Modeling something mechanical WITHOUT subdivision surfaces.

In this tutorial, I once again show another example of how to model something mechanical without needing to use subdivision surfaces, using direct polygon modeling. This method gives you freedom with large planar regions to use ngons and not needing to dice them up into a patchwork of quads.
Here is the start file:
drive.google.com/file/d/1pw7f...
Here is an important followup to this video covering the Weighted Normals modifier: • What is the Weighted N...
Part 2 is here: • Modeling without subdi...
#blender4 #polygonmodeling #marksharp #hardbodymodeling

[@superkaboose1066]

This was so good, you do things right and properly explain things, it's really refreshing.

[@yessinebellaaj6360]

Your approach to modeling is very satisfying! Very helpful tips! Thank you Sir!

[@ppsystems4317]

Really genius the way you are teaching ! and everything feels so easy for you.... I love hard modeling without Subd... thanks a lot !

[@davexbit]

What an incredible tutorial!!! This helps me understand what hard surface modeling is and explains so many areas where I didn't fully understand. Thanks for also explaining the surfacing philosophy to enable good consistent radii. I love that the tutorial is nicely paced, clear and free from ego. The software is intimidating enough. The fade in shots of the complete product in between your explanations is also nice. It gives me confidence in what this will look like when I'm done building this and helps keep things moving. What a gem of a tutorial!!! Thank you so much and SUBSCRIBED!!!

[@leonidaltman]

Brilliant explanation, as always!

[@jacoborum]

This is just perfect! Thank you so much for this insight,,, 🙌

[@neodidi]

This was so useful... I learnt a lot from this.. I want to do HSM and find jobs in that line, work on them using blender, but subdiv makes it seem difficult, but this, this has given me hope... Thanks for sharing

[@bdbjr28]

Great video! Haven't really seen many tutorials with this style of modelling, which seems to be quite well practiced here. Would love to see how you approach this style of modeling from the beginning, whether that's creating the start file or some other process. Thanks for the upload!!

[@marshallwilliams7207]

Fantastic walkthrough!

[@JohnRaska]

Very impressive! Thank you!

[@EdBeals]

Fantastic tutorials!

[@tbrg1965]

One thing I like to do when I am creating bevels, is always make the segment count even. That way, if I want to optimize it as a game or VR asset, I can simply delete every other edge that makes up the total bevel segments. Also, I often use the profile option, and bump it up to somewhere around .60-.70, which create curvature lead-in. This may require larger bevels, but creates an especially nice transition, which works very well for concept modelling. (This avoids the fuss of creating extra ed cuts just outside the bevel.)

[@michaelantonio6643]

great workflow bro thanks! 🍻

[@roni.rsnstn]

Really love this approach and how precise you are. It might just be me, but i feel like there is a discrepancy between the knowledge required to understand this video, and the commentary. What I mean is, to understand the video, you probably need to know about hard surface workflows and have intermediate level experience with 3D modelling, but the commentary (whilst great and detailed) explains every menu and button. Again could just be me, and the video is amazing regardless, it just stuck out. Super impressive either way 🙌

[@LucidDream1967]

this is really really great!

[@sidekick3rida]

So so good. Thank you!

[@BenceJBalogh]

I just finished a model that is basically a flat surface with a lot of small extrusions. I didn't use subd, but tried only using quads still. Ended up adding an insane amount of loopcuts, and adding way too much geometry. This solution is so much quicker and makes so much sense

[@christopher3d475]

Make sure and watch my video on the Weighted Normal modifier as it'll further expand on this approach.

[@theGoogol]

Excellent. A lot of HSM tutorials on KZbin make too much use of SubD. No SubD, beveled edges (bevel modifier with weight), sharp edges, isolated geometry, weighted normals, auto smooth and geometry only where needed, I say! Tutorials like these are gems.

[@StrongmanLi-pz7sl]

I have a newbie question, what if I send this model to game engine like unity or unreal, what will happen, since it will triangulate the mesh, a great mess will occur, this method is not for game assets, am I right?

[@theGoogol]

@@StrongmanLi-pz7sl : Neither are SubD'd models (way too many polygons). To export, apply all modifiers. Weighted bevels will only export the edges which are selected for a bevel (keep the resolution low, let shading take care of the bevel where you can). It is important to master how to manipulate normals for really good looking low res models. Selective normal manipulation can do wonders (selective shade flat vs smooth, merging and splitting edge and vertex normals or even manually pointing edge or vertex normals to get the desired results).

[@buttersmooth4532]

Amazing explanation!!

[@ramyissa20]

Nice tip: Instead of using orbit around 3D cursor you can change orbiting method to be around any selected element from preferences. It's very useful actually. Great video btw 👏

[@animatorizwan]

Great Tutorial. I gained confidence to even at time to work without SubD after watching this video. I have a small thought that at 21:18 the bevel function messes up, but if we open up the action menu, if we untick loopslide, it will evenly bevel. I am not sure whether it works in this specific case but I have found it working at time when beveling is uneven.

[@hermano8160]

Still amazed how great that Nizo looks. Dieter Rams would be pleased.

[@peko1967]

Super well done and clear

[@blenderproject1]

nice work bro 😍

[@biostarstepa]

I'm using this manual approach every time I'm working with complex and large hard surface objects with a lot of details. Control over bevels is crucial here because Subdivision Surface modifier does it kinda automatically and in most case don't do that in a way we want it. In addition, SS modifier makes a lot of unnecessary geometry. Well, that won't work if we are doing game assets where we have to pay attention to quads and tris (leaving no ngons at all) but for rendering images/animations ngons are by mho life and time savers. Also, unfortunately, I've noticed that most of people don't pay attention to boundary-bevel edges which is usually not noticeable with small objects but when it comes to large flat areas and especially areas with additional details makes a lot of troubles and weird shading. I'd really like everyone in this business watch this video and learn something that seems trivial but actually is very important for entire process of modeling. Most of time beginners are thought to use SS and Auto-Smooth combo when learning modeling but I think that's wrong way to understand geometry and shading issues. Atop of all, that habit is hard to get rid off in later stages. Anyway, thanx for this great tutorial. Keep good work.

[@jhovala]

great class!

[@williamfernandez2185]

siempre excelente su contenido, gracias,,,,

[@davexmit]

I had the sudden realisation I didn’t need sub div for what I was trying to accomplish, so guides like this are very useful. I just wish normal hardening wasn’t so mystifying at times.

[@christopher3d475]

The next video will be about hardening normals.

[@TheLeonardProduction]

A small tip for anyone having troubles with solid mode having wobbly or imprecise lines, change your "clip start" and "clip end" settings on the view tab of the tool panel. Making the renderable area smaller helps with precision. I dunno if that was going on in certain points in this tutorial, but it's a good tip to be aware of regardless for yall reading the comments ^^

[@bdbjr28]

definitely - blender's default clipping seems to really hate smaller objects. though I have found it displays a bit oddly when zooming out if the clipping it set to a very small scale

[@Kram1032]

@@bdbjr28 the clip planes define the near and far side of a cube that gets distorted into your view frustum. - It's a technical thing concerning projective transform and it's necessary to avoid infinities. Giving too disparate values (very small near clip, very large far clip) means numerical issues as the underlying values get close to the smallest or largest possible floats. But going too small simply means stuff further away or closer will not be shown at all. So that's why it's "a bit odd" if you set a very small far clip. I guess by default it's set up for roughly room- or house-scale scenes, rather than extremely fine stuff or landscape scale stuff

[@STANNco]

very cool, i was recently stumped as how to 3d model a handheld canon camera, one of those with a bunch of smooth bumps and corners. I have no idea how such geometry is modelled. it looked similar to a Canon EOS R5

[@xDaShaanx]

Nice 😁❤

[@TadeoDOria]

This is pretty much how I always model hard surface at work, subdiv is really overvalued for that purpose IMO

[@RomboutVersluijs]

Downside ia that we are working with tons of pokies and takes a lot of time redoing errors. But it does learn one to plan better and use core tools

[@fadhil4008]

16:30 Whoa, I've been using Blender for more than 5 years now and I just knew that you can do this. G then B, I was wondering what it was. Then I realized that it is actually quite useful than having to open up the snap tool all the time and change it to vertex snapping. Thanks

[@iochimura]

It's fairly recent, I believe they added that option in the second half of last year...

[@rbettsx]

In my startup file, snap is set 'vertex' and 'active' ... A good default for modeling, IMO. At last, Blender lets you set the snap source, but I find I don't have to use it that often.

[@Dina_tankar_mina_ord]

this voice reminds me of a very old explenation about imagine the tenth dimension. gotta be 14 years agoo I heard that.

[@asr59]

Have a look to the weight normal modifier. It will save you from adding support edges to avoid bad shading when a face is bigger than the others

[@christopher3d475]

I've already done a tutorial on it using this model. kzbin.info/www/bejne/bGGoXmVsjsmVnpo I like to show multiple approaches to achieving something. There are benefits and drawbacks to both methods.

[@asr59]

@@christopher3d475 great just on point!!! Thanks

[@mineraljunction]

Just found the channel recently after getting back into hard surface and needing some refreshers, so much great stuff here. Really loving this series, I just caught up on the latest episode but wanted to come back and ask something I've been wondering about as the series has gone on - you mention here that planes/polygons don't like having holes in them and that's why we need the loops through the ngons. I'm just wondering if there's a particular reason the loops need to run precisely through the vertical centres of the holes - does the location of these loops have a significant impact on shading and why?

[@mineraljunction]

Ooook after actually trying to replicate your process myself I see it's in order to prevent funky geometry after the knife project :))

[@RoseKindred]

Wow, this was in-depth, but I barely understood it. I am so used to working with booleans that the knife-project section at roughly 18:00 in lost me. Like, I vaguely understood what you did, but not enough to repeat it later.

[@Fleig.]

is the addition of the bounding vertices around the bevel the same thing as activating harden normals in a bevel modifier?

[@christopher3d475]

It's a more robust way of handling shading between curving areas and flat areas. Harden Normals will do that via a kind of shading 'trick'. but it can cause problems if you're not really careful with it, and if you need to export the model to some other application, this method is much more stable.

[@DragonWarpFX]

What makes you use knife project instead of boolean?

[@christopher3d475]

Booleans would be another way to get the cutouts. Sometimes booleans can produce weird results but they would also work in this situation.

[@saikenn61]

The method you are using is very impressive, however I believe it is not optimized enough for use in a game, unlike what is done using subdivision. Your method is more technical and effortful, and being able to control certain things yourself expands the limits of what you can do.

[@christopher3d475]

I show it just to demonstrate how to think differently about modeling something. Many things are best done with SDS, but now and then a direct approach is better.

[@mytube001]

I tap GG to get the slide edge mode. Really easy and quick.

[@wheany]

It's a good shortcut to know, but going through the menus and clicking on toolbar buttons is better for a video tutorial so you don't have to explain "I used GG to go into edge slide mode here"

[@christopherobert103]

Hello, I really like your approched to teach blender. I'm a beginner that have stopped blender for 2 years ago now because it was to difficult for me and (even if I like it so much). When I've watched your videos you get me back in again. I've begin the tuto but I'm stopped at the beginning to roundging the perimeter edge. It do nothing when I drag the edge to bevel (add) it. Do I need to activate a specific addon or somethong else? Thanks a lot for your sharing.

[@christopherobert103]

I'm answering myself just in case for other people. Just my mistake, I have deleted de left edge instead of just unselect it before the extrusion oO!!!! Sorry!!

[@Canis.Lupus.Arctos]

I find navigation easier by turning on both [Orbit Around Selection] and [Zoom to Mouse Position] under the Navigation tab for Preferences, specially when modeling details... just keep in mind that if you pan the view (or if you select different objects) it will still pivot around the current selection, making wonky rotations, nothing one can't get used to IMHO.

[@christopher3d475]

Yes, I have both of those enabled. I think they should be on by default because they do make navigation a lot easier.

[@josephrussell1419]

That was my navigation setup for many (ten?) years but I increasingly felt it wasn't fast or flexible enough. After experimentation and practice I have it on Trackball, Orbit Around Selection off, Auto Depth on, Zoom to Mouse Position on. The different actions of MMB dragging with the mouse cursor positioned towards centre versus edges of the 3D viewport with trackball takes some getting used to but eventually becomes totally intuitive. Crucially I also have my mouse button 3 mapped to center view on selected (same as Numpad period) and mouse button 4 to lock view to 3D cursor, which often comes in handy, in effect temporarily substituting for Orbit around Selection. (You can quickly throw the 3D cursor on a surface with Shift+RMB of course.) Between all of that, the MachineTools navigation pie, and frequent use of alt+MMB and shift+B to center and zoom the view, my navigation is SUPER FAST and more precise than ever before, and I never need to pan with shift+MMB. (I do wish the viewport had flick panning though.) I would not go back to Orbit Around Selection or Turntable.

[@Canis.Lupus.Arctos]

@@josephrussell1419 I feel yah, my particular issue w/ making highly customized settings for navigation on any particular software is cuz I use a handful of different applications for work. Of course one can learn different schemes for different applications, but in order to get the speed and precision I need consistency across most of the software as possible... After many decades (30 year or so) using different CAD/CAM, 3D software and whatnot the thing that kills me is every developer seems to want to reinvent the wheel when it comes to navigation and control schemes... At least nowadays most software offers ways to tweak and customize key bindings and shortcuts... I've used trackballs in the past, and while it takes some "getting used to" I do feel they end up being more comfortable than mice overall, only issue I had was the tech spec wasn't comparable to mice, but recently I've been more inclined to give them another shot since my wrist is kinda "tired" again and I wanna avoid carpal tunnel syndrome or similar... (Space mice, lol, I've tried one too many times, but I've never get them to be as fast a good old mouse, was a big waste of money for me.. since those are not exactly cheap)

[@josephrussell1419]

It's interesting to hear perspective from someone more experienced than me. Also I should have said I'm so far only a keen hobbyist with just a couple of small paid 3D projects under my belt, but now aiming to develop professionally. So it's useful to consider the points you make about consistency over different softwares. I have barely used anything but Blender and I'm aware my view of things is quite narrow as a consequence. I'm not really saying everyone should use my setup, Im just excited that it works for me! But, by the way, I don't use a trackball physical device, although I have tried one... I use a normal mouse but in Blender's Navigation settings I have the mode set to Trackball instead of Turntable.@@Canis.Lupus.Arctos

[@justsumCrumbs]

What kind of scenario is this technique best applied for? Regular renders? Game models? Film?

[@christopher3d475]

Depends on the object.

[@Fleig.]

Another thing: you pressed z twice to got to global axis, but my Blender works in the opposite way (I have to double tap the z key to transform in the local space). Did you customize it be that way, or is my version altered?

[@christopher3d475]

It depends on how your Transform Orientation is set. In the tutorial, mine is set to Local which switches the behavior compared to if you have it set to Global. I probably should have mentioned that.

[@Vlow52]

Bevel is pretty much a subdivision , just for the limit of edges. To make an alternate you have to use CAD, that’s the only alternative.

[@AndreeMarkefors]

Not really. Beveling like in this video adds local detail by adding geometry where it's needed.. Subdivision modeling lets you model at a lower-than-target resolution, and rely on the algorithm and control edges to predictably control smoothing. But a SDS modifier subdivides every surface and in many cases generates A LOT more geometry than needed. This is especially true for mechanical details that have many large flat faces that shade just fine as N-gons-as demonstrated here-as long as you control the curved shading going into the larger N-gons. Again, as demonstrated in the video. The strategies involved in SDS all quad modeling compared to local beveling and liberal use of N-gons are quite different, so I wouldn't say they are similar. It's also not a case of one always being better than another.

[@SkigBiggler]

Really wish I could just export from CAD for stuff like this, but the 3D polygon exports are universally terrible in every CAD tool I’ve used. Fine for 3D printing, but not very useful for game models or doing much complex with.

[@chryssdale5747]

What's the difference between shade smooth and auto shade smooth?

[@christopher3d475]

Shade Smooth smooths the entire mesh regardless of the angle between normals. Shade Auto Smooth places a limit on that so you can prevent smoothing across certain regions of the mesh.

[@chryssdale5747]

@@christopher3d475 so like, shade smooth is for objects that has round or less edges while auto smooth is for hard surface like sharp edge objects or cars?

[@tuna98khan]

I've been trying to learn subd modeling for a while, but I don't understand why it's so difficult. What is your advice?

[@theGoogol]

Follow some topology tutorials. Good topology is essential if you want to do SubD right!

[@tuna98khan]

@@theGoogol Yes, you are right. I'm also trying to learn topology, but it seems like a difficult process or I just can't do it. :)

[@theGoogol]

@@tuna98khan : I just spent half an hour typing good tips but since this channel has anything that looks like a link disabled, the entire message got deleted and I'm not going to type it all again. Sorry ... blame Christopher.

[@theGoogol]

@@tuna98khan : Long story short : - Edge loops directions (how to steer edge loops around your topology to create islands) - Edge joining / splitting (how to make 1 edge loop out of 3, 3 out of 5, 2 out of 3 and how to deal with edge loops meeing at various angles (poles))

[@speltospel]

this is call Mid-Poly style

[@sudd3660]

this workflow is called hard surface modeling, i use it a lot. just making stuff in blender it is more often the best way to model.

[@Zhiznestatistiks]

TLDR making a middle-high poly model by adding a lot of polygons from the beginning. But in reality you are essentially doing CAD modelling, except it being fully destructive here. Which is a waste of time really. If you really have time & references for this types of things, you will be much better served just doing CAD modelling from the start. There is enough cheap or somewhat free CAD nowadays.

[@christopher3d475]

People are here to learn the use of Blender. Using CAD for this model is a side issue because then that wouldn't be teaching people how to work in BLENDER.

[@Zhiznestatistiks]

@@christopher3d475But this blender workflow aren't very efficient or useful. It can work in similar situation where the model is just as simple, and you have all the blueprints, but if it's something more complex (like at least one freeform surface), trying to apply this type of workflow will be a waster of countless hour for any mistake you'll made.

[@christopher3d475]

I'm not telling people they should always work like this or even that's it's the best method for a given situation. It's simply a demonstration of ways of thinking about modeling something. You can use subdivision type modeling or go to a NURBS modeler or whatever you want, but this is about demonstrating a different way of thinking about the modeling process and using the tools in general. @@Zhiznestatistiks

[@SugarTouch]

MISINFORMATION and WRONG as usual for blender fans ! Subdivision surfaces are _subset_ of NURBS surfaces in math. And ALL modelling in industrial design use NURBS for AGES even before computers. ALL and EVERY CAD software in ANY industry use NURBS modelling these days. If you need industry-grade NURBS models NEVER use blender. Blender is unable to carry even low-poly crap. It's useless toy. Use industry-grade tools like Rhino, Studio Tools, Catia or Solid Works instead. If you're in VFX : use Maya (Studio Tools is the same engine by the same team) or Houdini. Both will provide you amazing NURBS toolset. Don't waste your time on blender. Blender was NEVER used in ANY real projects nor in VFX neither in industrial design. It has nothing in common with 3D, graphics or modelling. It's made for developers to make more development for more developers.

[@christopher3d475]

You clearly didn't watch the video. I DID NOT SAY don't ever use NURBS. I showed that you can poly-model something in a way that doesn't require SDS. Please, watch videos next time before making dumb comments.

[@danilomoura9663]

I think you don't know the industry that well. Most of the gaming or video industry uses Blender in conjunction with other tools.

[@multiarray2320]

​@@christopher3d475 dont worry...he was probably high when he wrote this (at least thats what i hope xD)

[@artcrushmovies5336]

Dear Sir, Would like to tell us your name so we can see the groundbreaking work that YOU have done? We would be blessed to see the work of a legend like you. Please enlighten us blender fools.

[@ai_is_a_great_place]

No true scotsman? That's like saying "artists only use paint, pencil is crap for babies"