Mesh distortion... or breaking

[Dreamcube017]

Hi again.. I konw I'm posting a lot about what seems to be the same thing... but this is a bit different from the other issue.

I shrunk my model down a bit as suggested in the other thread I started and that fixed some problems.

But now when I do a merge with scene, only half the mesh appears and I can only use that for voxel painting.

Also the mesh is made up of a bunch of triangles in bad placed... So I tried the autoretop tool... it KINDA worked... sorta... When I import the mesh for auto-retopping, it gets kind of curvy and distorted. The mesh is a building... kind of like a temple... with hard edges. There are some open curves in the mesh (arches and windows) but I don't think it should mess it up that much. Because the shape gets messed u0p, it throws off the auto-retopology process.

So I guess the problem in both situations is that the mesh keeps getting messed up one way or antoher.

Hm, all I wanted to do was add some detail but I can't do it in Voxels because it's not adding the whole object... I even tried opening ZBrush, but subdeviding it messes it all up, so that's why I tried retopping, but everytime I put it in, it gets distorted some other kind of way. (the walls get bent up and everything gets rounded off)

Help is greatly appreciated.

I've attached the model so you can see what I'm talking about.

[Psmith]

Dreamcube:

What application did you use to create this model? Please post a picture of the wireframe view of this model.

See my comments on your other post.

Edit: I see you are using Sketchup, from your other post. Just as I suspected. Sketchup produces bad triangular topology, (unequally sized triangles - and long skinny triangles that radiate from one point).

Your only hope with Sketchup models is to import them into the Voxel Room, but the results I've gotten are not good. And, as Javis said, scale it waaaay down - if you know it is a large model.

The simplest solution would be to find a plug-in for Sketchup that makes a good mesh out of bad one, but I don't think it exists.

Greg Smith

[hOss]

Forum member chippwalters has made a free utility specifically for correcting SketchUp .obj files to work in 3DC. I can't recall what it's called, but if you search the forums or contact him, you will be able to get the utility. I think this should solve your problem.

-Patrick

[hOss]

Here is the post for his free Thumber utility:

http://www.3d-coat.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=6601&view=&hl=chippwalters&fromsearch=1

-Patrick

[Dreamcube017]

Ah thanks so much. You gys are really helpful.

lol Sorry about the double post of this thread. I meant to attach something but I clicked post before I did that. (It was really late when I did this so I think I ma have been half asleep)

I'll definatly give this a try. It seems SketchUp and 3D Via Shape (another building tool) do the crazy triangle thing.

Importing to voxel works... KINDA... half the mesh gets ignored ... the temple ends up looking like temple ruins. (I actually plan on breaking parts of it with a physics simulator later)... but it broke all the wrong parts. xD

I'll give this a shot when I get home. Thanks.