Reply To: Is this hard surface geometry ok?

[Catherine Irkalla]

Alright so here is what I have right now. I took some idea from Deloris’ example:

I have a ring of edges that goes around the entire object:

And I’m gotten close but not perfect to a goal that I made up of having the geometry flow correlate to reasonably expected directions that stress on the real world object could propagate. For example:

I’m not a metallurgist or anything but I personally would reasonably expect that if stress is applied to the tab in this direction that some major stress would more or less follow this line:

Likewise I can imagine stress on the other tab here could flow this direction in a real object:

But some of them I have muxed feelings about, for example this one:

I think the general concept on this one is right, but something still slightly off.

Now of course I realize in a real metal object there are TONS of factors that dictate how stress in one place affects the rest of the object and I certainly don’t have to be perfect, but I am trying to go beyond just a model that looks good in a render and make something where the mesh topology and the real world deformation properties have a relation.

So now I have a big question – am I completely off base thinking that its at least OK to model this way when doing a technical object with a focus on theoretical/philosophical considerations over practical ones?

So I’m asking for critical feedback on this modeling idea as a concept as well as this topology considering that concept.

Thanks!