- So far in this course
we have looked at applying modifiers to entire objects.
We can also apply modifiers to parts of objects
or sub object selections,
and that's done by making some selection
and then passing that selection up the modifier stack
to some subsequent later modifier.
And we can do this non-destructively
it's one of the great advantages
of 3ds Max actually is that we can select by volume.
It's done with a modifier called volume select
and I'll do that in this case to delete some of the faces
or polygons at the bottom of this monitor stand.
Let's say we are going to have many, many of these in a scene
or in a game, and we just needed to trim off some of the fat
and remove some of the polygons that we really don't need.
And that's easily accomplished with this method.
And also because we're using the volume select modifier
it is reversible.
So we can actually restore that polygon
after it's been deleted.
So let's take a look,
I'll tumble or orbit with alt and middle mouse.
And look at the bottom here and pan with middle mouse
let's turn off the display of the grid
with the G key select the monitor stand object
go to the modify panel.
And we've got a box that's been tapered and bent
and above the bend let's add a volume select.
So with the bend modifier selected, go to the modifier list
and at the top, there's a category of selection modifiers.
We want vol select or volume select.
We choose that it's added above the bend
and we see an orange gizmo or box surrounding the object.
That's because our current stack selection level is object.
With these settings, the modifier
is not actually doing anything
it's selecting the entire object and passing it up the stack
to whatever the next subsequent modifier may be.
But that would happen even if
we didn't have a volume select modifier applied.
So it's doing thing now.
In order to have some effect
we'll need to be in some stack selection level
that is a component or sub object mode.
Let's choose face.
As soon as we do that, we look over here and we see
that all of the polygon faces are highlighted in red.
And I can orbit again with Alt and middle mouse,
take a look.
We can select using different gizmos,
down here we can choose a spear and so on, cylinder,
we can even use another object as our selector
but in this case I'm doing something very simple
so I just want a box gizmo and all I need to do
is transform that box to change the selection.
Anything that's inside that box will be selected.
Okay, so let's open up the volume select sub object types.
Select the gizmo sub object type,
we're dropped into our selected move tool automatically.
And we can move that down in the world
Z axis to select just the area at the bottom.
And let's again, orbit or tumble with Alt and middle mouse
getting close with control Alt middle mouse
and pan with a middle mouse.
I do want to leave a little bit of a buffer here.
I want to make sure that there's no chance
that any viewer or player is going to see a hole here.
So I'm going to leave some of these polygons at the bottom
just by moving my gizmo over in the Y axis
so that I don't delete some of these near that curved area.
All right, as simple as that we've made the selection
and that's going to be passed up the stack
to some other modifier.
Let's exit out of gizmo sub object mode.
And we see that there is a little square over here
next to the volume select modifier name.
That's an indicator that we are in face
or polygon selection mode within this modifier.
And since we we've made a selection,
that's going to be passed up the stack
to whatever is the next modifier.
And the one we're going to use is a delete mesh.
From the modifier list, choose, delete mesh.
Here it is and boom, now those polygons have been deleted.
Again close again with control alt and middle mouse
and we can see we've created a hole there.
And again, this is nondestructive and reversible
because we can go back into our volume select
to the gizmo sub object mode
and we can move our gizmo around maybe in the Y axis.
And we can restore some of the deleted polygons
so we can fine tune exactly what we want to delete
and don't have to commit to that at this time.
Very cool.
So I want to stress again
that this is really a very helpful methodology
for modeling non-destructively in 3ds Max
the ability to make a selection based upon a volume
rather than an explicit selection
allows us a great deal of freedom
in non-destructive or reversible
parametric modeling workflows.