Edge loops and unnecessary geometry?

[Nathi Tappan]

I was wondering… edge loops are definitely the most convenient and fastest way to add lines and make some of these cuts, but don’t they also add quite a bit of unnecessary geometry where they might not be needed after all?  Like at the parts of the boxes where there are no windows?

And, should we strive to make our quads roughly the same in size? Or as long as it is a quad we are good?

I’m sorry if that doesn’t make much sense… I can try and rephrase it.

[Dwayne Savage]

Topology is an advance topic, but the key thing is to look at the end goal. So for deformation like a character that is going to be animated then you want more evenly spaced face loops. This becomes less important with still images. The main reason that quads are so important is because of the modeling tools. It allows for mathematical predictability that you don’t always get with other polygons. So, with that in mind yes it does create unnecessary geometry, but in this case it is less of a problem since it’s not going to be animated. Plus the added system resources is very small compared to the amount of time it would take to actually clean up or do the modeling without do the loops. I’m not sure if I explained that well or not, but hope that helps.

[Nathi Tappan]

I hear you. Thanks for the insight!

I’m an animator and definitely plan to make most my models move, organic shapes or not. So I’ll keep that in mind! Thank you!

[Dwayne Savage]

Well then you may want to read the section on modeling with animation in mind. Topology Guides The rest of the guide is good also. 

[Nathi Tappan]

This is awesome! Thank you so much for sharing, will dive into it right away!

[Omar Domenech]

That’s a cool link Dwayne. 

Kent once focused one lesson on optimization for the Collab backhoe. Here’s the link, the chapter called “Is Mesh Optimization Worth It”. Either way when you click it, the time stamp should get you right there that you just have to click play. 

https://cgcookie.com/live-streams/modeling-heavy-equipment-backhoe-part-4

[Nathi Tappan]

Awesome! Thank you guys! All the good resources. Definitely a topic that I’ve been meaning to geek out on. Still working through the fundamentals but I was hoping to not develop bad habits to begin with.

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