Quote - Surely you could remove a good number of edge loop across the width, in theory they are doing nothing. Not a lot you can do about the cushions.

Nice work here and I've seen your stuff over at DA

Is your username on DA the same as here?  Hit me up over there too so I can add you to my DevWatch, if you aren't already on it.

Yeah, There aren't many unnecessary loops before subdivision smoothing, especially on the cushions, but I could definitely reduce a few of the edgeloops after the final smoothing on the wooden frame, and just relax the result to prevent faceting.  Did you see the tutorial on how to make the cushion?  It's pretty low poly before smoothing, but if you see anything about the technique that might help optimize the results, feel free to comment.  Thanks for the input!  I'm always open to suggestions or more efficient techniques.

Capitone Cushion Tutorial

PS:  if you want the cushions to be more "full", then it's easy to do.  Just grab each vertex in the middle of each cushion "pouf", and pull it out from the world origin until you're happy with the thickness.  If anyone needs an example of this, I'll post a screencap, but I'm sure most of you know what I mean.

Making progress, and almost done with modeling now.

I added a small Voronoi back plate to the frame, similar to the underside cushion guard, and I will also include more throw pillows like the one in this wireframe clay shot.  I also re-modeled the cushion itself ENTIRELY from scratch.  This time, trying to conserve on polygon count, keeping the limitations of other applications in mind.  So these shots are a reduced resolution cushion, without any trim or buttons.  I will add buttons next, but I think I will skip adding trim, since that part alone jacks the polygon count by nearly 20,000 quads once smoothed.  So the final version I use in my project will probably have trim, but the one I distribute for free use will not have trim.  It will, however, have buttons and throw pillows.

I didn't subdivide more than once on any of the objects here. This is a perspective view of the new Voronoi back plate:

And here's another "clay wire" shot of the back plate from behind, showing the sister cushion guard underneath as well:

ShawnDriscoll

Is it really complicated?  I've never once used it, but I have friends who have, and they claim it's quite easy to get the hang of.  The only complex part is its material editor, which from what I gather, is a node-based procedural framework, kind of like the new slate-editor in 3dsmax, or Maya's hypershade?  3dsmax has a Poser preset scale option to export .obj files to Poser with proper scale conversion values.  The only package that is like Poser I've ever used is called Daz|Studio 4, because it came free on a disk, along with some free rigged mannequins, from 3D Artist mag, which I subscribe to.  If I need human figures for my scenes in a pinch, I'll sometimes reach for that Daz|Studio, or sometimes MakeHuman, or just use the pre-rigged characters that ship with Max, and customize them.  I haven't yet modeled and rigged a full character in Max, nor do I intend to in the near future.  My education currently is focused on 3D modeling for contemporary design reform and visualiztion.  Human models are used merely as props in the classes I've been taking.

prixat

Keep an eye out here in the modeling forum.  I'll post a tutorial thread sometime later today.

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Quote - car is carrara file, vob is video object for dvd files and also vue format.  oops, I get the feeling poser is not welcome here.

Why?  As you probably have seen from the Ottoman freebie, I've provided my past two freebie objects with Poser-compatable export settings, and will continue to do so.  I've even gone so far as having someone save the object as a Poser scene file so I could offer it for direct loading into that application.  I have no problem with anyone using my stuff in Poser.  In fact, I welcome it.

ShawnDriscoll,

Thanks for your input.  I actually saw your vids on Youtube before this, and you do some cool work.  I distributed two previous freebies so far as OBJ, and feeback was positive for the most part, with only a few exceptions, but it was mostly due to my own inexperience with sharing content, and saving things out to other file formats.  I never heard of the .VOB file format for 3D objects.  I thought VOB was a DVD container format for audio files?  Also not familiar with the .CAR file format.  The export dialogue in 3dsmax is decently robust, and lists over a dozen different 3D file formats, including .FBX, .DAE, .AI, .DWG, .W3D, and others, but I don't see that one.

Miss Nancy

I don't think I'll go with steel springs, only because this wouldn't be an item intended for everyday wear and tear.  It's more geared toward the art-deco type of contemporary furniture; fashionable, and ok to sit on, but not something you'd necessarily buy for the family room.  ;)

prixat

When I export the .obj, it will have the modifier stack collapsed (there's no way to prevent that unless I save as proprietary .max scene file), so any early modeling steps will be baked into the result, and hidden by subdivision.  However, I 'd be happy to do a quick and dirty tutorial in another thread perhaps, showing how it's done from start to finish. I'll be using max of course, but I'm sure you'd be able to translate the steps fairly easily in Cinema too.  I know that both Cinema and Blender have very similar tools and workflows to 3dsmax.  Let me know if that will help, and I'll start a thread on the technique, with step-bystep screencaps to illustrate it as well.

Quote - your ornate chaise longue is very nice, however she can't lean back in it like this :crying: will try to think of some good pose.

That render is great, and the ottoman footstool looks awesome there.  NIce work!

I'm actually adding a back piece to the sofa/chaise right now, so leaning back will be possible to some degree; but it's more for aesthetic reasons than functionality.  I'll also include extra pillows for decore.  I'll post an updated WIP that includes the new back piece soon in the modeling forum.

Quote - The voronoi lattice is very attractive, a bit of a shame to lose the more organic rounded shape.

What do you think of providing a single level of subdivision baked into the OBJ with the expectation that the user is to add more as required?

That's possible, but most people will not know to do that after importing the obj I'm afraid, even if I specify in the Readme.  Especially casual users, or users of apps that don't support subD at all, like Poser., etc. will get confused, and end up not using the model.  I will keep the Turbosmooth modifier intact for the .max scene file, however.  What modeling app do you use?  If i can provide a native scene file for you, I will.

I think the "hard edge" voronoi lattice will have to stay for this model.  I'm currently reworking the cushion, and trying to remodel it to look good with less subdivisions, so I might save on the polygon budget there as well.

Quote - Coming as I do from a Poser background, poly count is important only because of the limitation Poser appears to have with high-poly figures. I've been working a lot more in Blender these days, and scene polys can easily end up being triple that to a typical Poser scene without Blender batting an eye: the limitation seems to be more texture size, particularly if you use Cycles (render engine - uses the GPU) and then, the limitation is imposed by the card's RAM, not by the app itself. Otherwise, if you're happy to use the CPU and wait a bit, it'll render just fine.

I'm glad to see you using quads... I think they deform better (although actually all quads are paired-tris to the program) and thus render better, and not just in Poser.

Thanks again for your input.  Yeah, everything I model ultimately ends up with quad topology (even if it's at the expense of a higher poly count).  Not to say I won't consider using triangular tessellation to achieve a particular shape during the modeling process (I often do), but in the end, I try to keep the topology as quadrilateral as possible.  Even when chamfering edges, I use a special modifier that produces 100% quad chamfering, since standard chamfering can cause triangles at the corners, which can result in "pinching" when subdivided.

Hey, that looks great!  Very good render.  I like your materials, and lighting.  Thanks for making use of the Ottoman.  I have a high detail sofa I'm working on now (see the modeling forum for the WIP screenshots), and will also be offering it up as a freebie.  If you'd like to beta test it for me when I'm done, that would be great!

Thank you again, and really great work!

RobynsVeil got me thinking about optimization, and instead of the circular holes for the Voronoi lattice as the bottom cushion support, I'm going with a more regular Voronoi style lattice, by simply adding some quad chamfering to the edges of the base object, and not subdividing it at all.  So this is what it will look like now, with just quad chamfered edges.

This simple change will optimize that piece, and overall polygon count, by about about 8,000 quads.  The resulting mesh looks a bit less "organic", but it's still the Voronoi pattern I wanted.

See image:

Quote - Very nice! I find the detail on the cushions quite compelling. How many polys did you end up with?

Distributing as obj makes your artwork a bit more accessible... don't know too many people who have 3DSMax... it's pretty dear.

Thanks!  Still not totally finished yet, but after 2 levels of subdivision smoothing on the various elements, it's a very high resolution object.  The polygon budget is about 100,000 quads, and I'm really pushing that amount already.  Most of the resolution is in the smaller details; the trim on the cushion, the buttons (which are simply quad hemispheres), and the Voronoi lattice work underneath.  All total, after smoothing, it comes to more than 170,000 quads.

I will probably offer the .obj, however, without the Voronoi lattice piece on the bottom, and I may ditch the buttons, trim, or back piece I'm working on.  It may sound like a lot, but for most demanding arch/viz scenes, the budget is well within reason.  However, I know that most hobbyist users will find the resolution a bit high.

I really like to model as many details as possible into my models, as to not have to depend entirely on maps for that need; you always loose a little detail through displacement or normal mapping.  Plus, not every render engine supports those features.

I'll have to think about what to do about optimization before offering it for free.  That won't be a problem for other 3dsmax users, because I can offer the scene file with the Turbosmooth modifier intact, and they can just subdivide it as they wish, but the obj files will need to have subdivision baked in. 

Quote - it's nice.  I'll see if there's a scene like that in poser.  they got some in carrara.

Thanks.  If Carrara supports .obj or .3ds file formats, then one of the files I supplied in the zip should import ok there too.  You may need to scale the object up or down after import, as with almost any .obj, but it should work in just about any scene.

Quote - Thanks!

You are very welcome.   Hope you can find a use for it.

Here are some links that might have some use for you in 3dsmax to do what you need...

**Mesh Deform Maxscript **

Fitter Script

Geometry Projection Script

Terrain Conformer

Conform Wrap

Plus, don't forget the Conform tools already in 3dsmax 2010 and above, under the Graphite Modeling tools.

Hope this helps you get the results you want.

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