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Best practices for retopology

 
 
 
Area Best Practice or Tip
   

Try an iterative approach

Run a fully automated retopology operation first to see what result you get. Use this first pass to identify areas where you need to add curves to guide the operation. (Draw curves to guide retopology)

Be aware of subdivision levels

Start the retopology operation with the source mesh at a lower subdivision level if you prefer a resulting mesh with simple topology. Working on a lower subdivision level makes the retopology operation less sensitive to the source surface details, which can help to produce a simple edge flow with fewer extraordinary vertices.

With a higher subdivision level, the retopology operation is more sensitive to the surface features of the source mesh and therefor produces a more complex result. Generating the topology to flow around every bump and valley of the source surface can take considerably more time, and can result in more extraordinary vertices.

In some cases, retopologizing a high level with lots of detail can produce holes in the output mesh. If this occurs, try using a lower subdivision level.

Note All high resolution detail of your source mesh is transferred to the output mesh if Sculpted Details is turned on in the Transfer to New Mesh options of the Retopologize window. Using a different subdivision level affects only the topology of the output mesh, it does not affect the transfer of detail.

Use hotkeys

Quickly switch between creating and editing curves by pressing the hotkeys 1 and 2.

Related topics

Retopology

Troubleshoot retopology operations

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