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Synopsis

polyBoolOp [-caching boolean] [-faceAreaThreshold linear] [-mergeUVSets int] [-nodeState int] [-operation int] [-preserveColor boolean] [-useThresholds boolean] [-vertexDistanceThreshold linear] poly poly

polyBoolOp is undoable, queryable, and editable.

This command creates a new poly as the result of a boolean operation on input polys : union, intersection, difference.
Only for difference, the order of the selected objects is important :
result = object1 - object2.
If no objects are specified in the command line, then the objects from the active list are used.

Return value

string[]Object name and node name.

In query mode, return type is based on queried flag.

Related

polyCBoolOp, polySeparate, polyUnite

Flags

caching, faceAreaThreshold, mergeUVSets, nodeState, operation, preserveColor, useThresholds, vertexDistanceThreshold
Long name (short name) Argument types Properties
-faceAreaThreshold(-fat) linear createqueryedit
Area threshold to determine whether faces should be collapsed before boolean. Attribute is ignored unless useThresholds is set to true
Default: 0.0001
-operation(-op) int createqueryedit
Boolean operation type. 1=union, 2=difference, 3=intersection. Default type is union.
Default: kBoolOpUnion
-preserveColor(-pcr) boolean createqueryedit
If true, boolean op will compute color for the new mesh. If false, the new mesh won't have any color set.
Default: false
-useThresholds(-uth) boolean createqueryedit
If true, merge vertices with separations less then vertexDistanceThreshold and collapse faces with areas less then faceAreaThreshold. If false, do not merge vertices or collapse faces
Default: false
-vertexDistanceThreshold(-vdt) linear createqueryedit
Tolerance to determine whether vertices (and edges) should be merged before boolean operation is applied. Attribute is ignored unless useThresholds is set to true
Default: 0.001
Flags from polyCBoolOp
Flags From polyUnite Node
-caching(-cch) boolean createqueryedit
Toggle caching for all attributes so that no recomputation is needed
-mergeUVSets(-muv) int createqueryedit
Specify how UV sets will be merged on the output mesh.
  • 0 = "No Merge": Each UV set on each mesh will become a new UV set in the output.
  • 1 = "Merge By Name": UV sets with the same name will be merged.
  • 2 = "Merge By UV Links": UV sets will be merged so that UV linking on the input meshes continues to work.
The default is merge by name.
-nodeState(-nds) int createqueryedit

Maya dependency nodes have 6 possible states. The Normal (0), HasNoEffect (1), and Blocking (2) states can be used to alter how the graph is evaluated.

The Waiting-Normal (3), Waiting-HasNoEffect (4), Waiting-Blocking (5) are for internal use only. They temporarily shut off parts of the graph during interaction (e.g., manipulation). The understanding is that once the operation is done, the state will be reset appropriately, e.g. Waiting-Blocking will reset back to Blocking.

The Normal and Blocking cases apply to all nodes, while HasNoEffect is node specific; many nodes do not support this option. Plug-ins store state in the MPxNode::state attribute. Anyone can set it or check this attribute. Additional details about each of these 3 states follow.

State Description
Normal The normal node state. This is the default.
HasNoEffect

The HasNoEffect option (a.k.a. pass-through), is used in cases where there is an operation on an input producing an output of the same data type. Nearly all deformers support this state, as do a few other nodes. As stated earlier, it is not supported by all nodes.

It’s typical to implement support for the HasNoEffect state in the node’s compute method and to perform appropriate operations. Plug-ins can also support HasNoEffect.

The usual implementation of this state is to copy the input directly to the matching output without applying the algorithm in the node. For deformers, applying this state leaves the input geometry undeformed on the output.

Blocking

This is implemented in the depend node base class and applies to all nodes. Blocking is applied during the evaluation phase to connections. An evaluation request to a blocked connection will return as failures, causing the destination plug to retain its current value. Dirty propagation is indirectly affected by this state since blocked connections are never cleaned.

When a node is set to Blocking the behavior is supposed to be the same as if all outgoing connections were broken. As long as nobody requests evaluation of the blocked node directly it won’t evaluate after that. Note that a blocked node will still respond to getAttr requests but a getAttr on a downstream node will not reevaluate the blocked node.

Setting the root transform of a hierarchy to Blocking won’t automatically influence child transforms in the hierarchy. To do this, you’d need to explicitly set all child nodes to the Blocking state.

For example, to set all child transforms to Blocking, you could use the following script.


import maya.cmds as cmds
def blockTree(root):
nodesToBlock = []
for node in {child:1 for child in cmds.listRelatives( root, path=True, allDescendents=True )}.keys():
nodesToBlock += cmds.listConnections(node, source=True, destination=True )
for node in {source:1 for source in nodesToBlock}.keys():
cmds.setAttr( '%s.nodeState' % node, 2 )

Applying this script would continue to draw objects but things would not be animated.


Default: kdnNormal

Flag can appear in Create mode of command Flag can appear in Edit mode of command
Flag can appear in Query mode of command Flag can be used more than once in a command.

MEL examples

// Union
polyCube -n Cube1 -w 1 -h 10 -d 1;
polyCube -n cub1 -w 3 -h 3 -d 3;
polyBoolOp -op 1 -n result1 cub1 Cube1;

// Difference
polyCube -n Cube2 -w 1 -h 10 -d 1;
polyCube -n cub2 -w 3 -h 3 -d 3;
polyBoolOp -op 2 -n result2 cub2 Cube2;
move 5 0 0 result2;

// Intersection
polyCube -n Cube3 -w 1 -h 10 -d 1;
polyCube -n cub3 -w 3 -h 3 -d 3;
polyBoolOp -op 3 -n result3 cub3 Cube3;
move 10 0 0 result3;