3D Modeling - Are Ngons Really That Evil?

[@GlebAlexandrov]

Tutorial Timeline: 00:01 - Introduction 00:28 - What is an Ngon? 01:30 - Typical problems with Ngons 04:35 - Triangulation 06:07 - Rendering/shading issues 09:15 - Sloppy topology 10:06 - Poles 13:39 - Broken subdivision surfaces 14:54 - Retopology 15:03 - Bevel modifire 16:12 - Wireframe 16:53 - Polycount 17:24 - Ngons and deformation 18:24 - Importing/exporting meshes with Ngons 19:50 - Conclusion 20:48 - A few tips for working with Ngons

[@OutOfNamesToChoose]

Amazing video! Thank you for all the effort you put into making quality content.

[@GlebAlexandrov]

@@OutOfNamesToChoose You're too kind :)

[@validol696]

Благодарю. Как всегда - четко и понятно)

[@AidyBurrows3D]

In conclusion - All Ngons are welcome!!! Well, only under certain circumstances, like 3am in the morning is too late for an Ngon party at the door, and the Heptagon and Hexagon are pretty cool, but that Pentagon has really been hanging out with the wrong crowd lately.

[@GlebAlexandrov]

5am poles are especially odd at parties.

[@setroid8235]

I'm glad to see a video that actually explains topology. Too often instructional videos just say quads only but don't explain why. Having the extra information presented here is very helpful for knowing more options to use in your workflow.

[@GlebAlexandrov]

Agree, it's useful to get down to basics and question presuppositions.

[@ZachHixsonTutorials]

Should have been titled "Dr. Alexandrov, or how I learned to stop worrying and love the N-Gon"

[@GlebAlexandrov]

lol :D

[@rangerRick9895]

hey dude liked your animation nodes videos.

[@systemG3000]

This is outstanding. You have such a clear way of explaining and demonstrating the subject, like a 3D modeling engineer. You have condensed a complex topic down into simplest terms like a true expert in his field. It was especially fantastic to realize poles are where a face loop changes direction.

[@tessjuel]

Quads and n-gons don't really exist in computer graphics, it's all triangles. As far as the API is concerned, an n-gon is nothing but a bunch or triangles with some of the edges undefined and it has to add those missing edges before it can render the model. So you don't really reduce the polycount by using n-gons, you just hide the actual number. It may seem like hair-splitting but I think it's important to keep in mind and it explains why they can cause problems when a mesh is ported between different apps. I think much of the controversy about n-gons is because people fail to distinguish between real-time and non-real-time rendering. In real-time rendering - games, virtual reality and such - speed is crucial so everything is triangulated in advance to save time. I don't think any game engine supports quads or n-gons at all (Unity and Unreal sure don't), all models are triangulated when they are loaded into the engine. Non-real-time rendering (film animations, CAD, 3D printing etc.) is different. For that it doesn't matter if it takes a few millesconds more to render. For that n-gons can be very useful. Just remember that even thoguh those edges between the triangles are undefined and invisible, they're still there and they can cause deformation problems if you're not aware of them.

[@thomasshaw6938]

I think it's more about usability and convenience while working on the model/deforming it, rendering issues can be solved later but the process I think is the point

[@tessjuel]

@@thomasshaw6938 Yes, exactly. While you work on your model, use whatever suits you and the model. If you're creating a game asset, you'll have to triangulte eventually. Whether it's better to do it before exporting or let the game engine do it automatically, depends on several factors - to many to go into details in a KZbin comment. If you do comission work, many clients insist on quads and the customer is always right so give them what they want.

[@EnigmaGameMaster]

Not always. I know of one game called Need for Madness which rendered true Ngons and they weren't triangles.

[@hikerwolfspaine8200]

@@EnigmaGameMaster Most graphics API's convert to tri's even when you specify n-gons. If I'm not mistaken most hardware is built to handle tri's specifically since it has the most desirable properties for culling.

[@EnigmaGameMaster]

@@hikerwolfspaine8200 Yes, NFM is the only game that I know of which renders Ngons.

[@ArchaicVirus]

Your work really goes a long way in helping me understand everything from core to advanced fundamentals in 3d modeling. Especially for others like myself that don't necessarily have the time or budget to invest in proper training, such as solo or low-budget indie game developers. I guess my point is that I appreciate the many moments of epiphany I experience watching your content as you have a special way of highlighting the pro's/cons of any particular topic, that provides a silhouette which leads me to that "ah-ha!" moment of enlightenment. I hope that one day my projects will succeed like yours so I can give you a nice gift for my gratitude! Also I love your hair!

[@CurtisHolt]

Thanks Gleb! This will serve as a fantastic reference :)

[@GlebAlexandrov]

Thanks Curtis, much appreciated!

[@unfa00]

This video is gold! I've been fighting with weird shading after booleans so much!

[@GlebAlexandrov]

This video now has proper subtitles (en). Rejoice! :)

[@stchm9944]

Thank you. Apparently i'm just in time to understand even better how this stuff works :)

[@wayfarerzen3393]

Displacement and poles are the bane of my existance as a 3d modeler. Thank you for going over them.

[@bearwolffish]

In answer to the last question, and even after watching this, I will still try to avoid them. You covered the main reasons why, quick selection of edge loops, subd, deformation, export etc. They can be ok or even preferable in a few specific cases, but I just view those exceptions as evidence of the general rule. Good watch, cheers.

[@tobyfredson5668]

I use Ngons sometimes but never in the finished product. They are easy to work with in some cases but the end goal and end result is to quadify and triangulate them for game engines. They give you a lot of cleaning work to do.

[@IIIspirit]

This is great, I bought your hard surface modeling training last week and can't wait to start next month when I have the time finally.

[@andrewgoodsell6637]

This is the number 1 video about Ngons in my mind. Thank you :)

[@GlebAlexandrov]

thanks Andrew!

[@ioncladstudio2688]

not related to this tutorial, I just realized I hadn't had a fix of Gleb in over a month.. I'm like.. what is this guy dead?.. oh no.. what if he's dead!... I went to your channel.. nope not dead (whew).. but my little bell was off.. so no notifications. :P Keep up the good work man.. you are appreciated.

[@GlebAlexandrov]

now i'm thinking, am i dead or not? and what if in some sense we always are in a quantum superposition in regards to our own death? tricky stuff!

[@ioncladstudio2688]

@@GlebAlexandrovperhaps you are self similarity or a node in a fractal tree, blender user creates blender user creates blender user.. which one is real.. are any real? :) Would the real Gleb please stand up.

[@jonathaningram8157]

This should have been my first video. I messed up so many 3d models not understanding what even was ngons or poles and always wonder what was so wrong with my topology. Like I learnt a thing in every second of the video and I'm doing 3d for months now. This is the fundamental but I totally missed that. Really useful video.

[@HyraxAttax]

Just split the n-gons into quads and triangles with a few more edges. I'm sure Blender has the tools for it. It will still have the same amount of triangles, but you then don't have to worry about how the software interprets it, and you won't have that crawling effect from the algorithm constantly reinterpreting it when you deform it.

[@charliebevis7719]

Summary of the tips at the end of the video: -In general, first do your quads and subsurface stuff, and then move to your boolean operations-this will get a more uniform geometry density which will make your ngon troubles more local. - Auto Smooth angle can be set in an object's Object Data > Normals > Auto Smooth - If you select some polygons you want to make up a smooth face, you can choose Edge > Mark Sharp and they will be delineated from the rest of the geometry. - N-Poles are the real villian, not ngons.

[@RonHicks]

This was a really intelligent and informing discussion with a hint of dry humor. It's hard to find people that can talk 3d shop and make it helpful😀

[@GlebAlexandrov]

It means a lot to me, Ron! :)

[@Disthron]

17:06 Wow, that mesh on the right has sooo many polys for such a simple shape!

[@carbonman8178]

i didn't watch the video yet but i'm going to guess the conclusion, it depends

[@kobaltkween]

This was _so_ helpful. Just great for helping decide modeling workflow and methodology.

[@GlebAlexandrov]

Yeah, we thought that ngons are really important to understand, to be able to understand the broader context of 3d modeling.

[@ZwipZwapZapony]

As far as I, myself, am concerned, _n_-gons are always perfectly fine in 3D modelling, as long as they're both flat and convex. If it's concave, it should be split where an edge curves outwards, until each _n_-gon is no longer concave. (Yes, for a square with a circular hole near the middle, I would not use anything but triangles when modelling it.) If it's not flat, the same applies. The only time that I'm okay with the above "rules" being broken is when they're broken by a quadrilateral (4-gon/tetragon/"quad") that doesn't break the above "rules" _too_ much. (Note that triangles (3-gons/trigons) are always both flat and concave, so triangles _always_ abide to those "rules". Digons (2-gons) and monogons (1-gons) are invalid here.)

[@bohdan_lvov]

Can't watch this video because of my allergy to ngons

[@GlebAlexandrov]

Bohdan, use it as a vaccine, or in other words, facing your horrors can be a remedy)

[@AidyBurrows3D]

Make sure to use a de-activated and safe ngon to combat the allergy! :D

[@anmoldureja4247]

I took your hard surface course and was extremely surprised by your extremely liberal number of ngons in your final model. Course was fucking amazing though ❤️

[@StringFairy]

Great video Gleb!

[@joeedh]

The original intended use cases for ngons (me and Geoffry Bantle discussed this a lot when we designed Blender's modelling tools) were 1) flat, planar faces with orthographic UV projections (typically used for architectural and CAD stuff), and 2) creating poles on subdivision surfaces.

[@joeedh]

For example, see this picture: photos.app.goo.gl/8X1pz8xzqo3Vj88KA Notice how the ngon under the arm creates a 5-pole. To avoid deformation problems, I can simply apply one layer of the subsurf modifier.

[@l.clevelandmajor9931]

My main modeling program is Wings3D. I use Ngons in it only when the surfaces they are used on will be flat. I do not use Ngons with inverted angles, as that can cause weird anomalies. To insure that my Ngon surfaces are kept flat, I harden the edges around their perimeters before subdividing. I also inset the Ngon edges a small amount, and then subdivide outside the Ngon and the inset border. This ensures that the Ngon surface does not get divided. One thing I never do is deform any surface topology that contains Ngons. All surfaces I deform in any way, must always be made of quadrangles or triangles. Those two types of polygons tend to bend and deform better that all others.

[@TheVFXShow]

Thanks Gleb! This was a much needed video for me

[@GlebAlexandrov]

Glad it's helpful!

[@CTRL_SMarcos]

Thanks for the video, Gleb. You have unleashed the beast with this "blessing to the Ngons". I say this because if someone like you gives a legitimacy label to something, many people will appropriate it and make it their own. You just have to see some comments in the video. But there are some questions that could be asked. Would you show a work full of Ngons to a client? How would you deform or animate such a mesh? Do you really save time with this type of modeling when you have to do retopology afterwards? Newbie questions, but also newbies like me follow you : ^ )

[@GlebAlexandrov]

Marcos, that's the kind of questions that will definitely keep popping up, you're right. Just for the record: * It depends on many things. If it's a hard-surface asset that isn't going to be deformed, then probably it's ok if the work has ngons. That being said, retopology is an option too. It depends on the needs of the client (or the project so to speak). It gets even more complicated when you realize that some modeling styles tend to produce ngons and work with ngons no matter whether we want it or not, for example boolean operations. * As for deforming/animating the mesh, I think that's probably the biggest issue with ngons and I emphasize it in the video. * Does ngons help to cut corners? Yes and no. It could be much faster in blocking out, but chances are that a retopology pass will be required in the end, as you mentioned. Or maybe the retopology pass won't be needed, but something like normals transfer will be needed instead. Thanks for your questions!

[@simoncodrington]

What a great video mate. Explained everything I always wanted to know about ngons (And how to get rid of them) Cheers :)

[@isabel5066]

This video helped me understand this so much more... thank you so much for this video! it was great to hear the pros and cons!

[@DjTasteless]

...other modelling issues from hell... I love you! ;)

[@GlebAlexandrov]

:D

[@MMmmmVarley]

Your video made this old man smile. 20+ years in the 3D game, and everything you pointed out is spot on. A dogmatic approach to modeling without N-gons will drive one mad. You have to be flexible. Be like water, as Bruce Lee once said. I might be slightly drunk. Keep on rockin', I dig what you sayin'.

[@Tarek_Abdelhafez]

Thanks, Gleb, for the amazing and knowledgeable video. Truly, you answered many questions about Ngons and how too deal with it. In my opinion, practically, Ngons would be avoided in most of the cases. It is hard to work on a model with Ngons that will not face the challenges you mentioned. It will be great if you make another video on how the model (clean or bad) will affect texturing, lighting, animation, ... etc. Thanks, again!

[@GlebAlexandrov]

Yeah, texturing, lighting and so on. Definitely something to explore in the next iteration.

[@peterkrauspe9217]

This is an incredible helpful presentation and explanation of the problem ! Great work !

[@GlebAlexandrov]

Thanks Peter!

[@marsmotion]

an excellent subject and well discussed.

[@StephenWebb1980]

Yes, they are - but then again it all depends on your scene the requirements and the attributes of the nGon. You wouldn't want a skinned mesh (blendshapes or any deformable objects for that matter) having nGons, mainly because deformations will not look right - lighting and material work also plays a major role in why avoiding nGons is a best practice - the really bad nGons in my experience are the non-planar variety, where you might have a vert(s) in the nGon that is causing the geometry to look like its distorted in such a way that its hard to tell what shape the nGon has (especially if the material and texture is the same across the face of the nGon). nGons also interrupt most modeling software functions, like insert edge loop, subdivision of faces etc. Almost every program I use in 3D modeling or game development would rather work with triangles or quads, often times the engine will attempt to convert the nGon to a proper collection of triangles which causes a ton of headaches if you aren't careful with your topology. That said, if it is a static object with no deformable parts, you might be able to get away with an nGon here or there so long as its not viewable by the end user (mainly because of lighting/normals issues). Anyhow that's my opinion on the matter

[@StephenWebb1980]

Please note, that I commented before watching the video LOL

[@skepsys_d]

Thank you for your thoughts and processes on this subject. Stay safe out there.

[@temptor7585]

Another eye opening video, i expect nothing less than just that. Great work....again!

[@Digistring2010]

thanks for this vivid analysis of coping with ngons.......i think ngons are the consequences of modelling issue.....which can be happen in the cases of both simple and complex area.......but its true that if it happens ..it ruins the smooth modelling reputation for everyone......a common problem i have faced many times......sometime a have been able to manage sometime dont......as you are the master of blender...your thought will enlightened the users like us.

[@Clases3d]

I always come here form time to time to watch this marvelous tutorial, thanks for sharing all of this, it opened my mind some time ago

[@DonEsteban3D]

the problem with bevels and booleans are that, it sometimes fail to do its job (0 bevel) or work with minimal strenght. If so you must fix topology abit or apply bevel before next boolean and do it manualy.

[@jtornhill]

These kinds of tutorials... that really explain the reason to why things happen in 3D... is just that kind that I love to see :D. Great explanations and good solutions to many NGON problems (however...I will still use 99% quads ;) )!

[@GlebAlexandrov]

Great :)

[@secret_things7944]

I was chuckling the entire time. i love this video. thank you for this fantastic talk

[@BRJoinGames]

Awesome video, super helpful!

[@pikminfreak0011]

Can confirm from my early days of CG that Ngons are absolutely UVMap-killers. Learning how to properly model with all-quads took me from being unable to ever get good UVs to suddenly being able to get almost-perfect UVs (at least, for someone of my skill level. I'm no CG god but I know my way around Blender for sure.)

[@polygon4399]

Newer uv tools unwrap ngons easily. No need for Tris and quads when unwraping.

[@pikminfreak0011]

@@polygon4399 Not from what I've seen so far

[@polygon4399]

@@pikminfreak0011 what software do you use, and what version?

[@pikminfreak0011]

@@polygon4399 Blender 2.79 (waiting on the full-on release of 2.8, don't remember if it's fully out or not)

[@ri-ri5031]

N-gons are like items in-game that seemed bad at first glance,but has potential to fit in a specific build under certain circumstance based on one's decision.

[@FoxBoi69]

Like rotten flesh is good for dogs and traiding with villagers?

[@hypernova4997]

I've been looking for a vid like this for a while...thank you so much Gleb!!!

[@GlebAlexandrov]

I thought it won't hurt to record yet another ngon tutorial :)

[@bearwolffish]

That bevel trick around 15:50 was very nice.

[@pinklady7184]

Tris and quads for stretchable, malleable, deformable mesh as in characters. I use tris sparingly. Besides, tris become quads when subdivided. N-gons for stiff, unchanged mesh as in hard-surfaced models. I keep topology as neat as possible.

[@funnyanimalworld7579]

so basicaly if ngon is flat surface and will not be bending during the animation it can be whatever you want until it has good shading, and even if not you can duplicate object before making ngons and transfer shading data to the one with ngon?

[@arloc_official]

great video! im gonna use the boolean modifier more often now :D

[@GlebAlexandrov]

yay!

[@ciaranpmryan]

I recently bought BoxCutter and my lack of understanding about how to rectify those crazy Boolean cuts has led me to not diving too deep into it. That will now change! HardOps bevel apply has been an eye opener for me in learning how to use the bevel modifier to get smoother shading. All round great content Gleb. You and MasterXeon have helped me to no end.

[@Kholaslittlespot1]

I might have to buy Hardops/Boxcutter. I remember them being pretty cheap but are there any official free versions?

[@polygon4399]

Using ngons can be a huge advantage in modeling workflowz. That's if you know what you are doing. There are alot of misteps when dealing with ngons. Most being shading errors from nonplanar faces. Keeping your mesh quad is a complete waist of time. It all turns into Tris at the end.

[@polygon4399]

quads are useful for character workflows. in that case you want good topology

[@lautarolavecchia5995]

this was really helpful thank you

[@curtisyue182]

I allow nGons in my own work, but one thing I've noticed is that you should avoid letting the edges be concave; All vertices should have convex relations to the center of the face. That seems to avoid the rendering issues.

[@3d_mihai]

A very well done tutorial, good job!

[@teragaga]

Thanks for the awesome video, yet again. I am a beginner, a mere shrimp and learn lots every time I watch your videos. The HSMC was totally worth it! Since your Runes video, I have suspected that you are an unmitigated ngon fan. I'm sure ngons everywhere appreciate your advocacy. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for ngons. They serve a purpose. However, when they venture beyond their remit, ngons can destroy the very thing they are part of. How is the best way to put this ?...... The ratio of ngons to non-ngons is like the use of salt. A little is really good, too much is poison. Hmmm... kinda works. Ngons can be awesome. Yep. They go where quads cannot, they bridge the impossible gap, and they can bring together dissimilar mesh that would otherwise be in conflict. I am, however, a little cautious. For military/industrial models, like your Robo, ngons are the cat's pyjamas. However, for softer, more organic and humanoid models ngons just don't work. (Imagine soft, vulnerable character model like a baby and mother each with a nasty ngon on their foreheads. For things to flow and be natural you can't use ngons.) So, ngons need to be more clear when to deploy their services. And, more importantly, when not to. Sometimes, simple, quads work just fine. Gleb, here is a joke just for you... What is the difference between Wimbelton centre court and a colourful shrimp? One is a proud lawn and the other is a loud prawn. Stay caffeinated. A little salt goes a long way!

[@spacep0d]

There's no excuse for ngons, and there's no 't' in Wimbledon. ;)

[@VirtuallyProgrammingcom]

I liked this video. I learned a bit from it and thought it was a pretty good exploration of the subject, with several things I hadn't before considered. However, rather than convincing me that there are "pros" to using N-Gons, this has largely reaffirmed to me that N-Gons are truly evil for reasons I hadn't even given a lot of thought too. Still, I think you presented enough that people can make up their own minds. And I think you are right that there's often no point worrying about N-Gons for concepting. You showed many ways to correct N-Gon problems or sweep them under the rug. So, if they aren't giving you problems (or the people you work with at the other end of the pipeline) then "what's the problem". I totally agree with that. I do think maybe you should have put more emphasis on character modeling and animation and the problems N-Gons create there. So, you model N-Gons and you may not want to be caught alone in a dark ally with your animator. But you at least mentioned these problems, and so I can't fault you there. I really didn't see that there are really any "pros" to using N-Gons other than "sometimes you can get away with sloppy work and it doesn't matter" which is a valid argument. But I think this video does a great job of illustrating that there are all kinds of problems associated with N-Gons and hardly any advantages for production work used in game engines and movies. For 3D models used in 2D renders it may not matter. And there may be other places it doesn't matter so much either. It may even open up some creative ideas. Re-topology allows you to do all sorts of things "wrong" before you retopologize for more creativity. The biggest disagreement I have with this video is the idea that N-Gons result in less geometry. At the end of the day, the graphics card doesn't know how to draw any shape except triangles (well, lines and points as well if you want to get technical). So, it's all getting triangulated at some point with the quad being 2 triangles and thus only divisible in two ways, making quads fairly easy to resolve and allowing for better edge flow than triangles and no poles. But you solved the bad topology problem by cranking up the number of quads involved. You don't HAVE to do that. I wouldn't. Usually, I manually rebuild the topology. You have the two holes at about 17 minutes into the video as an example of N-Gons having less geometry. But the real problem is that you've introduced "bad" geometry. And the two examples you give are to either just leave the bad geometry or crank the number of quads so high that the bad effects of the bad geometry are minimized. There's a third option: you can delete the bad surfaces and weave your own geometry out of the veritices using quads and triangles. For example, you could have deleted all the N-Gon faces. Then you could have built rectangles (basically quads around the offending geometry - the two holes) around the offending geometry by defining new vertices now that the faces are removed. You could then re-weave faces to the two rectangles allowing for very large quads and only a very slight increase in overall vertices or geometry. You could then weave the edges of the rectangles to the offending geometry using triangles and quads. This is what I do in these situations. I'm not afraid of using booleans, I just clean up after myself by manually rebuilding the faces to create good clean geometry. That results in removing all the problems of N-Gons while at most increasing the overall amount of geometry only by a negligible amount. I mean, the box I created around the hole is just 4 vertices. I may create a box inside a box, or maybe even a box inside of that to help resolve the quads in a transition between wild geometry to quads. But that's like 12 vertices added per boolean hole I created. In a model with 4,000 vertices, that's not likely to be a very noticeable increase in overall geometry but having no N-Gons. So, the one "pro" I see of N-Gons is that sometimes it may be more "quick and dirty" and not cause problems, especially for concepting. And maybe it might help with creativity as well. But overall, I think this video has convinced me to be even more resolved in my fight against N-Gons in nearly all cases. Thanks for the video though! It was very informative and a lot of good info to think about!

[@VirtuallyProgrammingcom]

As an example, there is a lamp on my DeviantArt page. www.deviantart.com/virtuallyprogramming/art/Lamp-667283667 If you zoom in, there are circular holes in the top portion of the lamp. Those are actual holes (as opposed to simulating it in the texture or something). There are also two rectangular-ish holes that the wire pokes through on the right arm of the lamp. None of that is N-Gons. It's all triangles and quads. It's been a couple years since I modeled that, but I just checked the file to verify it. The ENTIRE lamp is 8,470 vertices. I just checked and in the entire model there are 8 faces involved in pentagons and zero faces in N-Gons more complex than that. I'm not even sure where the 8 pentagons are. It's a still image render, and so it matters less, not to mention it's hard surface modeling. Still, the point is that you can get very complex geometry without N-Gons including boolean holes, if you take the time to clean them up.

[@izvarzone]

pro is having less support edges where they're not needed, instead of running then throught entire model, find a flat surface and make a pole here. "Spider nests" are acceptable in flat surfaces. ZRemesher create them all the time on more complex objects than boxes, they dont cause problem unless they randomly generated near rounded edge (remeshing fixes it), or projecting on original mesh and then polishing fix it. High poly isnt used for animation, it's used to bake on low poly. And hard surface are not deforming during animation anyway.

[@junicop1]

That is such a great work!

[@KiR_3d]

Maybe someday we'll get some kind of AI based realtime remeshing algorythms that will eliminate the most of all ngon cons.

[@polygon4399]

There already out

[@KiR_3d]

@@polygon4399 oh, yeah. Few days ago I've seen the video about the Sculpt branch and that cool remeshing algo! If you're about it

[@0xBnuuy]

Ngons gave me a lot of headaches while trying to learn the basics. I feel like I can learn and work so much better with how to use quads for character modeling. I respect ngons but I do character modeling so I don’t really use them.

[@4mb127]

Nicely visualized and explained video. Great job!

[@GlebAlexandrov]

tnx!

[@mihailazar2487]

well, to sum it up, ngons are a bit closer to CAD ... they screw up with some of the things polygonal workflows are good for, but in essence, if you are DESIGNING something, be it concept art or a mechanical piece meant for 3dprinting, you shouldn't subdivide things just because of the topology, just make the shape and don't worry about the topology at all, because if you want to change your design later, it's easier with n-gons, and the "not worrying" speeds things up

[@KaoukabiJaouad]

That clearly the hardest part of modeling, the money part is having a complex model with as few as possible polygons, perfect curvature(thanks to shrink wrap modifier but it's not magic, good topology is the base of everything), SubD ready, that why they called production ready models, you can do everything with it, animate it easily, it's works easily with renderers just a basic shader will look amazing ... UVing it can't be any smoother ... etc etc, but it's takes years of practice ... to be good at it .... the only guys that i found very good at it are the CG Masters guys and you ... your course on the Shrimp robot .... , the guy who did the 2 car models at CG Masters is crazy good too, on a 60 hours course he doesn't make mistakes .... he is crazy good

[@malcolmgambrill2692]

Excellent, the biggest problem I have been having is with the Materials and textures. Now I at least know the nasty little buggers that cause it so I can look for them and sort them out.

[@panprezident789]

"Auto Smooth" is a nice option for shading issues. However, its good to remember that if you want to use your model in other software/ or format in general, it will not be saved. ..happend to me when I was modeling a gun for a game mod, and had to fix models topology at the end as autosmooth was just blender-only option. ;)

[@epichdsheep]

panprezident789 you can save it. Just hit the checkbox «encode smoothing groups» when exporting. Can’t remember exactly what it was called, but it’s there and you should recognize it.

[@tom_paul_3d]

It absolutely saves, fbx exports smoothing groups perfectly

[@BoELoot]

I love your channel, Gleb. You do a great job.

[@nibblrrr7124]

1:01 Many faces on the inside of the loop are also n-gons, with the top & bottom edge split into two.

[@masterxeon1001]

nice video!

[@brianlundlauridsen9389]

Excellent channel, great content - learning a lot. Subscribed.

[@user-bl7oi6my4q]

To cut short - yes, very evil if not under certain circumstances.

[@eudymaverickmentor]

Сергей Бильмандо Actually the opposite. NGon's are perfectly acceptable except for a few circumstances.

[@user-bl7oi6my4q]

@@eudymaverickmentor go on make them all over your model if you're so sure about that.

[@eudymaverickmentor]

@@user-bl7oi6my4q I have been for the last 25 years. Facts are just facts. I have been teaching for 37 years. You can see my work here. polygrinder.com/ You can see some of my students work here. www.artstation.com/mediaarts How about you show us some of your work.

[@Ne0mega]

@@eudymaverickmentor I see nothing in your description about game modeling. If you are game modeling, Ngons are evil.

[@eudymaverickmentor]

@@Ne0mega NGons are not evil in game modeling. As soon as ALL models are brought into a game engine they are translated down to their base feature which is triangles.

[@RAYtheMEME]

This the video that we needed.

[@GlebAlexandrov]

let's hope it is so.

[@RAYtheMEME]

@@GlebAlexandrov It is indeed something we needed. Being confudent with our modeling skills is a challenge itself.

[@dannorris1406]

Nice video Gleb. Very balanced analysis.

[@GlebAlexandrov]

Thanks Dan, we tried to maintain some level of objectivity.

[@ABaumstumpf]

Even quads lead to many problems, triangles are the Only shape really defined in a 3D space. And n-gon is only defined if it is planar (all points in the same plane), but very often you have deformations or shadings that break this basic condition. So yeah - avoid them when ever possible. Quads are used cause while they do have problems they offer a lot of intuitive usability. With high enough vertex density the errors are very small but controlling becomes easy.

[@Disthron]

Overall, this seems like a pretty balanced look. Cheers!

[@ShiroiAkumaSama]

7:53 mark those edges as sharp changed my life. Thanks!

[@Disthron]

5:23 Also, those are not quads, they are 2 triangles put together. If they were real quads, moving the vertices out of alignment would cause all kinds of graphical glitches. As the system is trying to draw a flat surface with points that don't align up properly.

[@tiaan_va]

...they are quads, with a triangulate modifier on them... I mean he is demonstrating how software will interpret those quads when it automatically triangulates it.. pay attention man

[@jazzew]

Ooooooh! This was very helpful! ...I don't make enough stuff. I should try these techniques, though, because I have been afraid to use N-gons.

[@arpeegee_studio]

Very good set of infos. You might still wanna learn how to avoid them. There are many techniques for that. Ngons might be okay for stills and some hard surface modelling but in a pro environment your boss will ask you not to have too much of them.

[@arpeegee_studio]

There's a very good series of tutorials called Making It look Great for C4D that teaches all of those techniques, and how to model clean assets. The techniques can transfer to Blender or any other 3d package.

[@trafficface]

Thank you for this analysis! This has always been on my mind.

[@pauliusmscichauskas558]

Ngons are amazing and they save lot of time with no drawback (If they're flat). I just wish blender supported ngon holes on ngons in blender. It would ge a game changer.

[@SuyePhoto]

Ngons aren't evil just unnecessary. If you want to work in a pro environment strive to solve your topology cleanly. But good information about what a ngons are and the many unpredictable results they cause. 👍 Also if you want to use them for Boolean purposes that's a good starting point but the final product should be resolved. I would think that more people would think fully Triangulated meshes are evil especially to anyone that has had to clean up game assets, or CAD data lol

[@GlebAlexandrov]

Agreed.

[@donloder1]

I friggin need to start to learn Blender before my contract is over. Don't wanna stuck at home just learning and not making doughs. Subscription is a pain.

[@Techno-Universal]

Apparently in Maya N-Gons mainly cause problems when it comes to creating UVs and they can even crash Maya in the worst cases while you are trying to UV map an object with N-Gons! :)

[@HBMHD]

Generally speaking, it's best to triangulate if the model is a static solid object, otherwise quads are the only way to go.

[@user-us1ro6js4z]

Don't n-gons also cause problems with texture wrapping?

[@GlebAlexandrov]

I think so.

[@jfa3dwizard257]

You have to plan how you going to unwrap considering size of area/ amount of pixels on texture ratio. If you will end having enough uv space to properly texture the rest of your mesh, It can be done. Of course, this will always be a solution for a surface that does not need to be deformed. And it's the only solution for proper texture lightning tricks, since smoothing angles need to be 0, light vectors won't be able to create the diffusion gradient needed to simulate visually the 3d light spatial distribution. But in general, using Ngons it's always gonna be a mistake, back in the day before Zremesher, there was no other way around it that try to find these fixes and tricks, but not anymore. A proportional sized topology of preferred 4 side polygons it's always the best solution. Best use of UV space, fastest mesh rendering computation, realtime or offline, and cleaner vertex arrays, which in the art part are not that important, but if you want your programmer to quickly create good editor tools to properly handle mesh geometry, make sure you are delivering quad meshes.

[@prmnp]

What song do you use for intro and outro? I think I've ever heard that from freemusicarchive but I forgot the title

[@Kemer95]

Why you didn't mention meshmachine or how to transfer normals from a guide mesh (or in case of using meshmachine, from stache) Ngons on curved geometry are fine and are way easier to achive than proper full quad topology. And if you traiangulate them, then transfer normals, there will be 0 issues in other applications. Wireframe does look ugly, but who realy cares if there is no problem with shading and rendering. There's no reasons not use ngons on any hard surface, not deformable meshes

[@GlebAlexandrov]

Agree with you, Meshmachine is a great example of this kind of normal transferring black magic, I should have mentioned it probably. Maybe next time :)

[@FarBeyond-Studio]

Your overly compressed voice makes me shiver.. Great content though, as always

[@GlebAlexandrov]

It's the multiband compression effect. feels a bit weird?)

[@FarBeyond-Studio]

Feels tiring to my ears quite fast, a little too movie-trailer-like for tutorials imho, but if I'm the only one, don't mind... I've been following your tutorials for a year now, you have helped my projects in many respects, thanks

[@alanp741]

I came here bc idk if I should make an ngon for making 4 fingers bc I'm trying to do low poly to keep it simple

[@hello.4693]

Is a mesh with 3 Verticies a ngon? should we avoid it too?

[@proxeIO]

No love for Weighted Normal Modifier? In a pinch it most certainly doesn't hurt to check if it fixes any normal issues, in particular boolean workflow; It can work when Bevel harden normals does not and vice versa.

[@GlebAlexandrov]

My bad, i haven't tested it yet. That's something that is on my list.

[@theunraveler]

What about ngon in models that need to be rigged and animated?

[@hoenchioma]

Stupid question, but how does your blender setup look so cool?

[@GlebAlexandrov]

Raheeb, it's pretty much the default 2.8 setup, the only difference is that i used some custom matcaps from this page: devtalk.blender.org/t/call-for-content-matcaps/737/7

[@Kholaslittlespot1]

What is your preffered method for Re-topo in Blender? (for your hard surface, mechanical stuff) I'm familar with Bsurfaces, F2- (not used much yet) and doing manually with the polybuild tool but I am wondering if there is a better way.

[@MaxHancockCo]

Great video! also, I think of it this way; small ngons are not bad, but big ones are always evil.

[@Ben-rz9cf]

N gons just get divided into tris anyway, so it just helps to know how it is going to be divided. The problems with Ngons are really just problems with tris. Its an issue of density, not topology.

[@daysgame6295]

Бро , на 23.36 это ж Чёрный Рыцарь, которого якобы сбили американцы. Вот это да)))

[@daysgame6295]

Блин попутал прошу прощения, на 13.55