it!), and sent a pic showing what was wrong as well.

HUGE thanks to everyone who helped and who offered to help. Hopefully I can return the favour sometime. :)

That's good. Even better because I didn't have to do any work. Can we see Steve's picture sometime? Just for future reference, you understand, not so we can chuckle at what you did wrong. Although we might, if it was really amusing. :-)

Yes and maybe a little explanation on how he fixed it and what program he used...Could help us all down the road...

Well the holes where just missing polys, there wasn't really a clue as to why they where missing so i just welded them in cinema 4d, nothing very exciting ;o)..there was a mutiple polygon problem in the mesh, anyone else noticed anything like that in anim8or?..Steve

I certainly have had that sort of problem with Anim8or, Steve! That's why I jumped in to answer this question in the beginning. Usually, it happens when I'm adding vertices manually - if you don't zoom in close enough, it's possible to build a "mesh" which looks continuous, but actually has tiny gaps in it. The "fill holes" command does exactly what it's supposed to do, but of course a discontinuous mesh won't get filled, and that's what I suspected here. Glad you got it fixed, anyway. HaiGan, I'd be glad to attempt a more Anim8or specific answer if you need one. Just PM me for an e-mail address.

I'm guessing it didn't fill the holes because of the multiple-poly problem with the mesh? That's what I'd assumed anyway. I'd be interested to know if the 'Merge Points' command also merges any associated vertices and polygons. I think there might be a few more of those multiple polys in there- the mesh is looking a little suspicious in places when I try to map it in UVMapper.

Here's the pic Steve sent, to add to his post above.

"Merge point" merges every selected point within a user defined radius (the default is huge when seen in terms of Poser scaled items). The problem with doing this on a thin but solid model like yours, with front and rear facets separated by a tiny gap, is that you're likely to merge the front and rear facets by accident. The way to tell if you have separate vertices occupying the same spot is to use a single vertex selection, then move it. If some of your mesh moves but another vertex stays on the same spot, then there's your problem. If the separated vertices have identical 3D co-ordinates, then UVmapper's "weld vertices" command will fix it for you. If the vertices are really separated, if only by an infinitesimal amount, that won't work. Sometimes you can scale the model down by (say) 100 or 1000 times, then back up again, which will round off some of the precision in the coordinates and enable you to weld vertices. Of course you need to pick a scaling factor which doesn't bend your model out of shape. I have even resorted to an Excel spreadsheet to achieve this. Try "weld vertices" and let me know how you get on.

'Weld Vertices' didn't do a whole lot, but zooming right in and going through the mesh one poly at a time, merging every corner, seemed to tidy things up. :) Thank you again!