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I want to create an eighth of a sphere with extremely high face count enter image description here

I want about ~127 Million Faces.

the problem is that it takes a huge amount of memory, and creating an entire UV sphere and cutting faces out is too wasteful.

My question is: Is there a way to create slice of a sphere without creating the entire sphere?

Regarding memory - I have 32GB of ram, is it enough for this task?

Edit: I've been asked regarding my motivation for this strange task. I want to create an image of part of a ball in the size of the earth to simulate how things reflect on it in some conditions (angles, altitude etc...) and how the hight from the surface influence the roundness of the visible area, the exact amount of faces is, as a result, assuming every 1sqr km is a face (approximately, in the equator).

My calculation was:

  • Earth circumference: 40,075KM (segments)
  • Earth radius: 12,742KM
  • Earth diameter: 25,484KM (rings)

So since in UV sphere Segments X Rings = Faces we get 1021271300 faces for the entire sphere. and one-eighth of that equals 127658912.5.

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    $\begingroup$ Why do you need that many faces? $\endgroup$
    – user1853
    Jul 10, 2018 at 18:34
  • $\begingroup$ I want to create an image of part of a ball in the size of the earth to simulate how things reflect on it in some conditions and how the hight from the surface influence the roundness of the visible area, the exact amount of faces is as a result assuming every 1sqr km is a face $\endgroup$
    – yossico
    Jul 10, 2018 at 18:53
  • $\begingroup$ @cegaton thanks for your question, I've answered in the above comment $\endgroup$
    – yossico
    Jul 10, 2018 at 18:54
  • $\begingroup$ Please use the edit link at the bottom of your post, to clarify your question. $\endgroup$
    – user1853
    Jul 10, 2018 at 18:57

1 Answer 1

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Well this all sounds highly suspicious and unnecessary, but if you must.

Start with a Bezier Circle object. After adding it enter edit mode and change all handle types to either Free or Aligned.

Afterwards erase the necessary vertex so only one quarter remains.

Once done add a Screw modifier to it and change the axis to $Y$, and adjust the angle to 90º.

enter image description here

You can now non destructively adjust the Subdivison levels on both directions, either from the Screw Modifier steps parameter or from the curve resolution..

You can maintain a lower level for both for viewport display purposes so it doesn't slow down to much, and higher levels for final rendering.

Edit:

You can achieve a similar result as above replacing the bezier curve circle by a single vertex mesh, then using two screw modifiers on different axis, overcoming the limits of curve resolution.

enter image description here

This has the added benefit of yielding a mesh base object (which is more flexible and better supported) and it is easier to control since all parameters can be controlled from the modifier stack

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  • $\begingroup$ Wow, I have so much more to learn... Amazing! Thanks $\endgroup$
    – yossico
    Jul 10, 2018 at 19:28
  • $\begingroup$ There is a problem, The BezierCircle max resolution is 1024 do you think that subdivision will get the same effect? is there a different way? $\endgroup$
    – yossico
    Jul 10, 2018 at 19:57
  • $\begingroup$ You can replace the bezier circle by a single point mesh then use two screw modifiers instead. You get a mesh object and full control directly from the modifier stack. Answer updated $\endgroup$ Jul 10, 2018 at 21:48
  • $\begingroup$ BTW, loved your opening "...highly suspicious and unnecessary..." $\endgroup$
    – yossico
    Jul 16, 2018 at 20:12

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