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A seemingly common way to describe a beveled corner is with the radius of the circle that would fit in the corner. This is e.g. how the CSS "border-radius" property works in web design. The screenshot below explains my dilemma, and the diagram under it is what I'm trying to implement. Is there any way to do this automatically in Blender? I'd rather not merge and delete vertices 49 times to make the edges I want.

Circle positioned against an obtuse angle, showing the path of the bevel Diagram of radius-based bevel

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  • $\begingroup$ Unfortunately this kind of precision modelling is considerably complex to achieve in Blender, simply because it was not what the tool was designed for. It can be done but its an involved process requiring many steps. Regular bevel wont work here for two reasons, one being hat it extends beyond the length of existing edges, second that it is not tangencial to both surfaces. $\endgroup$ – Duarte Farrajota Ramos♦ Jun 1 '17 at 3:16
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    $\begingroup$ On a side note it might be a little faster to achieve what you want if you use an Screw modifier to make your revolution surface part, that way you only have to design the shape section $\endgroup$ – Duarte Farrajota Ramos♦ Jun 1 '17 at 3:18
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I don't know what kind of precision you want to achieve (and I hope I have understood the question correctly), but, if you don't want to use curves, I'll do your bevel this way :

Your set-up : no bevel

Extruding some faces to get a visual reference : visual reference

Loop cut and slide at the right height : loop cut

For all the visual marks minus one (because you already have one) : loop cut bis

After the scale on x and y axis of the inner edge : scale the inner edge

Grab on z axis each edges individually to match the right height : grab the edges

Done : done

It's quite fast (and could be even more precise with the use of snap ?). Is it what you want to achieve ?

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  • $\begingroup$ Yes, that looks like what I want. I may want to write a script to do this automatically for me—should be interesting. $\endgroup$ – user48147 Jun 1 '17 at 17:36
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Another method you could perhaps use next time :

Create a cross-section of your object then use the Spin tool to fill it out.

Starting from your original setup:

1: Set 3D cursor to center of object.

2: Select vertices that make up the cross-section. (The ones that are selected at the start of the gif anim.).

3: Inverse selection ( Ctrl I ) and delete those newly selected vertices.

4: Select the remaining vertices.

5: Go into top view then from the tools panel choose the Spin tool.

6: In the Operator panel set the number of Steps and Angle of 360°.

7: After the Spin tool has done its job select All and from the tools panel choose Remove Doubles.

8: If necessary Recalculate Normals.

enter image description here

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  • $\begingroup$ That is indeed a useful way to do this. Thanks! $\endgroup$ – user48147 Jun 1 '17 at 20:52
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There is no direct way to do it. I just would subdivide or use extruding methods.

Suppose you subdivide the verticals to create a few more ring around that place, then next in edit mode use proportional editing to lift the center up, the proportinal displacement can come close to a circle shape. And finish with a subdiv on your model

Its also possible to use a technical drawing on the background and make you model fit it, then by selecting those extra rings lift them up/down till its visually ok.

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