pixelmech

10,000! Wow! Well it does have a lot of parts. Well my first car I did (which is in cold storage right now) the musclecar, was very spline heavy too, and I found it very hard to retreat from that. So I went into this one with the mindset of keeping it simple. But the McLaren looks great, so hey - whatever works. I did find at the end of my musclecar that A:M started to bog pretty bad. I'll have to see how many that one has.

Yeah, that's awesome Greg... I forgot you said they were right there. I noticed on the video when the guy steps in the car, the door is really really short, like 2.5 feet tall or something, seems odd but they probably had no choice. They did an awesome job though, I mean how cool is it to see that thing rolling on by - it was every kid's dream of my age to have that. Greg if you do go down there, it would be neat if you could find out how they made their plans. I mean some engineer must have sat down and had to do something similar to what I am doing to get stuff done - either that or they simply did everything by hand fabrication like they do on these TV shows. Either way, I'd be curious to know. Wonder if they have any screenshots of plans lying around... Joakim: I really appreciate the comment very much. I'm going to work on it some more tonight so...should be some updates then!

That's looking really great. I still agree with John that I'd like to see just a *bit* more of the "uh oh" expression as he realizes he is in trouble. It is so fleeting I realized I missed it until John even mentioned it. Whether its via neck stretch or some other vehicle, that would perfect it for me. I love the eye wobble, very Warnerish, which I love.

I haven't decided if I am going to do all the bells and whistles just yet, there's also the fully closed cockpit with a periscope, high traction wheels (with 5,000 hp to each wheel - yeah that's right five THOUSAND) 2-way radio...it would be a lot to do! I'm still trying to figure out if I can get the hood/trunk modeled to open and still look smooth. Stian - Thanks - how's the McLaren coming?

Good points, Eduardo - I had been contemplating that very issue. That it isn't a real car, only a cartoon and I should be allowed some artistic license! Bottom and wheels actually sounds like a good idea. I may go that route. I also have an idea I want to try with the rear trunk/flares that might allow me to get that wider intake I'm wanting, I'll have to see if it works.

Thanks Andy. I'd like to do a bunch of cars from the series but who knows if I'll have the time, it's merely for fun. The short list of cars to do would be: Mach5 Shooting Star (Racer X's car) Car Acrobatic Team car - probably the lead car (Snake I think) There's a bunch more that would be cool...maybe the 200mph car... the X-3(?) car... I'm watching all the original episodes right now on DVD so I'll be making a list for future reference! I'm aware of that site already - it's actually not that useful for reference, but thanks. Tom

Here's today's update. I broke out one of the doors and built it up, which is getting really hard...hard to keep things matched up exactly. I had to modify the air intake on the back part, it was supposed to be wider but I could not make it wider and have everything meet correctly. (which aggravates me because it looked better). Not sure where to go next..have to think about it.

Yah Polar Lights makes great stuff! I remember when the real car came out, it was a big thing. "Purists" criticized it a lot for not quite being close enough but its got to be a hard thing to build. The shooting star actually looks pretty bad from the doors back, but the front end looks good.

Really nice David! I'm wanting to see some color on that badboy now.

Thanks Joakim Here's the latest. Going the low spline method is working well for the shape but is providing some challenges. I don't know how I'm going to connect the bottom of the front wheelwell for example - probably a separate piece for the inside. The back headrest and trunk probably won't be connected to the two rear 'bumps' either. This is tricky, but fun!

ROTFL yeah Josh, I knew you would show up and pin me on that one! See, every car I do - something appears on the front of it - grille, air scoop - that eludes me. I'm cursed!

Thanks for the comments - I'd need a trunk before they could be in it LOL! hehe. I would like to do the Shooting Star too (Racer X's car). That car will be tough because it looks so different in every shot. Probably would have to buy one of the bigger die-casts and take photos of it for rotos. I don't know if I am going to model all the add ons or not, we'll see how the main part comes out first.

Have you noticed I have a car fetish? But I digress. So this is my 3rd attempt to model this car. It's one of the favorite things from my childhood, I watched all the episodes as a kid. (And I just bought them all on DVD whoohooo!) It has been extremely difficult due to the converging curves. I suppose I could have made the three components of the front end separate, but I didn't want to. I do want to see if I can cut out the hood. I think I did a good job of keeping spline count down - but I'm not sure how good my approach is, but like I said..3rd attempt so, I've failed miserably twice already! I'm trying to keep Colin's lessons in mind on this one. The "m" is just a rough cut decal so I could see it on there. Not sure how I will handle the lights either, but the coloring is off. There is one thing missing - there is a type of ram air duct under the front end. I found it impossible to add the component, even as a free floating item. I found on most die-cast versions of this car, it isn't included most of the time either. Add to the fact there are no real true front end views of the car and it made it hard, but I don't know that anyone will really miss it. If I can finish this I hope to do a bunch of cars from the series - since I have the DVDs I have all kinds of reference material!

Arrrgh! it's awesome! I refuse to race your car with mine I know yer just playing with the materials so far, but the metal looks like shiny plastic. Take a look at Colins base metal material in the materials laboratory project file at http://www.hash.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=12486 I used it to make the silver on my gauges on the dog car and it worked real nice.

Handles are better for sure - but yep WAY too dark. The problem is essentially you have it backlit (not totally but almost) which cast the fore in shadow. You are using a spot which casts hard shadows. You want soft shadows and lots of light for product shots. I'd suggest this light tutorial which is awesome: http://www.itchy-animation.co.uk/indoor-light.htm Will open your mind to using light. A skylight would be nice of course, but barring that you want this softly lit with little or no shadows - soft ones for sure not hard. HTH Tom

They do look fun to drive don't they?

As Bill and Ted would say - that is "most excellent!"

Ok this will probably be my last post here since I'm pretty much done. Grabbed some material from Colin for metal on the gauges and the car colors. Tweaked the front end a big and put a bone in to slightly turn the front wheels. I also moved the gauges over to be on one side, they got lost in the middle. Here's a few renders...I like both the toon and regular, can't decide which best. At some point I'll have to do a scene with all the cars and the big tree!

Thanks Mike - that is exactly what was bothering me about the other one as well. This one doesn't quite follow the curve of the body, but you'd have to get super close to even notice it, it works for a dog car ;P

Nice table - can I have the real one please? Seriously, one little thing. I own a fair amount of mission stuff, I'm a big fan. The handles should not be chrome or metal like you have them, they should be dark charcoal pitted or chiseled matte metal. Other than that, really nice.

Hmm, see that is what I did Josh - I went to the shortcut and changed the color of the model. Now, I didn't change the color on the model itself, but on one group of the model... possibly the model color is overriding the group? I just wanted to change the body color. I guess I'll play with it some more. Certainly I could just dupe the model and change the colors too.

The model is pretty much finished, I just need to somehow figure out materials. I wanted to make the other 2 different colors, but nothing I did worked...how do you make different instances different colors? I thought once an instance is in the Chor, you could change it...

Thanks Madeline! Boy, I could go through Dr. Seuss books and find tons of fun stuff to model you know? Ask and ye shall receive...

Yer excused Thanks!

Interior, speedo messed up on the one but you can see it on the other.