Surface / Lightbox / noisemaker causes mesh to explode when applied

[system]

I have read online that the lightbox/noisemakers are useless. Is this really true?!! I can achieve the EXACT effect I want with one of the noisemakers, but when I apply it to the mesh it explodes and is totally unusable. I have tried applying to 3d, to uv, with smoothing, without, and nothing. Just one huge exploded mess. Other people mentioned a morph target, but its still nasty and shredded. I have tried the mask by noise and inflating/deflating, but it looks like crap. PLEASE PLEASE someone let me know if there is a way to make the noisemakers actually work!

Thanks!

Tim

[Cryrid]

It’s certainly not useless; I’ve gotten my share of amazing results using it. There are a few times when the strength might be way overblown when applied, although morph targets or layers usually fix the results for me.

Do you get the problem whenever you use any mesh, even the included projects and tools? Or is this only on custom meshes that you’ve imported?

[system]

Yes it explodes with anything I bring in or even a standard polymesh 3d object. I will try and take some screen grabs, and possibly do a screencast of the exact set of variables so everyone can see. I’ve tried layers, and morph targets and nothing looks anything like what the noisemaker preview window shows. It’s mocking me, it looks so good in the preview, then garbage when you click apply!

[verb]

Hi ! Maybe this will help you.

[system]

Ok so here are my screen grabs. the first is the mesh I created that I’m applying the noise to. You can see what the preview is telling me it is going to look like, and on the second is what actually happens. If I do a layer/morhp target it eliminates most of the explosion, but gives me unusable results that look nothing like the preview. So essentially it is useless for me to even use it.

Here is an example with a simple polymesh 3d that I have not touched in any way. Same thing, preview looks perfect, apply to mesh and it’s an exploded mess.