Go to Create
EP Curve Tool
Option Box. Click the Reset
Tool button and in the Front viewport
create a curve with the following CV placement.
Start by holding down the x key on your keyboard
and click the Left Mouse Button in the origin
(x=0, y=0, z=0). (The CV's
will snap to the grid while holding down the
x key.) Move the cursor and place a CV up
3 units in the y axis, and -1 in the x axis
(x=-1, y=3, z=0). Continue in the same manner
and keep placing new CV's according to the
image to the right. (-1.6.0 = x.y.z)
You will end up placing a total of 13 CV's.
Make sure
the curve you've just created is selected,
right click and hold and select the Control
Vertex button that appears.
This next step is also to be done with holding
the x button on your keyboard down. It should
be easiest to do in the side view, but can
also be done in the perspective view. Select
CV's 3, 6,
9 and 12.
Then move them back -1 unit in the z axis.
Repeat step
2 but this time select CV's 2,
5, 8 and 11,
push and hold the x key and move them 1 unit
in positive z direction.
Right click the curve and choose Select
from the hotbox that appears.
Go to Edit
Duplicate
Option Box.
In the Duplicate
Options window, go to Edit
Reset Settings. Then type in 6
in the Translate Y field,
and set the Number of Copies
to 2. Click Duplicate.
Your Front and Side view should now look
something like this.
Go
to Create
NURBS Primitives
Circle
Option Box. Click Edit Reset
Settings. The only thing to change
here is to set the Number of Sections
to 6 and hit Create.
Now you shall have a Nurbs circle placed at
the origin. Move it away from the origin in
the x axis just to get it out of the way for
later use.
Now open
the Modeling menu set. There
are several ways to achieve this. You can
select it from the Menu selection in the upper
left corner of the UI, push the F3 key on
your keyboard or push and hold the h
key on your keyboard then Left Mouse Button
clicking in a viewport and then selecting
Modeling. You can also access the
different menu sets in the hotbox while holding
down the space key on your
keyboard. Either way is fine, it just depends
on what works for you and your workflow.
Select the
Nurbs Circle and Shift select one of the curves
you've created. Click Surfaces
Extrude
Option Box. Click Edit
Reset Settings. Now under Result
Position check At Path.
Under Pivot check Component
and hit Apply. Use the same
Nurbs circle and repeat this process for the
last two curves. Push 5 on your keyboard to
switch to Shaded mode. Your scene should now
look like the image to the right.
If you want
you can adjust the thickness of the extruded
surfaces simply by scaling the Nurbs circle.
I will keep it at 1 for this example.
Now we will
make the surfaces "loopable" so
we can make the braid longer.
From the Outliner (Window
Outliner), select the extruded Surfaces. Then
in the main window click Edit Delete
by Type History. Back in the Outliner,
select the curves and the Nurbs Circle and
hit Delete on your keyboard.
Close the Outliner. Select the three extruded
surfaces in your scene.
Click Modify
Convert
NURBS to Polygons
Option Box. In the Convert NURBS
to Polygons window, click Edit
Reset Settings. Under Tesselation
Method check Control Points.
Hit Tesselate.
Three new polygonal objects is now selected
in your scene. Shift select over your scene
to select the unselected objects. Hit Delete
on your keyboard to delete the old extruded
Nurbs surfaces. The only things left in your
scene should now be three polygonal surfaces.
You should now have something like the image
to the right.
Select the
three polygonal shapes and click Polygons
Combine.
Now the three objects has been combined into
one object. This is done for easier editing
of the braid.
Select the combined object, right click and
hold. Select Face. Click
and drag a marquee selection (click, hold,
move mouse) to select the faces like the image
to the right. Here we can see that the braid
will be loopable after deleting these faces.
Hit Delete. Then you will be left with something
like the image on the right.
Right click and hold over the object and choose
Select from the hotbox.
With the
Braid (polySurface1) selected go to Edit
Duplicate
Option Box. Reset the settings and
hit Duplicate. A new copy of the braid will
appear right on top of the other one. Move
the copy 18 units in the positive y direction
by typing 18 in the translate Y field in the
channel box (Display
UI Elements
Channel Box / Layer Editor). Now the copy
is placed over the other to make the braid
twice the length. Now select both the surfaces
and Combine them like with the three individual
shapes in step 8. Select the combined object,
right hold click and select Vertex. Now Marquee
select all of the vertices and click Edit
Polygons
Merge Vertices
Option Box. Set the Distance
to 0.1000 and hit MergeVertex.
This welded together the seem between the
two combined objects. If you want the braid
to be longer, you just repeat this step. But
then you'll have to double the value of the
Y translation (from 18 to 36) because of the
braids length. Now right hold and click the
braid and choose Select.
Now there's only left to smooth it. (Polygons
Smooth) and there you go!
Hint: To separate
the individual strands of the braid again, select
the object and go to Polygons
Separate. Happy modeling!
If
you are interested; here
is a zip'ed scene-file used in the tutorial.
You can download WinZip from
winzip.com to unpack it. Enjoy!
:)
A 3.50min
video tutorial for this braid is
available in Microsoft Video 1 codec. It's a
2.61MB download in Rar format. Go to rarlabs.com
and download WinRAR to unpack it.
Extra:
The rings
in the top banner are made using the same
technique as the tutorial. The additional
features are another copy of the braid to
make it longer, then adding a Nonlinear
Bend (Animation
menu set (F2)
Deform
Create Nonlinear
Bend (Default Settings).). You will
get the same result after just a couple of
minutes tweaking it.
EP Curve Tool 
