Maya 2020 fundamentals - modelling the real world
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# 1 25-03-2012 , 11:09 PM
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Join Date: Mar 2012
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desperate for help with nurbs

I'm taking a college 3d animation class which uses Maya. My current assignment requires me to model in nurbs ONLY. I decided to draw my my own image to model (1st pic attached). Since i had no prior knowledge of what would be simple or difficult when using nurbs, i just let it flow. I'm coming to regret that more and more.

The issue i'm having is trying to model the triangular hole with 3 arms on the left(2nd pic). I can not, for the life of me, figure out how to make this into one piece (i have all 3 arms made but i can't figure out how to connect them). Needless to say i am extremely frustrated. Any help would be appreciated.

In class, my instructor showed us how to manually make a mesh, or individual patches, using two circles, one above the other, and connecting them with a vertical curve. He was able to snap the end of the curve to the circle and therefore define 'patches' that went around the circles forming somewhat of a cylinder. I clicked every possible option trying to connect the end of a curve to every possible shape i could make and got nowhere. user added image

please help

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# 2 26-03-2012 , 07:10 AM
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May I ask you, which college are you attending right now ?


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# 3 26-03-2012 , 09:03 AM
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As I can see you need to perform a "trim".
With a CV (or Bezier) curve draw a profile for the hole, then place your camera right in front of the shape you need to hole and project your curve on the NURBS surface.
Then perform a trim selecting the surface area that you need to keep and press enter.

# 4 26-03-2012 , 05:37 PM
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its a community college, entry level class. Not sure what that has to do with anything?

Making the hole in the center isn't necessarily the issue i'm having. I's creating that central, triangular, hub and connecting the 3 arms to it making 1 piece.
thanks for the response

Someone else suggested i try 'socking'.

I talked with my instructor today and figured out how to do the mesh with patches. It was just snapping the end points to curves by holding C, then selecting the curves involved, hitting 'trim', and then boundary.

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