Been a lurker for a copy months now and have finally decided to take the plunge and see if i have any ability in CG modeling. Looking for any comments and crits that'll enable me to grow and hopefully get better. Seeing some of the awesome work on here i can only hope that i can do something that well in the future. Wife "surprised" me with Modo on X-Mas and have been mostly trying to figure out what i can and doing some tut's. This is what I'm at now, but at a loss on a couple of things:
('1.) Any trick to greebling? Trying to put something together that looks "right" is alot harder then it looks.
('2.) Any modo users able to help out with some render setting suggestions. Am getting various "shadow?" artifacts and can't seem to get rid of them on the middle part of the ship.
Looking forward to being a part of the community here and growing as an artist.
P.S. can anyone tell me how to get a thumbnail to show up on the forum list page?
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Think about what type of equipment might actually be exposed on the hull of a ship. Then create a greeble for it, then place it in a position that might make sense. Do this and you will find that few systems would need to be exposed on a hull vs. protected beneath it. And you end up with a craft that has just the right amount of greebles to add detail, a good backstory explanation for those greebles adds realism then you wind up with an elegant design vs. one that would exist only in a Universe of pure fantasy.
Yes, I'm trying to recruit you..I don't want the "greebly modeler club" to get their talons into you when you're young and impressionable...Put thought and function into your design. Don't just make a shapes because it looks cool, but because it makes sense. When you design like that you pull ahead of the pack. And even a novice model can end up being an extremely talented design.
Can understand and to some extent agree with you, but at this point am more comfortable with basic shapes. Have made some progress with Sub-d, but still having difficulty if i use any stenciling or booleans on the geometry. Until i can get the forms to flow correctly will have to content myself with blocky as opposed to sleek.
The truly amazing artists are the ones that can create a unique and even, yes, fantastical look to a ship, but still be able to explain the reason for every shape and justify the form. The cool thing about scifi is that you are not limited to existing technology. You can invent your own technobabble to explain anything you want about a ship's design. Say you want a ship to look like a giant washing machine, well you can invent a technobabble reason for that to be the case. A humorous example but you see my point? There are limitations to how a ship can be designed before it becomes solely a work of art, vs something that could actually exist if it's technology were invented.
For example, you can design a future car to be as weird, odd or exotic as you like, but in the end, it's still gotta have four wheels and an engine. And it's overall form must still render its function towards its intended use.
Again, this is only one way of looking at it. It's a design philosophy. You can do as fantastical of a design or realistic as you like, in the end they are both art. But prioritizing function over form nearly always results in a much more "balanced" and beautiful design.
Looking good. I see the weird shadow but can't help there as I have never used Modo before. You have a great wife for supporting your hobby too!
Walkyrje, you mean like this:
CBear your killin me...
Join us on the Voyages of the SS Tide, using state of the art steam injection technology and electromagnetic centrifugal drive to rid the Universe of vile Space Dust ONCE and FOR ALL!
On a side note, are details that are more then likely to small to see at the distance i wish to do final render worth including?
Above section is not really even visable when looking at whole ship.. is hatch area above right exhaust grill.
In your case the OCD is worth it. I love the small well thought out details you always include. I seem to keep adding detail that no one is going to see unless I do a very close render. But I think it is part of the fun I get out of creating a model.
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Redoing the greebling in the open area next to the gun... trying to make it look a bit more logical.
Oh, just had a thought: to improve range of motion for the gun you could dish out the bulkhead behind it to allow the gun to swivel around even more giving it a larger arc of fire.
Here's what i have so far:
Just a thought