Many times when modeling, you may find yourself needing to select only part of a subobject polygon loop, or ring, between two given points.  Until the other day, I wasn't aware this was possible natively in 3dsMax.  Shame on me.

Selecting a full Loop or Ring, of course, is very simple: click any poly or edge, and then hold down Shift on the keyboard while you select the next edge or polygon along the loop or ring in the direction you intend to go, and Max will automatically select the entire loop or ring for you.  Very fast hand handy.  However, there are times when point to point selections are necessary.  I knew point to point selections were possible all along when editing UV's, but I didn't think we had that option when modeling, until recently.  In the Graphite Ribbon, under the Modify Selection panel (where all your Loop and Ring selection tools are) is a handy feature called "StepMode".  When in Polygon subobject mode, enable StepMode, select your first polygon, then hold CTRL, and select any polygon which resides on the same loop or ring as the first selection, and StepMode will fill in the polys between them, as a selection.  I find it most handy for polygon subobject selections, but it also has functions for edge and vertice (according to the manual).  It's a great tool which probably doesn't see much use, even in tutorials or professional circles, because it's placement in the Graphite ribbon is obscure to say the least.

Try it out, and I'm sure it will help improve your modeling workflow.

Very handy. I actually needed this last night, but didn't see the post until this morning. lol

<strong>bandolin</strong><br />
[Former 3DS Max forum coordinator]<br />
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Quote - Very handy. I actually needed this last night, but didn't see the post until this morning. lol

I remember not too long ago in another thread, I was complaining about this kind of thing not being available in the native workflow, and it actually was available all this time.  There was even some suggestion that this wasn't a useful enough feature to add into the modeling toolset.  I guess someone decided it was.

The ironic thing is that I'd been using RappaTools to achieve quick selections like this, but now since discovering StepMode, and having the ability to hotkey it, I can make these kind of edge and loop selections faster than I was doing with the Rappa plugin.  Just goes to show it's particularly important to really explore every button and feature you see in the UI.  They are there for a reason, and might not be the reason you suspect at first.  I thought originally it was something to do with the Dot Loop selection, but that's completely separate.

I never reserve time to explore Max's features, but every now and then whenever doing repetitive tasks I say to myself "you know, I'm not the first person trying to do this. Some intrepid people at Max must've created a better way to do this".

So here is what I do next. I create a thread here at Rendo and you tell me what the shortcut is. Et voila. I'm more efficient.

<strong>bandolin</strong><br />
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Glad to see it's already in there, so no dev time needs to go toward this.  It's so rare I actually need to select point to point subobjects for anything other than UV editing, that I wouldn't care if this were available or not.  I don't feel it's that big of a timesaver in my personal workflow, but I understand if you needed it, it's good to have it.  I've never had problems selecting subobject components in Max. The selection tools are so extensive, I feel most of them are probably unnecessary.  Take the Selection "Patterns", for example.  Does anyone actually have a use for those?

Glad to see it's already in there, so no dev time needs to go toward this.  Not to minimize this tip, I appreciate you posting it.  It's just so rare I actually need to select point to point subobjects for anything other than UV editing, that I wouldn't care if this were available or not.  I don't feel it's that big of a timesaver in my personal workflow, but I understand if you needed it, it's good to have it.  I've never had problems selecting subobject components in Max. The selection tools are so extensive, I feel most of them are probably unnecessary.  Take the Selection "Patterns", for example.  Does anyone actually have a use for those?

Glad to see it's already in there, so no dev time needs to go toward this.  Not to minimize this tip, I appreciate you posting it.  It's just so rare I actually need to select point to point subobjects for anything other than UV editing, that I wouldn't care if this were available or not.  I don't feel it's that big of a timesaver in my personal workflow, but I understand if you needed it, it's good to have it.  I've never had problems selecting subobject components in Max. The selection tools are so extensive, I feel most of them are probably unnecessary.  Take the Selection "Patterns", for example.  Does anyone actually have a use for those?

Quote - Glad to see it's already in there, so no dev time needs to go toward this.  Not to minimize this tip, I appreciate you posting it.  It's just so rare I actually need to select point to point subobjects for anything other than UV editing, that I wouldn't care if this were available or not.  I don't feel it's that big of a timesaver in my personal workflow, but I understand if you needed it, it's good to have it.  I've never had problems selecting subobject components in Max. The selection tools are so extensive, I feel most of them are probably unnecessary.  Take the Selection "Patterns", for example.  Does anyone actually have a use for those?

I've used the pattern selections for many things.  I agree in so much as they aren't a necessity for modeling anything, but can be a useful "bonus" tool.  Using the various selection patterns, and experimenting with procedural topology on densely tessellated meshes, you could come up with some really cool extruded or beveled designs in your objects, for example. These could then be baked to textures, for use in normal maps or displacement, or just used as-is on high poly models.  It's more of an experimentally useful asset, and allows for a more creative modeling process.

Other packages have tools that wouldn't necessarily be considered useful in everyday modeling workflow as well; a good example might be the Julianne slice tool in Modo.  However, with some creative thinking, these unorthodox tools could prove most useful in creating highly unusual or complex models.

Attached Link: Example of pattern selections in use

Just wanted to point out a real world example of the "pattern" selections in practice.  This image in my gallery utilized the pattern selections for some of the eggs.  Using remeshing techniques, and then selecting patterns in the topology, I was able to punch out holes in the eggs that created some interesting designs.  Sure, you could do it manually as well, and I did for some of them, but many of these were started simply by clicking the pattern selections a few times.

Well I guess there's a use for everything, and the tools are there for a reason.  Great eggs.  I guess if you are doing some abstract modelling, or looking to make unusual geometry, then they come in handy.