How can I Loft these 2 curves ?

# 1 24-02-2003 , 11:28 PM

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Why is it that Maya always makes me regret buying it ?

Why can't I loft these 2 curves and get a smooth transition ?

I tried reversing , rebuilding and birailing...

BTW - the upper curve is an offset of the lower curve

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Nir

Nir Sullam
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# 2 24-02-2003 , 11:32 PM

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is that 2 curves or a few curves?? maybe try splitting the curves into smaller pieces??

have you tried to rebuild the curves?? then do the loft again

don't know if these will work.

cheers

rich

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# 3 24-02-2003 , 11:35 PM

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I tired both tricks :

The 1st is too much work and second just didn't do it

Nir Sullam
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# 4 25-02-2003 , 01:37 AM

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Good luck

Hello, Nirsul.
I'm a Maya beginner.
My Engilsh is poor, perhaps I don't understand your meaning
exactly.
Have a look at the picture, do you want to do this?
I wonder if you can send your .mb file to the website or me?
I used CV Curve Tool create a curve, then duplicated it,
move one of this a little, then loft them.
Hope that is helpful to you.

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# 5 25-02-2003 , 02:49 AM

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Xiangbuilder is leading you in the right direction. If what he's doing doesn't work, make sure that both curves are exactly the same. ALso, you might want to make sure your settings in "loft" are set to default. You may have been fiddling around in there and done something to make this happen. If I remember correctly, you can either make the loft a polygon or nurbs. You can additionally try either one and see if the result is any better.

www.Darkware3D.com

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# 6 25-02-2003 , 04:53 AM

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When you offset, the spans of your curve are drasticly altered. Take a look at this:

-Mike
The Maya Toolbelt

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# 7 25-02-2003 , 06:59 AM

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Offset vs. Duplicate

This begs the question: Why then would you want to Offset curves rather than Duplicate them?

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# 8 25-02-2003 , 07:09 AM

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perhaps you could use curves as a placement reference or whatever... not necessarily wanting a surface using that curve. Maya tends to give you multiple options at accomplishing the same objective.

Also, after offsetting, you can rebuild the curve to be 8 spans or whatever your original curve's spans are, but that would more than likely alter the shape of the curve. Just depends on how you want to do it.

-Mike
The Maya Toolbelt

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# 9 25-02-2003 , 09:13 AM

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Thanks guys -

I offset them because I wanted a smaller curve that follows the source curve's shape - Duplicating and lofting is always good and easy but I can do it by extrude and distance .

If you see the backhoe loader model in my maya page - the roof gave me some hard time trying to loft an offsetCurve.
I think Mike's solution is the one to follow (well, he is a king in NURBS, ain't ya Mike ? ...)
:p :p :p :p

Nir

Nir Sullam
Architectural Visualizations Page: www.orvatsel.com/index2.html
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# 10 25-02-2003 , 10:02 AM

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Hi,

I don't know much about Nurbs, but I tried it with polygons instead...

I don't think it is very usefull to your problem, but I just had to try... user added image

regards

Strarup

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# 11 25-02-2003 , 04:50 PM

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As you can see Maya is not very helpful in this very simple need.

To be honest - this is a BIG and BAD surprise for me.

The offset command does its job very bad if you want a parallel copy of your curve so I imported the same shape from AutoCAD and than used DETACH which is good if you have less than 10 curves in your curve - and I lofted each each pair.

As you can see - I needed an offset (the red lines shw that the distance is consistent) and not a duplicate - because when you duplicate and then rescale - it does not give a similar distance between all the edges.

Anybody interested in a used Maya 4.5 Complete.. COL=Crying out Loud...) user added image

Nir Sullam
Architectural Visualizations Page: www.orvatsel.com/index2.html
Maya Page: www.orvatsel.com/maya
www.nirsullam.com

Last edited by nirsul; 25-02-2003 at 04:53 PM.

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# 12 25-02-2003 , 05:30 PM

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I love it when people are ready to return a piece of software because they feel the software should conform to them instead of them conforming to the software. user added image

Not meant as an insult or as a negative comment... I just think it's funny. user added image

Good luck!

-Mike
The Maya Toolbelt

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# 13 25-02-2003 , 07:58 PM

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Mike
You've got to admit that I am right - there is no way to do what I want in maya

I tried the rebuild command and I am used to work with software that actually does what you expect it to do - if oyu have ever worked with Rhino - you know that NURBS are a pure delight in that sense

Nir

and No I am not giving up on Maya ( i am paying for it for the next 33 months OUCH !)

:o :o

Nir Sullam
Architectural Visualizations Page: www.orvatsel.com/index2.html
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www.nirsullam.com

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# 14 25-02-2003 , 10:15 PM

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Well, so far, I must say, I've had no problems getting Maya to do what I want.

Just my observation, is all. I don't really know if our back-and-forth here can really accomplish much. How about we just agree to disagree. user added image

-Mike
The Maya Toolbelt

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# 15 24-03-2003 , 09:10 PM

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This is my first real post here.

Offsetting in most software packages is a pain. I don't know why but I've found that you can offset just fine with B-Splines and Nurbs if you always send your offset outwards e.g. increase the radius. Then simply scale these two curves back down from a "top" view to match original curves condition.

It's easier for the software program to establish curves radiating out than in because there are no "Pinching" problems. As there is a difference between an offset curve vs. an scaled down curve I would consider trying the above before a standard scale. But there are simply times when things don't go the way ya planned.

This is also why you sometimes have a good fillet until you've specified too small a radius. Then it's gone!

The only packages that don't really care about this are CAD type packages.

Send Maya back and pick up AutoCAD. JJ

JB

Last edited by STZ; 24-03-2003 at 09:16 PM.

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How can I Loft these 2 curves ?

Good luck

Offset vs. Duplicate

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