Modo question

26 Oct, 2011 by Andrew Ward in Discussion, Questions
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I have a question about creating the hole in the model shown below:

The person who made this model describes his procedure as follows:

Create a new mesh item draw out a circle with 16 sides perpendicular to the the original cylinder, this will be used to make the hole. Go to snapping options – Constrain Mode – Background, and Geometry Constraint – Vector. Select your circle and move it along 1 axis toward original cylinder, the verts should snap to the cylinder perfectly. Now delete polys on original cylinder around the constrained circle. Make sure you’re left with 16 edges around. Cut/Paste circle so everything is on one mesh item. Bridge together. Bevel inset circle poly in alittle. Bevel shift it back to make a hole.
Delete half of the cylinder that doesnt have hole and Mirror it back, connect your hole if it isn’t via Bridge. create holding edges inside hole. Hole Done. 
This sounds like a lot of trouble to go through just to create a hole! Is there an easier way?
Also, by wrapping the circular face of the second cylinder onto the side of the first cylinder, as described above, won’t the hole end up being an oval instead of a circle? 
  • http://cadjunkie.com adam

    “This sounds like a lot of trouble to go through just to create a hole!”

    Yes it is!

    “Is there an easier way?”

    I’m afraid there’s not :( Unless, of course, you’re willing to go the ‘dirty’ route: freeze the subdivided meshes for both cylinders and, with the cylinder to cut in the foreground, use Mesh Edit > Boolean > Subtract.

    The boolean will do the operation by brute force, but it’s not recommended in most circumstances. Seneca has a really helpful script on his amazing website that makes circular holes easier, though they’re still quite difficult in SubD.

    This is ‘the downside’ of SubD! It’s great for organic shapes, not so great for rational geometry.

    Cheers,
    Adam

    • Andrew Ward

      Wow! Lots of good stuff on that website. Luxology should consider incorporating these scripts for the next release. :-)

      • http://cadjunkie.com adam

        Yeah, for sure. A number of his scripts have been implemented into modo over the years. Super useful stuff!