Template:Maya2017 Create Polygon Tool

Create Polygon Tool

Create a custom polygon with the Create Polygon tool

With the Create Polygon tool it's possible to create faces in any shape by clicking the corners of the desired face. You can find this tool in the polygons menu under Mesh Tools > Create Polygon:

Your pointer will turn into a cross and you can now start clicking the corners of the desired face. When not using snap options the points will be placed flat in the view port you're working in. If you're working in the perspective view the points will be placed flat in the y-direction. If the face is finished you can press Enter on your keyboard to finish it.

If you want to close the custom polygon, don't finish it by clicking on the starting point again, like when drawing with lines. This will create a double vertex there, which can cause problems later on!

Use Control to add holes to your custom polygon

If you want to create a hole in the face, you finish the shape, and before closing it with Enter press Control on your keyboard while clicking the first point of the shape of the hole. After that you can proceed to click the next points of the hole (without pressing Control). You can start another hole by pressing Control again while clicking the first point of the new hole. When your shape is finished (with or without holes) press Enter to close it.

If you press Backspace on your keyboard (before you've closed the face with Enter) you can go back a point, if you made a mistake. You can do this as many steps back as you'd like.

If you're drawing a face it's convenient to draw counter-clockwise, that way the normals of the face will be facing upwards, which is easier if you want to extrude the face later. See the section in this chapter about normals for more information on normals.

After you have closed the face you can adjust it in Component Mode like other polygon geometry.

For a more elaborate explanation of the Create Polygon tool we refer to the Modeling an orthogonal pavilion tutorial.