is there a way to convert all to nurbs? (i m a complete noob... go ez on me! lol)

# 1 13-04-2008 , 11:12 PM

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Join Date: Apr 2008

Location: Brooklyn, NY

Posts: 1

is there a way to convert all to nurbs? (i m a complete noob... go ez on me! lol)

ok so u decided to look at my pathetic post. THANKS :attn:

i m gonna attempt to explain wat i mean and i really hope i dont sound too stupid.

ok i m tryin to open a maya project in maya and export it to second life. only thing is, it has to be nurbs to be able to work in second life. i downloaded sum free 3D models for maya to test this, but i think theyre not nurbs. is there a way to convert sumthn entirely to nurbs?

pls help if u can and i really hope i dont sound too dumb here... user added image

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# 2 14-04-2008 , 02:03 AM

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Join Date: Jan 2005

Location: vienna

Posts: 1,095

it is possible, but not that easy. end of last week I had to convert a hires polymodel for silhuette´s construction guys to nurbs, because they weren´t able to open any common 3D format of a polygonal model. fact is that the polygon model consisted of 5 Parts. after i converted it to nurbs it had around 1000 patches. they could open it then as an IGES format but i doubt the funktionality of this file...

your question is anything else than dumb, just be aware of that it isn´t the easiest thing to convert polys to nurbs. i dont know the resolution of your mesh but mine had about 60k polys. allthough I modeled it pretty clean i had to spend about 2 hours of work getting it ready to be converted without being fragmented into sensless nurbs patches.

1) make shure you have as less (better none!) non-quad faces. anything else than a quad is bad because of the parameterization of a nurbs patch. this means if you convert a quad to a subd and then to a nurb you get a relatively 1:1 conversion. important is also the shape of the polygon border(edges) since you have to convert to subD and from subD to nurbs. if you convert a square to subD you get something like a round shape in subD. to make sure getting the same shape in SubD than in poly you have to add edges by beveling or split polygon tool. if you are used to modeling with subDs you pretty much know what i mean.

2)... there is no 2nd really. make the polygon as clean as you can get. then convcerti it to subD then to nurbs. you can also split your polygon object into reasonable parts, because heavy meshes convert slowly or you might run out of memory fast.

good luck!

everything starts and ends in the right place at the right time.

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# 3 14-04-2008 , 07:55 AM

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Join Date: Dec 2005

Location: London

Posts: 429

As you have maybe noticed on my tutorial the Nurbs are limited to 16 isoparms in each U and V section, this means the the actual lines..

You can also import polygons, same limit there 16.

You can go higher, but you loose the form of your creation in SL.

For understanding the Maya UI (User Interface) i suggest first following some basic tutorials on Simply Maya, then when you understand the tools you can start creating your own stuff.

Learn first of Polygons, then with the tutorial i made you can follow it much easier.

Have fun.