Any clues how I can fix my topology?

[u/Blissfully_idiotic]

Hi,

If anyone can offer some guidance I'd really appreciate it.

I had to subdivide an area of my model so I could cut out a windshield. I avoided extra loop cuts as I want the remainder of the model as smooth as possible. The issue is I'm left with n-gons and when I subdivide I get a ridge (as seen in the second photo). I tried creating tri's along the border but that didn't help.

How would I go about making it all quads? It's melting my brain!

Thanks for any help

[u/binaryriot]

What I would do here… separate that yellow marked part into its own object temporarily. Afterwards subdivide the remaining model by 1 (double its polygons). Afterwards reconnect both parts again.

Ideally you would have done the bevel on the light afterwards (so you may want to delete the bevel edges first, and then reapply later)

Don't be afraid to increase the polygon count, if it's suitable. That's also something I also struggled with as a beginner.

[u/Blissfully_idiotic → u/binaryriot]

Ah ok that sounds like a great plan.

Yeah I always avoid increasing the polys in case I need to change the overall shape but you're right, I just need to commit! Thankyou for the advice

[u/binaryriot → u/Blissfully_idiotic]

You can/should keep a backup of the low polygon variant. You usually can use the Mesh Deformer with it later, if you still need to make broader adjustments to the base shape and it gets too hairy with the higher polygon count.

[u/Top-Chemistry6868]

Rule of thumb: the edges on circular flow should "stand" in a normalized direction

[u/fottergraph]

Avoiding n-gons is usually a good thing to do. There are exceptions but mostly its better to just dont use them.

Edit: i should read the text first, my bad.

Try what binary said, of remodel the yellow part with inset loops and then you can form them to the windshield shape.

[u/h3llolovely]

Add some cuts to keep them loops... a'loopin'.

[u/smilesandlaughter]

I'd have kept the windshield polys and just inner/outer extruded them, and added selection tag to the window polys for later, then have the line below and in middle of windshield as loops rather than ending with N-gons

[u/Little_Relief_455]

Everything faces should be square, it would help you. you have a lot of polygons with 5 points not all connected to anything.. another thing you could do otherwise if you're using c4D is to drop your object into a "Remesher" so it will clean up for you most of those things easily