New to Maya - confused with the smoothing process.. what am I doing wrong?

[Anonymous]

Hey there! 

I'm new to Maya - I'm currently completing a modelling course at Uni, but having to teach myself from home due to COVID-19. I'm trying to create a simple, rounded rectangle shape (using bevelling), which is going to be the body of a camera. However, every time I go to smooth it (clicking key 3) the shape turns out weird. I'm unsure what I'm meant to do to fix this. Any help is really appreciated. 

below is the shape I want:

And then this is the smoothed shape:

[mspeer]

Hi!

This has been explained several times.

For Smooth or Smooth Mesh Preview to work as expected you need to create a mesh based on quads with a clean topology consistent of evenly spaced faces.

Either edit your mesh or simply don't use Smooth.

You can try Retopologize to correct this automatically, please check the Maya online help for further information about this.

[g2m.agent]

It must be because of n-gon (n > 4).

[Anonymous]

Is there a certain method / ability to even create a smoothed rounded rectangle shape? 

[mspeer]

Hi!

There are dozens of possible options, some that work with Smooth Mesh Preview and some without.

One method would be to create a simple polygon cube, then add further subdivisions with Insert Edge Loop Tool, and then enable Smooth Mesh Preview.