A new skin modifier implementation

@Safetyman: I have updated the x64 build version

It seems the project is unfortunately reaching an end.
https://developer.blender.org/D1465

Hi all,
I tried to change Nicholas skin modifier to make branch node topology better, without hole, without high valence vertex. But it doesn’t work. The topology is even worse as we have to stich a vertex with 6,7,8… valence on branch node convex hull with 4-subdivision number limbs, which results in a very very bad topology. I think Nicholas approach is best for 4-subdivision limb.
I will stop this project here. So sad.

Too bad, as it was promising but must be hard to work on such code.
Hopefully if the new skin modifier project can’t find a solution, the devs will still find a way to solve the current skin modifier long standing problem

Is it really that much of a deal to keep everything 4-sided? I mean if the bugs can’t be fixed keeping everything 4-sided and if it can become a far more powerful system with the inclusion 6 or 8-sided limbs, then it would be worth it, right?

If having the possibility of a triangle appearing in the skin modifier would void the very bad faces/holes being generated, i would be easily happy to have that couple of triangles appearing.
… instead of having, as currently, to tediously move/rescale vertices constantly until i can get those problems disappearing, but with the object then not being what i wanted originally.

The skin modifier is mostly used as a base for doing something else, so the user can retopo at any time, meaning that if the user want a full quad mesh, with some work he can, while a skin object that is full quads but having holes and bad faces isn’t really workable.

That of course until someone can find a better algorithm that do not involve triangles to fix the problem, but i guess that is the very difficult part.

What I’m guessing is that it wouldn’t even be possible without increasing the maximum allowed sides for each limb, especially if you want good edge-loop flow.

Sure, it’s supposed to be a base, but you might be forcing the potential into a small box by forcing everything to be 4-sided.

Quad [ 4 SIDE ] is the way to go, and people use it as a base because they don’t analyse the tools behavior to get good result i have lot of model ready for poly-modeling not sculpting and i get nice result with nice topology here are some example I have discover a lot of tricks while modeling with the SkinMod.




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I can even do nice hole with some tricks, cloth, drive the topology flow as I want here some weapons concept and insect with the skin modifier




Kakachiex, I’m not the kind of guy who asks for tutorials or books or guides when I see great stuff on the net, but the behaviour of the skin mod is so unpredictable to study by myself and your use of the skin modifier is just outstanding!

I’d buy your book / guide /tutorial for sure.

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I’m making my blog and working on some video tutorial I hope i can finish it because of my work I don’t have much time

@kakachiex2 very nice results! the beetle impressed me expecially.
you give me courage to try and keep using skinmod.

@oris
is good to hear that I’m giving you courage to keep using the skinMod thanks is really a powerful tool that need more love from dev.

That’s the thing that is infuriating with the skin modifier.

It’s an utterly amazing tool, a fantastic feature in which you can build nice stuff and base meshes a very very lot faster than when modelling the classic way
http://i.imgur.com/rTmOILps.jpg

But it has very bad nasty problem , in which you can have horrible unwanted holes, missing faces and internal faces being generated.
And those flickering/changing etc… by just moving your skin vertices by a single a pixel

bad area being generated :
http://i.imgur.com/jpd0kBUs.jpg

moving a single pixel the selected vertex :
http://i.imgur.com/3H3LypWs.jpg

moving it another pixel :
http://i.imgur.com/eUhHP0cs.jpg

so you have often to tediously test with a combination of moving a skin vertex and scaling it how to have the skin modifier not generating those horrible things, so you can obtain an usable result.
http://i.imgur.com/l5VSPC5s.jpg

The day the devs will manage to find a solution to that problem that has been with the skin modifier since forever, will be a joyous great day :smiley: , especially considering how great and useful the skin modifier can be.

@sanctuary
Yes you’re right those limitation make the skinMod a nightmare for beginner and intermediate user I have experimenting a lot so i Know how to solve some problem it has become instinctive for me I will share some videos tut. on how to master the skinMod and how to solve some problems wen dealing with the skinMod.

here is an exmaple of proportion, body setup,hand setup etc…



you can use stuff like the smooth, lap smooth, displace after the subdv mod for further effects or refinement. you can even use planar displacement at something like 2.5 to reduce the resolution, disconnected edge are easily fixed later. even remesh after the smooth mod.

but agreed with Sanctuary about the flickering geometry problem. though with patience one come up with a lot of workable stuff.

if you’re having trouble with the hands or feet, do it separately as it’s seems to be easier done that way and connect it later after the mods are applied.

@iceking
Making some part separately is one way to go and more predictable for newbies here some tips:

  • wen moving vertex or scaling always use shift for small increment specially if you have flickering problems
  • keep some distance between vertex branches [ small scaling, moving with shift ]
  • sometime if you get hole add a vertex in the middle of the two vertex that are giving the problems
  • always place the [ Root vertex ] in the spine of the model, you can move it in other place will give different result
  • you can have more than one vertex Root in the same model by duplicating the [ vertex Root ] or duplicate any vertex and make it [ Root ] this give the user more flexibility
    Here is ma hand setup I hope it is useful for you


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Some more complex character with eye socket I want to motivate developer to fix the Skin_Mod limitation


Here some more detailed Skin Mod creature and Aliens the possibilities are endless with this toll I can do anything from character to hard surface etc…




And could the reason for these being so hard to fix due to trying to force everything to have a maximum of 4 sides?

For an algorithm like the Skin Modifier, that is just an extremely low amount of geometry that it is allowed to work with (so I would think it makes the creation of valid forms more difficult).

@kakachiex2: frog looks legit bro