Anyone using Pepakura to “sculpt” real 3d models from Obj files? Best Poly reduction software?

Headwax

Hya

Pepakura is software that takes an obj file and prints out the polygpons with tabs so that you can join them together to make a 3d sculpture out of paper cardboard and then use it as a mold or fibreglass the paper etc - and further work it up.

So I want to use a monkey obj that I have posed as a basis for a clay or resin sculpture but have way too many polys.

I’m using Carrara but:

Carrara “decimation” is pretty crappy and I must selecxt peices of the Obj file to decimate otherwise she crashes.

Carrara crashes anyway when I try to ” decimate” the paws.

If I don’t reduce the poly count I get a zillion polys and Pepakura tells me I will spend the rest of my life making the “sculpture”

So I wondered

1) anyone else playing with this software.
2) have you any success using high poly commercail meshes.?
3) Can anyone recommend a good quality poly reduction software?

tanks in advance

PS I am aware that decimate means :reduce by a tenth.

Links:

-eg of what I am interested in http://www.flickr.com/photos/33151641@N07/5267504906

-interesting video on costume building but shows techniques http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbDXidgCwqI

-software page http://www.tamasoft.co.jp/pepakura-en/

jit

Roygee

Hi head wax:)

Meshlab is free and does a great decimation job - although you'll end up with all tri's. If tri's are a problem, Blender has the only really efficient free tri-to-quad converter I've come across.

Headwax

thanks Roy! Obliged will check it out!
cheers from Oz :)

happy mesh making

Roygee

My pleasure:)

Problem with Meshlab is that it is geeky to the extreme, documentation is all very scientific and no-one answers questions on the forum.

Take a look at this video http://cgcookie.com/blender/2011/10/24/decimating-sculpts-with-meshlab/- made for Blender users, but you can ignore the first bit which shows how to get a sculpt from Blender to Meshlab - simply open your model in Meshlab in whatever format it's in.

Meshlab has a few algorithms for converting Tri's to quad, but none seem to work and no explanations forthcoming on the forum.

If tri's are a problem in your project, take it into Blender and with it selected in edit mode, hit Alt+j. This will convert most tri's to quads - what it doesn't convert you will have to do manually - for me, Hex works best, but whatever you are comfortable with.

Cheers from a seriously sunny and hot SA:)

Headwax

Thanks Roy, yes I played with meshlab for a while and couldn't find the reduction tool, so thanks for that link.
I have been looking at scuptris because it has a reduction brush so you can attack just part of themesh
but I can't import my obj into it I keep getting errors like can't have on edge attached to two faces ? (gah)
so I cut it in half to see where the probem was and now both halfs tell me I can't have more than four points on a face - and I cant really see where ...

Maybe I should install the hex that I paid good money fo a while ago :)

Headwax

Edit: gah did I tell you I was a thickhead? :) I downloaded a program called meshbox (last update 2002) not meshlab - no wonder I couldn't make tails nor heads :)
downloading meshlab now

EDIT : thanks Roy, does the trick admirably reduced polys from 28000 to 2000 and still looks like a monkey
Pepakura still tells me it is a life time work but hec, what do they know :)

Roygee

Great:)

Yep, I've seen that error in Sculptris and been totally puzzled.

BTW, the latest version of Blender has upgraded sculpting to include dynamic geometry, so it now works pretty much the same as Sculptris, with more brushes.

Found a whole bunch of video tuts on Meshlab posted at YouTube - worth a look for the more intricate uses.

This Pepakura looks very interesting - as far as I can make out, you make a 3D mesh, Pepakura unfolds it, you print that on paper, assemble into a 3D shape, harden and paint. Is that about right - bring my 3D modeling to reality?

Headwax

Hey yes, :)

Chap at workl spends a lot of time making Halo helmets or something similar,
he prints the map out on paper then sticks it to cardboard then glues it, uses electrical tape to keep it in place,
recently he has been trying to smooth it so has been gluing small pieces of newspaper over the joins
now trying plaster impregnated tape - looking good.

He also says y ou could use resin impregnated paper - you can get solar setting polyester resin - this would seem to be the go - as catalyst
setting times vary quite rapidly depending on temperature and can go off really quickly (I used to make surfboards)

Possibly a better result would come from fibreglass tissue paper and solar setting resin

In Pepakura I've noticed with high poly models the tabs (they show up on the flattened map) are all over the place - so that seems to be a limiting factor. If you just upload a simple low poly "sphere" into Pepakura you get to see what t he tabs should look like.

I haven't read the destructions yet.

I played with meshlab again and got much better resukts by ticking the box that says (can't remember exactyly) something to do with keeping fidelity. Thanks for pointing out the youtubes!

Looking forward to seeing what gets built of your designs Roy :)

Dartanbeck

Very interesting. Besides your current dilemma, have you printed anything out yet?
Checking out their onsite 3d database (looks like clicking the big "Download" button gets you the whole catalog?) shows some pretty cool things to make with it. Sure is a decent price, too. For the software, I mean. Thanks to you from Oz, from this one in Eveningstar.

Roygee

That does sound like something worthwhile trying. Since downsizing to a townhouse I no longer have a workshop to make stuff like I used to.

While researching to find out what this was all about I came across a forum where there was a blazing row about whether this was "ART" or "CRAFT" - I don't give a toss about that, I'd be happy to be able to have a tangible piece of my own creation:)

Apropos of nothing, a friend is off to Carrara in Italy to buy himself a few tons of marble - unlike Dart, he uses it to make counter tops.

Headwax

Dart Heh pleasure.
Printing? Not personally, I have seen plenty of examples tho - as my fellow workmate never has anything else to do ;)

Just a matter of deciding what to make. A few years ago I saw a paper mache rabbit with a handle in its gut, when you wound the handle the tongue stuck out etc. So stuff like that. Us boys never grow up we just get wider ... er I mean more intelligent!

Headwax

Sorry Roy cross posted !

Ah art and craft? There's a fine line. I think Artists hide the genesis of their work where craft people admit to it.
"Genesis" meaning how it is made.

For me, I just bought a light box to get my illustrrations onto canvas.
I could spend ten times as long gridding them up and transferring them by hand - but life is short and I don't need to do the same thing twice !!!

I also just boght a data projector so I can get much larger paintings happening - all designed as illustrations digitally.
Of course that will be frowned on by the purists - but they are still grinding their own pigments and hunting feral foxes so they can cut off the ends of their tails to make sable brushes ... :)

Headwax

Hi Roy, re those silly error messages in sculptris, I managed to get a previously error inducing mesh into sculptri by cleaning and repairing it in Meshlab

three steps remove duplicate faces, then duplicate vertex points, then
remove faces from non manifold edges (I think this command is the one that does the trick : a google tells me non manifold = Edges of polysurfaces or meshes that have more than two faces joined to a single edge are non-manifold. )

!

Roygee

Yep, Meshlab is a great tool for fixing meshes - happy for you that you learned to speak geek so fast:)

Just BTW, Hexagon has what I call diagnostic tools for identifying all those problems - you need to fix them manually, though.

Joe Cotter

For me, the difference between craft and art is that craft is the product of a hobby or profession, where art is the product of a lifestyle. It comes down to how much of oneself one puts into it. The difference between good art and bad art is where the discussion becomes tangled...

I've seen craftsmen who hone their craft to the point it should (and often is by others) be called art, and I've seen 'artists' who use the term without applying themselves...

In the end it's all subjective?

Headwax

Thanks Roygee, I had another play today without compressing the mesh at all in meshlab, just did the manifold thing and it didn;t load up in sculptris (error message as perusual) so will try compress, clear up points etc and see

Gedd, ah what a can of worms that is.
I'm a painter. My attitude is, if someone deson't like my work, then they have no taste :)

Roygee

There must be something in Meshlab that will analyse a mesh and tell you what errors there are, instead of going through each possible error..."Select non manifold edges"....nope, not that...."Select ...etc...haven't found it yet:(

Every discussion of what is art and what is not is fraught, so won't go there, except to say that there is artistry in all good craft and it takes good craft to produce good art:)

It is easy to tell what is a good piece of craft, but who is to say what is good and bad art?

Just the other day we had a well-known artist on TV who gathered a crowd one night outside City Hall, strew thousands of those little light sticks all over the steps and had folks sweep them up. Looked really pretty, all those glowing colours and had some sort of message about polution. Maybe the artists here can explain how that is art?

Headwax

Oh I think that art like that is very impportant because it lends itself to being read on sorts of levels. Firstlyhere's the temporal level, then there's there the spatial level, then there's the hysterectomy level, and finally, there's the how much money can the art entrepreneur make if he convinces the general public that what ever they are seeing is art, level.

It''s like the emperor's new clothes, only less substantial. ;)

That said from an artist who is no longer allowed to show in a gallery here because his work is not "contemporary"
Not that I am bitter or anything against the stupi ^%^%&^%ing Id(*&*&&^^ic management or anything....

Heh. I'll show them I will burn their gallery do....

Re paper models

Ahh, I read todday if you coat your paper model with plaster then coat the exterior with PVA glue, the plaster will absorb the glue and become much less brittle :)

EDIT I took that object that Scukptris wouldn't load back into Meshlab, reduced it by about two polys, then did the manifold thing and it now loads into Sculptris no probs!

TapiocaTundra

Don't ya just love that Meshlab :) more often than try fixing a mesh and looking for stuff to fix, I usually just re-mesh it, after a few goes find a suitable density, can always decimate it then, with useful results, Meshlab does not have an undo, but, it will reload a mesh quick with a button.

Roygee

I was served notice today by Sheba (She who must be obeyed) that the re-vamping of our bathroom starts TODAY - NO MORE EXCUSES!

So, is re-tiling an art or a craft? Is the threat of withholding marital privileges and/or throwing my modem out the window performance art or crafty/artful method acting?

Is it possible to virtually re-tile with procedural tiles in Carrara, or must this be done physically?

So many questions, so few answers:)

Dartanbeck

Rosie and I look at many things as art that many would certainly protest, I can see that now. Mother Nature is one helluva great artist in my opinion.

static

In the bathroom it's the craft of the artistic; in the bedroom it's the art of the crafty ;-)

Roygee

Rosie and I look at many things as art that many would certainly protest, I can see that now. Mother Nature is one helluva great artist in my opinion.

I'm with you there - she also has one heck of a render engine:)

Dartanbeck

Roygee said:

Rosie and I look at many things as art that many would certainly protest, I can see that now. Mother Nature is one helluva great artist in my opinion.

I'm with you there - she also has one heck of a render engine:) ;) Yes she does! ;)

Joe Cotter

Roygee said:

My pleasure:)

Problem with Meshlab is that it is geeky to the extreme, documentation is all very scientific and no-one answers questions on the forum.

Take a look at this video http://cgcookie.com/blender/2011/10/24/decimating-sculpts-with-meshlab/- made for Blender users, but you can ignore the first bit which shows how to get a sculpt from Blender to Meshlab - simply open your model in Meshlab in whatever format it's in.

Meshlab has a few algorithms for converting Tri's to quad, but none seem to work and no explanations forthcoming on the forum.

If tri's are a problem in your project, take it into Blender and with it selected in edit mode, hit Alt+j. This will convert most tri's to quads - what it doesn't convert you will have to do manually - for me, Hex works best, but whatever you are comfortable with.

Cheers from a seriously sunny and hot SA:)

Getting 404 on that link.

Joe Cotter

Roygee said:

So, is re-tiling an art or a craft?

That depends... are you making and firing your own tiles to create a self constructed image, or some other variation which would take it beyond normal craft tiling ;?

Dartanbeck

Gedd said:

Roygee said:

So, is re-tiling an art or a craft?

That depends... are you making and firing your own tiles to create a self constructed image, or some other variation which would take it beyond normal craft tiling ;?or,
are you installing them with love? I've seen masons who definitely install pre-made tiles, creating art, all the way!

Joe Cotter

There is no question, or should be no question, that people can create art with 'premade' objects. Painters used to mix their own paints from scratch, but I'm guessing very few do now.

Dartanbeck

Gedd said:

There is no question, or should be no question, that people can create art with 'premade' objects. Painters used to mix their own paints from scratch, but I'm guessing very few do now.

Most of the Dogwaffle videos have much better sound from the mic... but on this topic of mixing colors, check out what you can do for mixing colors in Project Dogwaffle, I believe any version, as Developer Dan Ritchie Demonstrates how to make custom Color Wells! Freakin' Awesome!

Dartanbeck

If you liked that one, watch Developer Philip Staiger demonstrate even more color mixing power of Dogwaffle! Being an older video, when he says "Is not yet available in Pro or Howler", that's no longer true.

Side Note:
Philip Staiger was first introduced to Carrara in version 2, when he was working for Eovia as they took it on as a product! Sweet, eh? It has been his favorite 3d app ever since!
It's mine too!

Headwax

Gedd said:

Roygee said:

My pleasure:)

Problem with Meshlab is that it is geeky to the extreme, documentation is all very scientific and no-one answers questions on the forum.

Take a look at this video http://cgcookie.com/blender/2011/10/24/decimating-sculpts-with-meshlab/- made for Blender users, but you can ignore the first bit which shows how to get a sculpt from Blender to Meshlab - simply open your model in Meshlab in whatever format it's in.

Meshlab has a few algorithms for converting Tri's to quad, but none seem to work and no explanations forthcoming on the forum.

If tri's are a problem in your project, take it into Blender and with it selected in edit mode, hit Alt+j. This will convert most tri's to quads - what it doesn't convert you will have to do manually - for me, Hex works best, but whatever you are comfortable with.

Cheers from a seriously sunny and hot SA:)

Getting 404 on that link.

hi Gedd, try this http://cgcookie.com/blender/2011/10/24/decimating-sculpts-with-meshlab

Roygee - goof luck with the martial arts.... you did say "martial" not "marital" didnt you? :)

edit: I meant ":good" not "goof" !