[Bf-committers] Adaptive subdiv modifier

[Patrice]

This was meant to be a new thread, so I repost, sorry.

Hello,

An idea that I wish to share here:   a new option of the subdiv modifier 
where subdivisions level would depend on distance from scene camera.

In a scene, objects may be near or far, sometimes the whole tea-cup may 
be so far away it's just a few pixels high, sometimes it's a closeup 
shot, or it may start near and big, then end up far and tiny later in 
the scene.   Clearly there is no use in having a 4 level SS when it all 
ends up 10 pixels high, but one cannot adjust settings for every 
shot.    It would not be very difficult to have the SS modifier first 
calculate the final pixel size of the whole object, then adjust the SS 
level accordingly.   This behaviour could be set at the SS modifier 
level, or better yet at the scene level, together with the "simplify" 
panel.

Has this been considered before ?   Is it maybe not far from what the 
open subdiv integration will do ?    Do you see any difficulty ?

One that I can imagine is the case of large objects with some part of 
the mesh near the camera, others further.    Ideally, the SS would adapt 
the level to the distance of each face, but this would be far more 
complicated, and maybe would be exactly what open subdiv does.   Short 
of this, it could simply consider the nearest distance between mesh and 
camera, and base the SS level on this distance.

Patrice.