Make a small CUT/SLIT/Opening in a mesh,

Support Modeling
#1

Hi all,

Merry Xmas everyone, I hope your had a great one and had great food and great beers! hehe

anyways I want to learn how to cut a slit into my mesh to allow me to animate the opening of the top so that my prop sword will go into.

I have tried but I am kind of lost on this one, I am unsure best way to go.
I would like to duplicate the (RED) seamed line and allow the mesh to seperate / open allowing the sword to enter the compartment.

can anyone please explain what I need to do…

CutMesh.blend (498 KB)

EDIT: frames 1-60 will show the sword entering
many thanks
Shaun

#2

you will need to do some animation here!

for the slit just select verts and use the V key to rip open that segment

but then need to do some anim function of frame
you could use shape keys to do it
or just manually do the anim

happy bl

#3

Alternate to shape keys is to use vertex groups and vertex hooks. Might be easier to rig that to follow an armature for a hinged-style part. Shape keys tend to want to morph in a straight line, unless you go through some process of adding intermediate steps. That’s more of an animation/rigging topic than modeling, but still worth a mention in this regard.

—Edit—
With armature you don’t even need hooks. Just weigh those vertices to the bone that controls them. facepalm However if you wanted to use an empty for some reason… Bones are probably still better though, for various reasons.