Quad Cap / Smart Fill

[trevor.adams]

Enhance Maya's Fill Hole & Bridge commands so that a hole that has more than 4 border edges can be filled with only quads.  Also, the form of the added polys should match/follow the surrounding form of the model.

Specifically for bridge, do something similar to Modo or 3ds Max; i.e. "Auto Connection: When 'Auto Connection' is enabled, the Bridge action will automatically add 'Segments' and connect them to adjoining boundary edges when Bridging opposing edges within the same surface all while attempting to retain the surrounding curvature. The sample below shows the edge selection prior to activating the tool, and then the tool activated on the selection bridging between the two clusters and finally the 'Auto Connection' option enabled, where additional spans are automatically added and connected to the border edges."

"When you have a hole in a poly surface with multiple loops on both directions, instead of using the Fill Hole tool to create a single face and connect the loops with multi-cut, it could automatically make quad draws if possible. This could be also added in "bridge"."

Some links:

https://mariussilaghi.com/products/quad-cap-pro

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qawF-_4qbxI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sgBrt-vQvdQ

[klaudio2u]

I like this idea and it would be really great addition in modeling...very much needed! The idea about bridge tool is also good! Great example also, from the links, Quad Cap Pro....that kind if a thing, very interacitve abd robust woukd be really nice.

- ADDITIONAL SUGGESTION -

While reading this and watching the videos i was thinking why not also integrate into the tool the same functionality as XSI Softimage (port it into Maya) tool called Dicing Polygons? The tool would work in a way similar to above explained one but instead of using existing topology to make all quads the “dicing polygons” mode would ignore topology and simply make nice and even grid or multiple slices which is also super useful in all kinds of modeling situations as well as even more in boolean modeling.

I think this would be perfect opportunity to combine multiple tools into one powefull. You would overhaul current Maya fill hole tool but also bring in major addtional value to make it more robust as well as make ex XSI Softimage guys a bit happy too!

Trevor, if you are reading this (or whoever has access to Maya beta forum) please do check thread i have made there a while ago on Dicing Polygons tool for additional info.

[Anonymous]

Maya desperately needs a smart cap / smart bridge feature. The current bridge / fill hole is as rudimentary as it gets

[johnkeates2865]

This has probably crossed the minds of all serious modellers. I think mayas modelling is up to the point now where quad caps are the next obvious inclusion.

This link is interesting also:

https://polycount.com/discussion/182245/maya-quad-cap-for-cylinders

Particularly, I like that where the edges are not even, a triangle is made but it is protected by an edge loop.

[Anonymous]

Yes Autodesk please include quad fill and smart extrude in Maya in the next update I am begging you.

[Nico0307]

Yes please, and it is actually fairly? easy to implement. I’ve already "hacked" this via script using already existant maya functionality. select your 4 boundary edges (rails) and coverteach to a nurbs curve matching the vertices on them as cvs. make sure those curves touch each other and create a boundary surface shape. convert the boundary surface back to polygons. combine. 

 The algo is already there and works great in many cases if you know what to expect(with some skewing on complex shapes whoch could possibly? be solved if profiles vtx vectors were to reorient according to rail vectors normals and not stay the same throughout along the rail.)

Anyway, evenin its current form and with some caveats (has to be even amount verts, opposing spans need same count, etc) this is a modelling tool I cant even think about not using anymore

Would love to see a proper implementation by Ad devs . Again, even in its most basic form, this functionality is soo useful