Blender. Why there everybody so obsessed with quads?

I would like to ask why everywhere people are trying to make everything from quads.
I've tried to archive details on this form without triangles but I have not succeeded.

I've used some to get correct flow for ribs and then make final form with sculpting in multiresolution 1 to bake details to normal map and seems good for me.

But I'm a bit afraid, are there some consequences to come from triangles?

 

A triangle here and there shouldn't cause you problems, and in reality it all gets split into triangles by the time it gets rendered anyway. I have it understood that quads work better with most of the modifiers, especially with the subsurf one. I also have it understood that quads make better topology and are generally easier to work with. A single quad with 4 verts makes a plane, and another next to it makes another, and you can keep everything nice and straight right? With triangles, you can too, but somehow it isn't as easy(not sure how else to explain that last part).

Besides those, I'm not sure what else is the reason, though there is probably more.

 

In most modeling applications (maybe sculpting too) a quad can retriangulate itself based on internal stuff (length of edge, direction etc) so not having two triangles making up the polygon with an edge that can't change triangulation is beneficial when doing organic modeling.
In sculpting applications when you increase the density of the mesh a triangle will eventually cause slight pinching areas in the mesh based on the surface detail and displacement.

Minor triangles shouldn't cause problems as long as you don't plan to animate the mesh later. Animating with quads is preferred to triangles imo.

Here are a couple edits to the mesh that could be done if you want.

Divide green edges to form quad flow around to yellow verts.
hide/delete edges to form blue outlined quads.
It's not perfect, but will work if you manipulate the mesh in a similar way.

Everything gets rendered as triangles in the end - as kbrukhart84 stated.

 

Well, yes in many ways quads are easier to work with.

I think the proper workflow is create a desired topology probably even with dynamic topology of sculpting and then do retopology with quads. In other case I have no idea how to predict where quads should go. A blueprint is not enough for me.

For retopology I found a remesh modifier but I'm not sure if this one helps for retopology after sculpting. It worked on small test but have not tried on a big object such that vessel.

 

Quads can stretch from edge edge to cleanly and not as well when it is corner to corner stretching. Come render time what happens with each quad is it gets converted to a tris and the values for each part of the face of the tris are interpolated from the three corners of the triangle. So the closer to right triangle /equilateral triangle it is the cleaner the interpolation will be. Once it gets kind of stretched weirdness can begin to happen as the render engine tries to figure out what to do with this overly stretched angle.

Here is what happens when you have triangles that you apply a subsurf to. I won't say it is a "bad" thing. triangles can and do have their uses, Even in animation. But they are a tool to be used with caution.

 

This thread on blenderartists.org really helped me out when I started out, the images are all lost but if you look at the last page you will find links to a PDF version and some other resources. It's related to general topology, and not blender specific even if it's at blenderartists.

 

Aside from the mentioned points, working with quads and proper edge loops will pay off down the line and are easy to read when compared to a triangular mesh.... It's so much easier to work with quads...

Triangles have their place in the workflow and it is not necessary to make a mesh entirely with quads strictly but just like some methods of design are better in code the same holds for modeling. Bottom line it's all triangles, but quads make it easy to work with.

 

Thank you for suggestions.

If I may ask more suggestions about topology, what do you think, will this re-topology work as a proper quad mesh? In a certain point I'm not sure about adding more rows on the back side of a cabin.

 

It looks pretty good, there are a few things that stick out to me

1. You should follow the edge with straight quads on the other side as well
2. These look like triangles in disguise, I think you'd be better of with the bottom edgeloop following the edge all the way (to where it meets 1)
3. These diamonds look a bit too stretched out

I'd also recommend asking about topology on a modelling forum, you're likely to get more, better and faster replies there. For example blenderartists, polycount or cgtalk

 

Thank you very much. Will follow that way.

I though about modeling forums but since I'm much more developer than artist trying to stick with this forum first

 

@steego
Just one more concert about red edge loop on your picture. Will that be good with normal map then?
Those small bumps I'm going to bake to normals when re-topology is finished.

 

Yes I think that should work just fine.

 

steego nailed it with his pic. Those are common blunders and you'll be better at ironing them out over time. Study other wireframes of nice models and note the flow of the loops. Try to avoid quads that have one vertex skewed away from the others, or long rectangles where they can be avoided.

I would also recommend Polycount for stuff like this.. This is a developer forum, we do have artists here but Polycount is much more appropriate to get feedback and learn more as art is their entire topic. There is a wealth of information over there on these sorts of topics. CGTalk is also good, but its rather huge and heavily moderated now.. I haven't posted there since like 2005. You'll probably feel more comfortable and personal on polycount.

 

Will follow then. Thanks a lot!

I did it before but unfortunately I read about high details meshes, re-topology and baking processes just a few days ago
So like a start all over again about the modeling

 

here are a couple other good 3D artist sites.
http://www.gameartisans.org/forums/forum.php
http://forums.3dtotal.com/

I also frequent polycount and cgtalk as well.

 

Thank you guys, you helped a lot!

I think my first experience in re-topology may be called not bad

Left is dynamic topology (over million triangles)
Right is low res topology with baked normal map. 2858 quads.
There a few rough corners like tails where I did not pay much attention yet because wanted to see result as soon as it possible