BlenderCookie have published an interview with Joe Eagar, the lead developer of the BMesh project. BMesh will change your life (the Blender-part of your life, that is).
From the interview:
How will BMesh change the modeling experience for Blender users?
Ngon modeling is far superior to quad-limited modeling. It allows you to change topologies much more easily, often times without ruining UV coordinates or vertex colors. Subdivision surface modeling is much more powerful and easier to use with it (at least in my opinion). I’ve found the modeling experience in BMesh far superior to the old tools, to the point that I couldn’t model at all in 2.49 when doing a modeling demonstration for a friend.
Link
17 Comments
oh this is exciting Bmesh looks pretty awesome :-D
Still trying to wrap my head around bmesh. Sure, I've heard the whole "It lets you have more than 4 sided polygons!!!" a bunch of times, but I still need to see something like a video of something that was difficult and would now be easy to get excited... I'm sure it'll be cool... when I understand it! :)
For years we've been hearing max/maya users bitch about the lack of ngons in blender, it would be interesting to know if just one of those have actually put their money where their mouth is by donating to this project, or if all the donations are done by current blender users.
@Blendiac
Try to take a look under "Related News" on this page. Or maybe google video search? . How about putting just a tiny bit of effort into it yourself?
it's interesting the fact that now the most important aspect of this new tool seems to be the n-gons support, some time ago it was not so
anyway i wonder what are the consequences for example in the booleans operations, or how will blender make the topology when you'll convert a n-gon mesh into one good for export in triangle faces; and what about the solidify? and the snap?
in these areas we'll have very important aspects of a lot of things (games, architecture...)
i think that if we'll have a full control of all these functionality blender will be number one! ;-)
sorry 4 my english...
after lots of effort and time, bmesh is finally ready to be merged in the trunk. frankly i was not optimistic that it would be anywhere near to finish untill 2.50 is released. this was the single most killer feature i wanted in the blender. kudos to developers. with the merger with trunk, this project will get the attention which it deserves. thank you , u r the best.
'For years we’ve been hearing max/maya users bitch about the lack of ngons in blender, it would be interesting to know if just one of those have actually put their money where their mouth is by donating to this project, or if all the donations are done by current blender users.'
Long time Maya user here and yes I've donated to the bmesh project and will probably do it again :)
I love Blender but I think Maya/Modo poly creation and editing is easier
N-gons are great while modeling, but in the final you still need to have it all 4 vertex polygons because n-gons can really mess up the fall of shadows and ruin your artwork. If you model something avoid n-gons in the final result!
I do not model in Blender and have software that handles n-gons and I know that they bring some good (makes easier modeling) but avoid them as much as you can.
Anyway it so cool this b-mesh is coming to blender.
I think, this is definitely worth donating... So, I encourage all to do so:)
I donated some times ago... anyway avery modeler NEED ngons.
thankyou for your work!
I am amazed tha6t NGons are given so much passion, as they are far from the most important improvement that BMesh has to offer.
Much of the work I do is professional modelling, done in Blender but used in other packages, and NGons aren't allowed, it's all quads for some projects and quads plus triangles for the majority. NGons are unusable in some applications so any model that needs to be portable must avoid them. The rendering problems NGons can create, mentioned by AS, mean that they need to be avoided in some projects even in applications like Blender that support them. Finally, no really good modeller needs NGons, if your skills are up to a good standard there is no shape you cannot make comfortably without NGons. I certainly have no use for them, never mind a need.
BMesh however is great for what it offers in addition to NGons, like better speed, potentially better stability and a code base that's easier to extend than the current mesh tools. Those are useful to everyone, so yes, BMesh is going to be a welcome addition to the Blender code.
What Fire Angel just said.
And n-gons can bring havoc to animators.
Except I wouldn't have made the comment about the skill of an artist to overcome the lazy use of n-gons. I would have thought it tough.
once again the focus has been shifted to ngons, sure they are nice but not the goal and the tesselation in bmesh is amazing (better the max's i can tell you that ;) ) so don't be so concerned that your models will be garbage because of them, every precaution to prevent the common errors of ngons has been taken
I explain more here
http://blenderlabrat.blogspot.com/2009/09/bmesh-tour-1.html
There isn't anything wrong with ngons, I used them all the time with Wings3D before I moved onto Blender. In many cases it's actually more logical to have them. Like for instance, picture a hexagonal prism (if you can't, then google it). It would be a lot simplier, and easier to just be able to put one face on that flat surface at the end than put 6 triangles with another vertex in the center, wouldn't it? Also makes extruding easier too, and selecting flat surfaces, etc.
ngons are just a lot easier to work with. No reason why we have to use only triangles and quads forever, in every situation. And if you can tell an ngon would screw up something, like say lighting, etc. Then just don't use them, do the task as you would normally with triangles, simple. :3
Cool! I hope it get finished quick. N-gons will make modeling easier. Confining to quads and triangles is restricting in several ways. I hope this feature get in quick.
Long time Maya user here and yes I’ve donated to the bmesh project and will probably do it again :)
the blender part of my life IS my life :)