Weird point/pucker in mesh (noob alert)

I’m a complete beginner with blender, and I’ve run into a weird issue. Right now I’m trying to model the nose part of this character. When I have no subdivide modifier on, it looks how it should:



…but when I turn the subdivide modifier on, this one strange “point” seems to jut out of nowhere:


I can only assume it’s an issue with how I’m joining the faces/vertices because I really have no idea what I’m doing. Any ideas on what’s going on here?

Also, I’ve tried a couple other ways of connecting everything in the nose area, but while I found a way that doesn’t have the issue mentioned above, it has an issue of its own. Everything looks perfect from a distance, but upon zooming in I can see an indentation or “crater” at the very tip of the nose :frowning:


I must not understand how to connect things when so many faces are coming together at one point, can anybody explain to me how to go about it? Thanks!!

Solution 1: Press A once or twice untill everything is Selected, then do W+R. This will do Remove Doubles.

Solution 2: Press Shift+F to enter FPS mode, then fly inside the model and look for wierd faces that are not supposed to be there.
Note that you will be better off with Vertex Selection Mode, as edges are invisable in Face Select mode.

Solution 3: Select every vertex in that area that is supposed to be in dead center, (were the mirror modifier meats), then go to the Mirror Modifier and click Clipping. Then move all the verteses back and forward along the X axses to make sure they snap together.
Note, you should know what Clipping does, look it up. i suggest a video for you.

If neither if these solutions helped you, then submit me the Blend File for review and we will have a closer look at it.

Thanks for the suggestions, unfortunately they didn’t fix the problem. However, I continued to play around with methods of adding faces/connecting things and found a way that has no issues, except the profile shape looks really off compared to the vertices I initially set:



I’m going for a soft upturned look as you can see in the vertices, but here it looks like a downwards hook.

Come to think of it, with all of the ways I tried, the profile always looks off compared to the original vertices I set up, with the exception being this one (the one with the weird crater at the tip) :



So, I guess I have two more questions,

  1. Why is it that the initial profile vertices I set up seem to have little effect on the end profile shape of the mesh? It looks fine with no subdivide on, but as soon as I even do one subdivide it completely looses the shape i’m going for.

  2. How can I get rid of the weird crater? (I’ve tried the suggestions with this one) This version would be perfect if it wasn’t for that. And I’m sorry, I’m really new, how do I go about submitting you the file?

Thank you so much!!

Problems like this usually result from unecessary interior polygons and extra vertices. I tried to replicate the problem myself and got a similar hole-like puncture out from the surface of the mesh near the same location simply by having one interior polygon or extruding one vertex. Also, you should avoid triangular faces, they tend to exacerbate sharpness like this. If you have any interior faces inside you mesh, probably from extruding individual edges and vertices rather than faces, delete them. You can also press “alt+H” to reveal anything that’s hidden, in case there is an extra vertices lying around that you accidentally hid.

At the base of the nose where you extruded individual vertices, you can see it makes the mesh very sharp and come to a point. To resolve this, you just need to finish modeling the nose with filled faces, preferably quads.

You can also use the “Crease” tool to make the profile of the nose sharper at certain edges by pressing “Shift+E”.

If you want an entire edge to shift downward but along the surface of the mesh, select the edge and press “Ctrl+E” and select “Edge Slide”. For sliding vertices, same thing except press “Ctrl+V” and select “Slide”.

Ah! I didn’t know that about triangles, thank you. It sounds like you’re saying I should avoid extruding edges and vertices, is that correct? About the interior faces, I’m not sure how to “find” them in order to delete them. I’ve tried the “remove doubles” thing, but that didn’t change anything, and I also did alt+H but found no hidden vertices either.

When you say “finish modeling the nose with filled faces”… What exactly do you mean? I thought that was what I was doing but I probably am missing something.

Thank you for your patience with me haha.

You don’t have to stop extruding faces and edges, in fact this is one facet of basic modelling, but be aware that you may end up with geometry that could be accidentally doubled.

Keep in mind that the mesh you are making is basically a control mesh for the underlying subdivided mesh. Think of making a curve with control points in a 2D app, the curve is inscribed inside the lines you draw, same thing here with the control mesh. The subdivided surface is inscribed inside the control mesh, meaning that sometimes extra geometry to control the curvature is needed, or simply exaggerating the the control mesh is needed.

You don’t have to avoid extruding them, you just have to make sure you remember to fill them when you’re done in order for the mesh to look proper.

Simply zoom in with your camera until you can see inside the mesh.

I mean when you extrude vertices, but you don’t fill them with a solid face, they will form very sharp corners and points. If you continue along your current modeling method which there’s nothing wrong with, just know that at every step of the process there will likely be some sharp corners or cusps until you fill that section of the mesh with closed faces.

To remove stray edges: In edit mode, vertex select mode, Do A to select all. Switch to face select mode, to reset the selection to just faces. H to hide the faces. A to select all. X E to delete edges. Then Alt-H to unhide the faces.