EVERYTHING You Need to Know About Topology

[@kassiag7579]

I wish I had this video when I was first starting out. I remember having to spend hours googling on topology for characters and best practices, but never getting much information out of the pros. I've learned a lot in practice, but this video has taught me a lot of things that I *didn't* know. One of the things I really appreciate is the breakdown in workflows between topology for real-time, and topology for offline rendering. I know the rules but never quite understood why those rules were in place, or how to apply them better.

[@artofjhill]

Glad to hear you learned some things

[@kartikzazadiya7312]

www.youtube.com/@Stylizedostudio

[@UncleJessy]

This is great. As I’m staring on a path of learning 3D Modeling for 3D Printing and finding if I just throw polygons at my model it will be bloated in file size or take forever to slice for printing. Great stuff baked in here

[@artofjhill]

Thank you man and your videos have helped me to understand more about 3D printing. I’m still very green at that. We should team up to make something

[@kartikzazadiya7312]

www.youtube.com/@Stylizedostudio

[@DeepFriedOreoOffline]

I really appreciate your explanation of quads vs triangles based on the necessary development process. I have studied a lot of professional game models, seen so many triangles, so I use them in my work to do just what you say: end loops and save verts. However, when people call me out on it I never really know what to say because I know it's okay to do, but I didn't know why. Now I understand that triangles are only bad if a mesh needs to be subdivided predictably, such as for cinema rendering!

[@artofjhill]

Glad I could help!

[@kartikzazadiya7312]

www.youtube.com/@Stylizedostudio

[@iscuxcar]

at 16:45, its mentioned that the mesh will be subdivided. might interest some people as to why its subdivided. you subdivide a model for the deplacement map. deplacement will pull polygons to make details. so you start from low-ish polycount to animate, block out etc. and come final render, the renderer will subdivide the model and pull geo with help from the displacement map. in that sense, if you're not working with displacement map, you dont actually have to subdivide the model. example, stylistic 3D animations, cell shaded animations, cartoonish looking stuff etc, anything you can get away with a normal map, which makes fake bumps. (as opposed to displacement map, which makes real bumps)

[@leucome]

I think your missing the point. He is also talking about the smoothing subdivision that is used to smooth and round thing. Basically everything that is organic or round can be made at 1/8 or 1/4 or the final expected poly count. And then it get rounded only when required. To give an example imagine you make a leg out of a rectangle. Then you add a smoothing subdivision to make it round after on top of that you add a resolution subdivision for displacement or for sculpting details. These are independent feature added on top of each other.

[@zues3663]

@@leucome this ^

[@kartikzazadiya7312]

www.youtube.com/@Stylizedostudio

[@mgimpelevich]

Been modeling for over a year at this point, and this is probably the single most broadly useful video I've seen among the dozens of tutorials I've watched. Good Job!

[@artofjhill]

happy to hear it! have fun

[@evanderdornelles]

Honestly, you're a gift to the 3D art community.

[@artofjhill]

Ha, I appreciate it

[@prasoondhapola2875]

Agreed

[@sriya658]

@@artofjhill i am new here.

[@kartikzazadiya7312]

www.youtube.com/@Stylizedostudio

[@artofjhill]

👋

[@braxtonburks7108]

Excellently structured vid. I’ve watched too many videos on topology that focus more on the tools rather than the methodology. This video is helping reinforce a lot of my learning thank you!

[@Fo2shstein]

Hi there, I just wanted to drop by & thank you for the treasure of knowledge I got from watching just this one video. You are a true professional & I can't thank you enough!

[@artofjhill]

[@taenjones6518]

after hours of trying to understand topology you finally made it make sense. Thank you so much.

[@coryzukatis7992]

Absolutely the best explanation I've seen so far, and you've set the bar so high I really doubt I'm going to find a better experience for a long time. PLEASE KEEP IT UP IM LOVING THE DEEP LEARNING AND THE WAY YOU EXPLAIN EVERYTHING. 💯 😎👍

[@aaashiet]

year for all of us, for so- it's still ongoing. i respect you for being honest as that's what's been keeping a bit sane recently, just being

[@TruthSurge]

nice vid! When you talked about the grid lines and how they should ideally flow along creases and anatomy that will move certain ways, that made a whole lot of sense to my brain. comparing yours to the stock zbrush was also informative. Julie got ISSUES. heheheheh but then it was prob just a fast thing they added for people to play around with w/o animation in mind like you said. thx for the info!!!!

[@artofjhill]

Glad you liked it!

[@shreyaspai3791]

Heh you had me at "Alright so we're gonna get super nerdy in this video" xD

[@clanker8021]

this is such a complete video, great information all around character modeling, amazing. Have you thought of making a video about SubD modeling? Currently learning that style of modeling

[@kartikzazadiya7312]

www.youtube.com/@Stylizedostudio

[@MsNathanv]

This is a good video. I come from the Blender world, where the amount of misinformation is insane, and there are a lot of bad Blender topo videos on KZbin. It seems like all any Blender peeps learn about topo is "all quads!" and so then they do things like make degenerate quads instead of tris just so they can call it all quad. One of the more technical things that I didn't see you mention was knowing where your mesh was *planar* . I understand you're typically a game modeller, but the thing with poles really shows up when you start working with subdivided models, where poles/stars just don't subdivide right. Except-- as long as all of the faces are planar with all of their neighbors, it doesn't matter. So you end up putting poles where it's planar. And, in terms of sculpting, there are a lot of sculpting things that are doing similar things to subdivision (same algorithms, or derived algorithms), so that's why they don't do things right there either-- but yet again, if it's planar, it's fine. Then, what about animation? Once you start deforming a mesh, you don't know whether it's going to be planar anymore, right? So that's why you put the poles in places that aren't going to deform much: they're not going to go dramatically out of plane (the way that a lip vert might, for example.) And it's a balancing act: the more planar they are, the less it's going to look wrong, even if they're not perfectly planar. (Really, topo for deformation isn't something any different than topo for something static: you want edge flow that describes your shape. The complication is that your one topo is going to deform into a lot of different shapes-- but, not *every* shape, there are things you know the animator isn't gonna do. So you make edge flow that represents the shape in likely deformations.) I don't think it's particularly hard to UV map or weight a triangulated mesh (i just select shortest path, but it probably depends on your preferred program), but it's kind of hard to maintain good edge flow when you're modelling in tris. Using planar quads makes it clear what your effective edge flow is, for purposes of smooth shaded normals. (If they're not very planar, it doesn't help at all though.) You can triangulate the mesh afterwards, and it'll be fine, but if you work with triangulated meshes to begin with, what's the edge flow, which is the diagonal? It just doesn't end up working right.

[@antonbayda2571]

Thanks for another great video J! Keep it up!

[@rouzah9419]

I even asked in Blender discord what 'verts' means. They were also unsure. Translated it mean "green". I guess you mean an abbreviation of vertices?

[@artofjhill]

Yea verts are vertices

[@wacom8199]

Hands down the best topology video for characters!!

[@artofjhill]

🙏

[@oskars_l]

Totally very great video. I am diving into this and using Blender 3.4 with budget tools like Speedretopo. Reflow I will try next. But speedretopo is absolutely great to learn how to model partially manually. Why my quads turns to triangles and triangles newer ends all over the place. But J Hill just explained. First I thought I don't know something. Apparently it is normal to have challenges with manual topology. Thanks!

[@deepatterson1894]

I wish I would of found this years ago! I have learned so much from watching today! I had a little bit of understanding but I frustrated trying to find a good teaching video on topology This is the Video! I watched and took notes and snippets of examples. You really have opened my understanding on this subject and can't wait to start applying what I have learned. Thanks a million for this! I am going to have to get those books!

[@artofjhill]

Happy to hear it and glad I could help! Glhf

[@kartikzazadiya7312]

www.youtube.com/@Stylizedostudio

[@ariaxua]

i wish you also went over some quadruped topology, i know in genreral its all the same principle but maybe some examples etc or talking about problem areas like skin fold between leg/belly. anyway great video i was a bit sad when it ended :d

[@artofjhill]

Glad you liked the video. Quadrupeds would be super specific for sure but in general I’d say it’s like 4 shoulders in how all the legs move of that helps

[@land3021]

Gotta say, the star shapes almost completely flew over my head, because I was still looking at the squares and looking for shapes that weren't squares... until... Well, I guess I just got lucky * Y +

[@land3021]

9 months or so later; Still don't know how to model human beings :C... although thats not technically 100% true, its just I don't understand the process, but I think I've definitely got a pretty good understanding of how to model the front part of the human jaw line in the anime-style... and not have the cheeks look like they've had massive bullets put into them to make them go inwards instead of outwards... AND my topology definitely adresses the stars that naturally will start to form around the 3 major "holes" in the face(assuming you're modelling anime characters since regular humans have 5 holes in the face, these being the eyes, nostrils and mouth). I think the major areas I still need to improve in, would be the forehead and, dear I still say, the general depth and variation of said depth...

[@goldenmace]

subscribed and bought your base mesh! I have been looking for something like this for a while.

[@artofjhill]

Thank you! Have fun

[@MrChikkooo]

Man this is wat I was waiting for!! Feels like u read my mind 😅

[@artofjhill]

Glad to hear it, I hope it helps!

[@godsgiventalent8823]

Can u make a video on how to sculpt clothes in blender and shoes

[@adityasamudre2291]

Honestly, you're a gift to the 3D art community.

[@artofjhill]

🙏

[@ShadowoftheDude]

32:34 "the ear doesn't animate." Me, who can wiggle my ears: :(

[@artofjhill]

This is a hot topic

[@3dbznessdesignz855]

tons and tons of respect to you Jay

[@artofjhill]

🙏

[@prasoondhapola2875]

Thanks so much for all the knowledge bombs. I feel so enlightened, I'm almost a different person from the one that hadn't watched this video 😵

[@artofjhill]

I don’t know about all that lol but I’m glad you learned some things and liked the video

[@prasoondhapola2875]

@@artofjhill on a serious note, though, you have completely demystified the concept. Everyone kinda knows it's a big deal, but for people without industry experience, it is not clear what is meant by "good topology". Googling around a little you may find concepts like topology for subdivision/shading/animation but the way you elaborate exactly what each thing means in practice and breakdown everything with your knowledge and expertise, it's INVALUABLE..And all off that in 40 minutes! That's brilliant and probably painstaking work in terms of ideation and video production. HATS OFF TO YOU SIR.

[@LeranWeethDSouza]

can you do the practical thing which is an animation that is side-to-side comparison between the model of good and bad topology (triads, random flow of contours ) which will help newbie like me

[@manameisjeffie656]

when i saw this vid thumbnail i thought it was about math, but i think they pretty similar in terms of the main topic (am not sure tho)

[@TvoeNastroenie]

Thank you for this video and wish you all the best :)

[@daruoshmonjezi9175]

Thsnks for all... so good your teach

[@bearish_bull]

Hey why would you need an optimal amount of polygons? Does the less polygons on the model = cleaner graphics or less rendering time? I’m sorry if you’ve addressed this. I’m about 9:34 min in & I had this question, so I thought I’d ask. Thanks a million for what you do. I’m a digital artist, & found my way to 3D art. I’m soooooo excited, but total n00b so forgive my ignorance. Much love! Cheers

[@artofjhill]

Hey. Np. The more polygons the longer the render time. For a game, everything on screen is rendered 30+ times a second. So all of the models need to be as low as possible. Textures as small as possible. Etc

[@FurlowT]

You use Zremesher? I'm rather curious how you get decent topology out of it. I've been encounter artists that use it and get these crazy flows that are almost impossible to use effectively for animation. I don't suppose you could put a tutorial of how to do that?

[@artofjhill]

The finished topology in this was made by hand. That’s the only way to get 100% control

[@egar6243]

amazing!!!! a question. can we overcome bad topology with rigging/weight paint? in a purpose of animation. Let's say the shoulder, if i retopology the shoulder without a flow, can rigging/weight paint overcome it to be able deform naturally? thank you hill

[@cyrilrueg]

What a great video!

[@pilotdawn1661]

Excellent overview!

[@artofjhill]

Thanks. I hope it helps

[@3dbznessdesignz855]

one question in my mind is 1.i have laid my uvs in udims to say in 8 udims and textured the same in substance 2.i am going to use the model in Unity is it the right work flow if not suggest me what should i follow the final scene will have a few more characters

[@artofjhill]

Typically games and real-time renderers don’t use UDIMS. We use separate materials that point to their own texture sets. All the UVs would be laid out in 0-1

[@ronydey2696]

So greatful thanks sir for these valuable explains and tutorials please make a digital double over any live action real chacrecter in maya modelling and surface study and anatomy .Hi sir myself Rony an VFX CG student from India !!

[@grayfox8904]

Very nice and educational video as always Mr J Hill! I have a question, where can we find The Art of Moving Points (with the videos) except the Apple website? Thank you!

[@Dak498]

Yes, this is what I need! My topology is a bowl of noodles!

[@artofjhill]

🍜

[@gain_2867]

them too

[@stevenzheng5459]

Topology; studying surfaces in reference to holes Bottomology; studying holes in reference to surfaces

[@clintg5120]

One thing I'm confused about, here is an example. If I model a table top and only use six edge loops to sharpen, is it good practice to split and fill in the larger faces into smaller more even sized quads? I know a lack of quads can have an effect on texturing (Stretch) but I'd wondering if there is a general rule. Thanks

[@artofjhill]

A table doesn’t deform so there wouldn’t be stretching. You can have a big face for the top and all the loops would be to support and round the edges

[@clintg5120]

@@artofjhill Thanks for the reply

[@ArtemM3D]

great one!

[@artofjhill]

Glad you liked it

[@Aquila666]

thanks

[@artofjhill]

np hope it helps

[@odinniereece4096]

post your portfolio link in the description please

[@artofjhill]

It is

[@holliscrane4644]

pause at 0:03

[@Blackiris_]

I was expecting open sets and continuity, what's this?

[@artofjhill]

3D modeling 🙃

[@Blackiris_]

@@artofjhill yeah I realized. I was just baiting the math people with my comment lol.

[@hameddesign70]

When youtube recommendation works fine

[@artofjhill]

🙏

[@ThankYouESM]

I want to know why still topology instead of just pre-calculated pixelization texture meshing in terms of limiting poly count?

[@artofjhill]

I honestly don't know what you're talking about

[@ThankYouESM]

@@artofjhill kzbin.info/www/bejne/ZmHKcpWdd9priJY

[@ThankYouESM]

@@artofjhill kzbin.info/www/bejne/nJeXcnyfls9jgc0

[@zhulikkulik]

Proper topology is much easier to work with when you are animating. And texturing. It's a pain in the ass to do retopology, but there's no easy way around if we are talking about characters. For static meshes like nature, statues and architecture - yes, we have "smart" subdivision modifiers like adaptive subdive in blender and we might eventually get this intellectual decimation thing like nanite. Oh, and yeah, nanite itself doesn't support deformations as it is right now. Might change in the future tho, who knows. It will be a game changer then.

[@Robinssoncravents]

this guy!!!!

[@vuethao8980]

Can you you tell me the name of the book and direct me to that book so I can purchase it?

[@vuethao8980]

Oh nvm I got it.

[@artofjhill]

cool glad you found it

[@sukmawadisulistyo3904]

When people want to escape from math by going to 3d art, They will hit this.

[@M_k-zi3tn]

Woa bro why did you gloss over blender when talking about retopology. It's arguably more versatile and maybe even better than every other retopo capable software you mentioned.

[@artofjhill]

Arguable for sure

[@M_k-zi3tn]

@@artofjhill Thanks for the video though. I do appreciate all of it's insight.

[@artofjhill]

Glad you liked it

[@Duskull666]

As a mathematics student in university hoping to understand topology.. i feel a bit click baited 😂

[@artofjhill]

Apologies.

[@IfthiAli]

You were my real professor when I was at Uni lol

[@artofjhill]

HA ask for your money back

[@IfthiAli]

@@artofjhill LOL I wish, thanks for everything man

[@cathymiller2798]

Revelation 13:15 “And he had power to give life unto the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak, and cause that as many as would not worship the image of the beast should be killed.” Beware of Transhumanism .. And all its Forms

[@BongbokCG]

🔥🔥🔥

[@sw6560]

gotta take an Adderall for this one

[@milii8320]

Lástima que no hablo ingles :'/

[@TruthSurge]

tuhpology. I thought it was pronounced TOP-ology. People gettin lazy wit dem LIPS. But okay, let me larn somethin about tuhpology. hehe I bet I know about 10% of what's in this vid. Or maybe 5%. Uploaded a year ago. The way technology is, this is all probably outdated by now. hahah just joking around. Why am I here instead of Blender for Noobs tutorials?

[@saibalganguli9153]

cant give job why sell such things

[@MaxHancockCo]

There's a bit of a difference between topology for characters, and topology for everyday objects like hard surfaces etc, and how you go about making it. This video is everything about topology for characters, mostly post sculpt. Just FYI for those watching. All good info though!

[@angiemaestre638]

that was gonna be comment so have a like random citizen

[@kartikzazadiya7312]

www.youtube.com/@Stylizedostudio

[@ArnCreations204]

Great video! Currently prepping for an assignment where I'll be making a game-ready character, so your explanations from both perspectives of games and cinematics are super insightful, especially the tips on triangulation. In my degree (Game Design) they've mainly taught us from an animation perspective since the criteria have been based on the Creative Industries (Animation) degree, it's only in the past couple of years that they have been trying to factor in a games perspective.

[@artofjhill]

Glad to hear it was helpful. Good luck with your degree

[@kartikzazadiya7312]

www.youtube.com/@Stylizedostudio

[@okamichamploo]

Ok so one question. In school I used to always think you had to combine the topology of your model. Like if you make a tea cup the handle should actually be connected to the cup, etc. But lately with ZBrush I see artists just make the handle, lever, wing, pillar, etc. and just move it into place without actually connecting the topology. Is it actually important to merge your meshes or is this just some outdated thing I learned in school?

[@FynnGB]

a rule of thumb for feature film quality is to have everything connected that is connected in real life as well. And in reverse also: everything that's separate should be separate as well. An example would be screws that should be separate, or certain panels etc. Another indicator are different materials like teeth and gum, or fingernails. In your example since the handle would most likely be glazed over or smoothed over a little bit there should be at least a slightly smooth transition so it would make sense to combine it. This would ensure that there are proper reflections where the pieces connect which become more visible the closer it gets. This applies at least to the hero objects (which are preferable for portfolio pieces)

[@JoshuaKubit]

Such a well made video Jay, the work you put into your channel shows! Picked up a copy of that stop staring book as well, thanks!

[@artofjhill]

Thank you, glad to hear it and enjoy the book!

[@Yuzach]

that's the best video ever about topology! thank you, Jay!

[@artofjhill]

Thanks Yulia :)

[@hopal6612]

Hi J Hill. The best tutorial I've ever watched on Character Topology. I am using C4d and I have studies on human modelling. Maybe I know most of the elements you describe, but with this video, everything fell into place in my head. Thank you so much. Stay cool.

[@artofjhill]

That’s great, I love to hear it helped. Good luck and happy modeling

[@kartikzazadiya7312]

www.youtube.com/@Stylizedostudio

[@kartikzazadiya7312]

www.youtube.com/@Stylizedostudio

[@DraconicKobold]

Correct title: Everything you need to know about topology for game development. This information is useless for quick sketches, models that will never be animated or even rendered. Different context different requirements.

[@rodneyabrett]

Edge flow is important but polygon construction is always dependent on the needs of production. What is the model being used for? There is clean topology and then there is efficient topology. Those two things are always going to be conflicting with each other because an efficient model means more loop termination points, which means more poles. Both types are "good" depending on those needs. Vfx models with hyper real deforms tend to have less poles but at the cost of denser, more uniform size polygons. This is because there are advanced deforms intended underneath. Muscles, bones, etc. You don't split the loops for the elbow bone, for example, because the location of that boney area will slide around realistically around the skin. An efficient mesh is more common with sub-d models because the deforms are more cartoony, so minimal vertices are ideal when distributing bone weighting gradients. Those models can sometimes tend to use more aggresive displacement maps to bring back sculpt details, however, at the cost of less vertices to do detailed deformations.

[@shana_dmr]

Most cartoony faces (let's say """Disney""" style) won't be "efficient" because cartoony usually requires more extreme deformations for animation purposes and you want to make them look good. It's the edge case as much as digidouble with muscle sim.

[@rodneyabrett]

@@shana_dmr That's true! vfx models the same. I did vfx character work for Atomic Fiction for awhile. Less poles, but denser cleaner uniform square meshes. Also takes into account 'sliding weights' for things like bones sliding under the skin.

[@Spork357]

I am a bit late. However, i am sculpting a model which requires high detail, it reached over a couple million faces after being done with the sculpt (including the arms legs etc..). I need to duplicate this model 4 times as I am trying to achieve a shot including 4 variations of said model. Apart from that single render I don’t need this model (no need to optimize it for a video game for example). My question is, is there even a need for me to retopo the model? Ps: second time sculpting, first time i reached an unfinished state due to hardware constraints and too many hair particles :,(

[@SmallerLives]

Two minutes in and I've just subscribed. I can tell this is going to be an amazing lesson.

[@urmumske1248]

nice clickbait, this isn't even close to everything this is like 1 or 2 actual topology tips

[@techknowbabble]

There's too much slightly incacurate info to correct but I will say threadripper isn't desktop it's HEDT (High-End Desktop) Epyc and Xeon are workstation. Most of about PCI-E lanes is true but current GPUs can't even saturate the bandwidth of an 8x PCI-E. But NVME can.

[@stalka6279]

blender boring ngl

[@the_tunez]

Taron Egerton-looking mf giving me 3D modeling tips OF COURSE I'm gonna follow them fam (great fuckin vids, keep it up)

[@tendibachmayum9484]

Am I hallucinating or does that polygons on the background move. But Thank you very much 👍👍

[@artofjhill]

👀

[@1DInciner]

Have you seen TOPOLOGY WORKS video?

[@zekezamora1770]

You used the unfamiliar term polycount without defining it. So I quit watching your video.

[@artofjhill]

Mkay

[@SleepyEvoli]

Thank you for this great video. I learnt a lot. You didn't cover topology reduction by using E-Pols and N-Pols. Reducing 4 faces to 2 for example. Some videos recommend those but I think they might be bad when you use subdivision (Which they never show). What is your opinion on that?

[@lalee9019]

"Hello, I'm seeking guidance on how to support my son, who is interested in realism and digital art. I came across your video and was wondering which editing software you use for your 3D art. Thank you!"

[@artofjhill]

Zbrush and Maya

[@lalee9019]

@artofjhill wow, thanks so much for a quick response. we will be sure to check it out and also any advice anyone can give to a serious young 3D arist. It will be greatly appreciated 👍

[@TruthSurge]

3:44 the elbows never seem to look correct when bent in lots of vids I've seen. Like old Poser vids etc. But the animation looks very realistic in that shot around 3:40

[@meghnapandey3673]

Can you make a video/tutorial on facial expression? (Tips and tricks) That would be really helpful. And quadruped topology maybe, for CG. I find it really confusing sometimes.

[@kartikzazadiya7312]

www.youtube.com/@Stylizedostudio

[@SuperValhala]

The one who made the zbrush head model: 😭

[@scottcourtney8878]

Tremendous! I'm a techie doing hard surface models for engineering (but learning a little organic modeling for personal enrichment), and I learned so much from this lesson, even things that will apply to my hard surface work. Thank you for sharing your talent and experience so generously!

[@artofjhill]

Thanks for the comment! Happy to hear you found it useful

[@nolanwollmer3032]

Thank you so much for the free subscription, your work is extremely inspiring so here's hoping I can learn something new

[@johndeggendorf7826]

Amazingly useful & concise. A mini MasterClass. Thanks 🙏☕️🎩🎩🎩

[@Polytricity]

100% about the triangle adding to ensure the quad is splitting the correct way, also important for baking that you know the triangulation is the same for the final model as the bake model to avoid artifacts later. When you import quads (non triangulated) into an engine its going to turn to triangles and some may be rotated (the dividing part of a quad) unless you export with triangulation checked or add it as a modifier to your stack / history. Fun times!

[@artofjhill]

💯

[@kartikzazadiya7312]

www.youtube.com/@Stylizedostudio

[@quadtychgort6485]

Amazing video. Thanks for making it; I can feel the esoterica falling away a bit...

[@manishvashist2487]

my question is how to trangulate the mesh for game and how to set equal space between eges during retopo

[@artofjhill]

It triangulated and render time or when formatted automatically and you space it out best you can when you retopo by hand

[@manishvashist2487]

@@artofjhill thank you sir , So it means I don’t have to convert mesh into triangle . I have to render it in triangle? Sir Can you make a video on it. And I tagged you on Instagram on my new post please give feedback sir

[@namolokaman2393]

This presentation is missing the key to understanding topology, which is how local curvature determines proper mesh layout. Absent specific animation requirements, and unless we are on a perfect sphere ( ex: eyeball ), or on a flat plane, at each point on _any_ curved surface ( ex: your arm ), the direction of least curvature is ALWAYS - mathematically - _perpendicular_ to the direction of greatest curvature! So when in doubt, ask yourself, at each point on a curved surface, what is the direction of greatest curvature, from which you can infer the direction of least curvature, and then you can determine how your spans, or edge loops, should go. Having your quad edges follow the lines of greatest and least curvature is the best way for the model to be efficient and light properly, particularly when low-res ( specular highlights naturally following, and stretching along, lines of curvature ). The rest is optimization, as well as accounting for curvature density ( = high-frequency important "detail", with high rates of local curvature = small radii of curvature ), in the base mesh, in preparation for subdivision. Determining directions of local curvature is how automated retopology tools work. Note: One trick, to help in the process - if you have a physical model to work from - is to walk around it with a spotlight, which will reveal directions of greatest and least curvature, at each point, as the specular highlight travels and stretches along the surface. Applying a reflective coat of paint or oil, to the model, helps. The direction specular highlights stretch ( i.e. the direction of least curvature ), *in a particular area,* as one moves the spotlight around, is an attribute of the surface, caused by curvature, not the position of the light, nor of the orientation of the surface in space. That is why good topology, for a given mesh density, rationally converges toward a single solution.

[@thomassynths]

Oh dang, this is modelling, not the branch of mathematics

[@artofjhill]

yea I'm not that smart

[@TheLiiviingDead]

Cool video and simple explanation of the topic. I would like to see more videos like that ! keep going that way =)

[@Gordy-io8sb]

This is misleading. You didn't cover any topological theory, like manifolds or transformations.

[@randatatang9222]

I'm a solidworks CAD product designer. Came to your channel to find answers about the difference between topology and geometry and now I'm LOST 😂😂

[@artofjhill]

Ha. It’s different?

[@soundsoflife8885]

Great video!! Covered everything really well subbed!!

[@V.Z.69]

30:13 When you are talking about *"changing direction"* , what do you mean? I can see that it appears that you speak of *"where edge-loop occur"* / *changing the direction of the edg-loop* , *_is that what you technically mean?_* thx!

[@berguru421]

I have pro tools 12.5 wNice tutorialch I bought back in 15 and It is really nightmare DAW for my soft creation. I have powerful computer but