Chapter 2
Polygon Operations
Before you start adding polygons to and cutting polygons from your
shape, it is crucial that you understand how to manipulate its sub-
elements because every modification and tool you apply to your
mesh will affect the position and/or the number of vertices, polys, or
edges of your mesh.
The Move, Rotate, and Scale tools are self-explanatory; they
move, rotate, and scale the selected sub-element. Each tool usually
has its own manipulator gizmo. Move is represented by three
pointed arrows, Rotate by a spherical gizmo, and Scale by a triangu-
lar gizmo, as shown in Figure 2-1.
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Figure 2-1: From left, the Move, Rotate, and Scale tool gizmos.
Figure 2-2: From left, using the Rotate tool with selected vertices, the Scale
tool with selected vertices, and the Move tool, moving the selected vertices
backward after a scaling operation.
These tools can affect sub-elements of an object, as shown in Figure
2-2, or the entire object, as shown in Figure 2-3.
Another interesting point to mention when working with sub-ele-
ments, or even an entire object, is the orientation of the gizmo in
relation to the object. Most 3D packages will likely have a few
options and allow you to choose the one most appropriate to your
modeling. By World and By Local are pretty basic and the most
common.
When the By World option is selected, it doesn’t matter how
much you have moved or rotated your object, the gizmo will be
related to your viewport, as shown in the following figure.
When the By Local option is selected, rotating your object will
cause the axis gizmo to also rotate and remain local to the object’s
internal axis. This can be very useful in some cases.
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Chapter 2 – Polygon Operations
Figure 2-3: From left, scaling in the X axis, scaling in the Y axis, and scaling
in the Z axis.
Figure 2-4: Using the By World option.
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