Hello, thanks for reading this. This is going to be my first, yet quite long post, please, read it through experts and beginners, as I experienced many many weird things, things that MIGHT mostly be related to version differences, but they ARE related to my bitter desperity without a doubt. (note: i did read the faq)
So, I can't convert an independent poly object from a subd. In case I'm choosing the "show" conversion option - which I do, because I'd like to assign the poly object as wrap deformer for the subd - I can even see the new poly object beneath the subd, but cant select it WiThOuT the subd.
Wrap deformers are behaving strangely. Let's say I make a high res poly sphere, make duplicate of it, lower the copy's resolution, and assign it as wrap deformer to the high res sphere. Everything's good and fine, the wrap and the object act predictably with each other.
But, when I take a more complex, yet not extremely heavy polygon model, and make duplicate of it, and lower this copy's resolution by reduce, AND then try to assign the copy as a wrap - problems arise. I can move the wrap object around without any noteable influence occuring on the high res geom. I could tinker around with the influence type, but alas, all I could achieve is some weird weird weird, unholy wrap geometry which I did'nt really like. Nor do I like it at this moment.
Gnomon Guru Alex "If I Go In Here" Alvarez shows very nice method for work with wraps, namely, cutting up the deformer geom to smaller pieces, thus speeding up performance. Alex uses face selection/extraction, which again, doesnt seem to act the way in Maya 5 as it acts under the version Alex handles on the DVD. He separates the region he selects off the geomerty, but Maya 5 "explodes" the selected region on a per face basis. Argh, really. Now that I think of it - maybe combine those exploded facets would solve this problem, but maybe there wouldnt really be a problem if I'd knew the correct way to do this in Maya 5. This must be me, whos committing mistakes, or who is unaware of essential version changes, please, anyone, help me with these issues, all suggestions would be very much appreciated.
