Blender demo 05 creasing and smoothing

>> In this video, I'm going to go over
subdividing and adding edge creases.

So I have these three pieces
here that are joined together

so they're regarded as one object.

And you can see that I have wire frame turned
on, so I can see the underlying geometry.

And I am going to subdivide these.

So I'm going to hit subdivide.

And you can see that I'm getting very
different results from the subdivision.

So I'm going to turn off optimal display
so it's easier to see what's going on.

And basically, the geometry that has the
least amount of geometry is smoothed the most.

The one that has the most supported geometry
is smoothing the least in terms of the shape.

And the reason why that is is
because when you add this modifier,

the multi-resolution modifier, you're basically
adding and averaging geometry to the mesh

and subdividing it and basically
doubling the number of polygons.

So actually it quadruples
the number of polygons.

So every single polygon turns
into four polygons.

So I'm going to turn off optimal
display again and, like I said,

I was subdividing like this
and this is the result I get.

You can also subdivide with
using the linear button.

So when I click on linear, it will subdivide

without averaging the vertices
or averaging the shape.

So that can be really useful
if you want to res up an object

and you don't necessarily want to smooth it.

So that said, that's how
you can subdivide things

and either make them smoother or not smooth.

Another thing that you can do
is you can use edge creases.

So what I'm going to do is I'm going
to go into edit mode and I'm going

to select some edges on my objects.

So I'm going to select these top edges here
and then these bottom edges here and --

So I'll select these, right
there, and then I'm going

to do the same thing for this one over here.

And then we'll do the same thing over here.

Blender is being so nice and it is selecting
the entire line of edges, as it should.

So now that I've got these edges here, what
I can do is I can now add a crease to them.

So instead of using multi-res, I'm going
to use the subdivision surface modifier.

So now we get this preview, but then
we can also see our geometry below.

So with all of these edges here
selected, I'm going to now go to edge

and I'm going to use edge crease.

So by using the crease, I can
basically change the amount

that the object will subdivide
and average in specific areas.

So the edges that I just selected are
the edges that are going to stay sharp.

So I can keep it at a factor of one.

I can also slide it up and down
like this to change the factor.

It'll allow you to just change the factor
by dragging your middle mouse button back

and forth initially and then once you
click, a little box here will show up

and it'll allow you to do
it manually if you'd like.

So I have this factor of one and
say I want to add more levels

in the view port to show it a little better.

You can see exactly what it's doing now.

And so it gives you this very
particular look for your mesh

and so there's definitely
some advantages to this.

It allows you to keep your geometry really
low res and then you can specify areas

that are going to be sharp without having
to actually model in the geometry so that

when you smooth it, it stays sharp.

So as an example, I was going to show
how to apply this to a screwdriver.

So if I select this screwdriver head here,
I'm going to go up to the top and I will,

just so that I have only this thing selected,
I'm going to hit Shift H to hide everything

but the object and then I'm going
to go into subdivision surface

and you see we get this weird looking thing at
first and so we're just going to have to deal

with the way this looks, so I'm going
to go into edit mode and I'm going

to select these edges here
at the top and then the sides

of the head will probably need to be sharp.

And then maybe these edges right
around here also need to be sharp.

And, of course, at the very bottom, these
edges right here should also be sharp.

So I'll select these and then these here.

I'm going to zoom out and I'm going to go to
edge and I'm going to edge crease and I'm going

to slide up the edge crease amount
and you can see if I zoom in here

that you can see the edge creasing
and changing back and forth here.

I can't slide it for some reason.

Well, once you are done -- interesting.

So I set it to one, so you may have to manually,
once you have clicked on this factor part,

you have to just manually do that.

Anyway, this is the final result
and this is what it looks like.

That looks pretty good.

And if I change the subdivision levels

on the view port a little bit more,
then we can see it even better.

When I go out of edit mode and I'm just looking
at the object as is, this is what it looks like.

So the head of the screwdriver
looks pretty good.

And then I'll do the same thing
with the handle of the screwdriver.

And to make my objects reappear, I need to hold
down Alt H and that will unhide everything.

And then I'm going to go to this piece
right here and I'll just frame it up.

And I'm going to hit tab.

I already have the edges selected here so it's
really easy to do for this particular object

and I'm going to go from simple to the
Catmull-Clark to see what's going on here.

And if any time when you're
trying to select edges,

if you already have subdivision turned on,

it's very easy to turn off the
smoothing mode and just show it simply.

You can see that those edges
are actually buried inside

of my object and it's really hard to get to.

So sometimes you may have to resort to going
into the simple mode to select the edges

and then the Catmull-Clark mode
to do the edge crease part.

So I'm going to go to edge crease and then I'm
going to change it to a factor of one and then

that makes this nice, clean edge like that.

That looks good.

And now I'll tab out of this mode here.

And this is what we've got.

So if I turn off the wire frame mode,

now I've got this nice clean
edge on the bottom of my handle.

So that's basically how it works.

And very useful for all sorts
of hard surface modeling.