I am trying to divide an organic base surface into separate panels according to a vertex cloud. Can somebody suggest me a way on how to do this? I tried several methods but with no success.
I would like to have several panels which include smaller panels in the same big panel (see the image below). The big panel would be glass and the smaller ones solar cells which are integrated in the glass. It seems to be more difficult than I thought to do this…
I attached the files in case you want to take a look. The remap tool was necessary to parameterize the surface, so I attached also this one. I would be very thankful for any sort of suggestion you can give me!!!
I’ve split your loft surface into sub surfaces (as your BIG panel).
And then have the one with 3 edges filtered out, because they are triangles.
(You might notice some panels look like tiangle but they are in fact quads with a very small fourth edge.)
But you do realise that each panel here is not planar, means they are twisted.
Imagine its not difficult to do a surface morph or even a morph box for 3D object, or simply panel tools,
however, does the twisted form serves your actual practical purpose.
i.e. Are you to manufacture curve-surface glasses panels?
If you are after planar panels, it’s better to recreate the original loft,
making all your loft curves the same length, use paneling tools to do your panels,
then trim it to the existing form.
It’s quite self-explanary when you think about UV points distribution,
and the way you have tried splitting your surface.
Let me know if you are not clear about your direction?
First of all thank you for your help and the suggestions!! I saw what you did there. Could you explain me why you used the expression “x=3”? In order to filter out the panels with 3 edges?
You are right, the panels have to be straight in order to be able to manufacture them easily, but they will tilt a bit in order to define this organic surface. Can I make planar panels that still follow this curvature with the paneling tools from the lunch box plug in? Doesn`t it work the same way, the entire surface will be divided in panels according to uv values?
For a quad panel to be easily manufactured, the 4 vertex need to be co-planar.
In your case, they can never be co-planar thus it is “impossible” to have proper flat quad glass panels,
as the loft surface is double curvy.
Solution: triangular flat panel would always work, i.e. split each quad into 2 flat triangles (they are always flat).
Solution 2: Have thicker edge to host the difference between twisted angles. (See attached picture.)
As for the UV Point distribution:
Lunchbox works based on UV points, but in your case,
you can’t use lunchbox on the lofted surface you’ve got there,
because your surface is a UNTRIMMED one, with one edge being wavy,
that means the actual uv points are conforming the wave in stead of a rectangle grid network.
You’ll see the difference if you DIVIDE SURFACE / LUNCHBOX on your loft surface.
The result you get will be different from the points you get from intersecting those 2 groups of lines.
