FSXA Hidden polygons

[MEPaquette]

In building my boat, I am importing many block items that end up against other items, thus creating "hidden polygons". Sides that are against another item.
what kind, and how much of an impact do all these hidden polygon have on the model and the performance in FSX

Michel E Paquette

 

[hairyspin]

It's a good idea to get into the habit of deleting polys that cannot be seen. That way they don't need mapping and although the performance hit of leaving them in might be slight, on more complex models it could be the difference between a successful export and failure to compile a model.

Today's rigs handle high poly counts pretty well, it's often badly-built gauge and animation code they choke on.

 

[MEPaquette]

Tom
Talking about exporting model, I never have any problem, except I get a list of workings as follows:

The list of "Degenerated poly is quite extensive, for almost every piece. Do I need to worry about it?

I am also wandering about the last one "rudder information". What is that all about?

Michel

 

[hairyspin]

The degenerate poly warnings are only really a problem if the model won't export!

rudder_key is an old animation-specific part name used in previous versions of FS and the exporter tells you if you're using any of these deprecated part names in case (I suppose) anyone is still using FS9-specific methods with FSX animations. Perhaps give the rudder a different part name?

 

[bob5568]

I always remove degenerate polys. They represent unexpected aspects to your model. Perhaps its overkill on my part, but I don't want anything I didn't plan to exist in my models.

 

[Anthony31]

Degenerate polygons can create problems with smoothing groups and even texturing in some cases.

It's a good habit to get into to make clean models that do not have spurious items lying about as you never know when one may come back and bite you on the butt.

I always hunt down and destroy all degenerate polys.

 

[toprob]

I always hunt down and destroy all degenerate polys.

Yeah, but who decides what makes a degenerate? Sorry, I meant to say:
Tracking down a degenerate is a nuisance, I wonder if there's an easier way than my current method -- create a helper object, and copy/paste the coords from the error window.

However preventing them is the best method, that's for sure, I just have some old models which I'm tweaking at the moment, and my modelling back in '06 was a bit sloppy.

 

[Paul Domingue]

Select the object that has reported degenerate polys. In vertex mode select all the vertices and weld them with a threshold value of 0.001. This should correct the problem in most cases.

 

[bob5568]

I generally make copies of my scene, and (using only the copies) export only half the model...then the other half. If you only have a couple problems, they are normally close together. Once you know a half has no problems, make copies of the other half, and delete half of the half ...and rinse and repeat. It only takes a half hr or so using this method to kill them. Once you know where they are, kill them again in the real version of the model and export cleanly.

 

[Anthony31]

Of course Bob you could just read the error report which tells you not only which part the degenerate polygons are found in but also their location (relative to the parts axis). In Michels case he appears to have a lot in "Br_Hk_Lower".

When one gets a bit of experience with modelling one learns what steps one should take when creating the model to avoid things like colinear vertices and degenerate polygons (like Pauls vertice welding). Practice makes perfect as they say.