Cutting part way through VS

[philnolan3d]

We have the cutting tools that work really well if you want to cut a hole all the way through the model. But what if you don't want to go all the way through? Here's a thought. You use the cutting tool the normal way, then as soon as you finish drawing out the "cutter" shape a window pops up with just a slider as well as a red plane similar to the DOF Plane Position. The plane defines how far back you want the tool to cut. Perhaps symmetry could even come into play here if you wanted to cut the same indentation on both sides of the model. Could be a nice step towards hard surface modeling.

Another option with the plane could be something like the plane you get with 2D-Paint. So that you could look around the model to be sure that is the correct depth you want before you commit to the cut. In this situation the cutting tool may need to act more like the retopo splines so that you could look around the model without them disappearing.

I'm just spouting things off as the appear in my head. Feel free to add any comments or suggestions you might have.

[Andrew Shpagin]

Plane for limitation of cutting is good idea and it is in to-do-anyway list

[philnolan3d]

Plane for limitation of cutting is good idea and it is in to-do-anyway list

Haha, maybe I saw it somewhere a while back and thought I came up with the idea myself when I posted here.

[jaf]

The Lightwave plugin LWCAD 3 has a real-time boolean feature that is similar to what is being discussed here.

To get an idea of how it is implemented, watch the video here:

http://www.wtools3d.com/LWCAD3-manual/

Click on the "Real-Time Booleans" then "Polygons Booleans". There a section showing how to limit the depth of cut.