Mutable for Unreal Engine | Remove Mesh Node
Updated 1,079 Days AgoPublic
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Function

Remove the faces of a material that are defined only by vertexes shared by the material and the input mesh. It also removes any vertex and edge that only define deleted faces, they are not left dangling. If the mesh removed covers at least all the faces included in one or more layout blocs, those blocs are removed, freeing final texture layout space. Only faces that are completely enclosed in shared vertexes are removed, as well as only the vertexes and edges completely enclosed by deleted faces, so the remaining geometry is unaltered while there are no floating vertices or edges left.

Use Cases

Avoid clipping problems with close geometry like tight pants.
Avoid clipping problems on morphs applied under existing features like a fatness morph under a shirt.
Optimize resources excluding unseen geometry like the scalp of a head with abundant hair.
Heavily optimize resources excluding geometry and whole blocs of textures that have been occluded by covering geometry like the torso and arms under a jacket.

Each LOD has to be done individually, as this node removes matching vertices between the input mesh and the material it is connected to, and those vertices may change for each LOD. To remove vertices regardless of the LOD, other mesh removal nodes can be used, that don't offer individual vertex removal but can be faster to set up: remove by layout block, remove every vertex that falls inside another volume, or use a cutting plane.

Node Properties

(combobox): The ancestor's material that gets geometry removed: the faces that are present in the input mesh at the pin Remove Mesh will not be part of the final material.

Input Pins

Remove Mesh: Mesh to be removed. A kind of "negative mesh" or a mesh "mask", the faces included in this mesh are to be deleted from the material chosen in the node properties. Only the faces that this mesh has in common with the ancestor mesh section chosen are removed, along with any dangling vertices and edges left. Here is an example on how to create a remove mesh.

Output Pins

Material: Material without the removed mesh section. If the removed mesh is big enough to include all the mesh of one or more layout blocs, the final mesh layout does not include those blocs, freeing space for other textures that can actually be seen in the final model.