I have asked this question over at polycount, but it seems to be a slow forum, I am asking here just in case too.
I have been trying to model a revolver for some time now, and while I have learnt quite a lot with regards to Maya, etc etc, I am still stuck on the project, specifically on modelling the revolvers chamber.
Its not like I have nothing to go off on, I have taken Elementzas modelling masterclass, as well as his topology class. I am struggling to apply his theories on a completely unrelated model
I have modelled the chamber in a simply polygonal form, trying to keep the polycount as low as possible (apparently its easier to work with few polygons). As it is, when I smooth preview it, the objects turns into mush, this is to be expected since I have no support edges for the corners.
I should say, I am not concerned with the bottoms and top of the chamber (cylinder), I know I can solve that easily with a bevel or an edge loop. I am mostly concerned with holding the corners of the small concave detail.
Above all I would really appreciate if someone could show me how they would model just the chamber, this is the image for it, so I can actually see how the topology could be approached. Thank you.
Subdiv algorithms don’t play nice with N-gons. You need to make sure your mesh is all quads to start with. I think this is the source of most of your issues.
Also, don’t be afraid to look at other people’s work for technical inspiration. Go on turbosquid, and look at revolvers. You don’t have to buy anything, just look at the images. Find a bunch that look good and look at the wireframe pictures. Get an idea of how big the polygons are for the details you want, and how they’re laid out. Find the things that look good and use that in your own work.
This form in particular is a tricky one because of the mixture of hard and soft edges – it’s not too bad having an edge loop cross a straight cusp edge, but it’s tricky when you have a curved cusp and the crossing loops are not parallel. The loopy shapes at the bottom of your cutout show how the subdivs don’t know how to combine both an N-way connection and a cusp edge.
If I had to model this as a subd, I’d add more vertical edge loops on the main cylinder, so there were loops parallel and very close to the vertical cut edges to hold the form… I’d also add an edge loop just inside the cut to minimize the spread as the edge loops cross the cusp. However this something I’d probably model with a conventional poly boolean or nurbs unless I really needed a watertight mesh .