MSFlynn

Blocked in the detail for the thruster assembly.

Finished adding the major detail of the nacelles.

Just a small update with the major parts blocked in.

A few years ago I had sketched out a design for a spacecraft and proceeded to model it in AM. I could never get the fuselage right. A few times a year I'd pull the model up and hack away on it but it just wasn't fulfilling my original vision. Sunday afternoon I had a what-the-hell moment and converted it to AM13. For whatever reason, it suddenly came together. I have a drawer full of old drawings with many a spacecraft sketch, but this one has always been my favorite; now it appears that I might finally be able to get it flying.

From Frazetta's 1973 painting? That would be awesome.

100%

I've gotten a couple nice trees but so far the lighting of the scene is a problem. You can, however, see that shadows are rendering - look under the poplar on the left. Why the shadow is orange when the tint is set to black is unknown.

Just this project. I suspect it's my lighting setup - the rim light is way out in front of the camera above the fill light, the fill light is the flare and the key light is behind the camera. The rim is the only one set to cast shadows but I wonder if they are getting washed out by the key light.

Positive. And all models are set to cast and receive shadows as well.

I'm getting the hang of creating trees. I imagine that it's going to take me weeks to come up with 6-8 varieties that I'm happy with. I still cannot get shadows to render.

I'm trying to get a handle on using the TreeeZ plugin. What I see as a problem is that it's not very good at creating the longer twigs that leaves are attached to, unless I'm missing something. As a work around, I created a set of 3 leaves and drew the longer twig. This seemed to give me more realistic coverage.

Shadows currently will not render for this image - I haven't figured out why yet. The images I used were 32-bit .TGA files with an alpha channel. As for the material, I tried Surface Color, I tried a Darktree and I even tried a Projection Map. BTW, you should have entered the image - I wouldn't have felt put out just because it's from TWO.

Orange Lilies As some may recognize, this was my contest entry for April. I almost didn't enter it since it is seriously flawed but I ran into several problems that couldn't be fixed or worked around in any timely fashion. However, the painterly aspect I was striving for shows and I am loathe to abandon the image so as the spirit moves me, I will continue to improve upon it. First, the trees will all be replaced, hopefully by trees created in AM with the TreeeZ plugin. These were created in XFrog and imported into AM as props. The problem is that the leaves on the trees do not render correctly - the alpha channel is ignored. I don't know if this a problem with the 3DS import function or not. They show up perfectly in shaded mode though. Second, the material I created for the ground needs some work. Time was against me and I made a modification at the last minute to get rid of an obvious division between two gradients. The result is 100% unsatisfactory. Third, the grassy patches along the water look too uniform. Small wonder since they are instances of same model. There 96 of them and I had no time to create several differing versions. I will be writing a program that opens a .CHO file and randomizes selected models. Something I still need to experiment with is using images with Hair. I don't know if my video card is the culprit, but I cannot use an image with Hair and apply any material for color to the surface the images from - they turn black.

Because I wanted an "it doesn't matter how finished these tires look because they are tires and are just going to get beat to hell anyways" feel. I purposedly modeled them to have facets and anomalies. Same with the front axel smack plate. Besides, modeling the holes didn't dramtically increase the patch count - the studs detail is what kicked it up more than anything. I don't purposely try and create high patch counts - I add as many splines as I think I need to get the look I want. If I end up with too many, I'm generally not going to go back and redo that section. One of things I tried to do with this model is use a "fractal" mentality - I've tried to model the different parts with self-similarity. When it became questionable that I might not be able to complete it in time for the contest, I also grabbed bits and pieces from old projects, modified them, then copied them and modified the modifications by resizing, squashing and stretching.

I've spent the last couple of weeks trying to come up with a cannon that goes on the rear turret. I've finally got something I'm mostly happy with. Patch count is currently 2,245. I would expect it to rise to over 3,000 before I'm finished. Rear Cannon I'm using 13.e and it seems from this render that the chrome cooling cylinder near the muzzle (I used a boolean cutter here) isn't casting shadows.

Here's a new render from the rear showing the cannon turret. Rear Cannon Turret

Just to make sure people know that I haven't abandoned the project, here's a rear view shot with the engine housing and thruster exhausts: Rear View

1: An old 1.333ghz AMD with 768mb PC100 RAM. 2: A few hours a day for about 5 weeks. I probably have some old files somewhere with higher patch counts.

They wouldn't look the same either - which is why I don't care about patch counts and render times on my own projects - I want what I want to look how I want it; I won't compromise my vision just to be done faster. And the high patch count is not why I abandonded it - I was doing it for the Mechanical contest and ran out of time. Since Martin would like to see on the Extras DVD, I will continue working on it.

Only if you promise not to cry... For those who don't know me (many would consider you lucky), when it comes to my own projects, I don't care about patch counts or render times. As I mentioned a few months back, although I never "left" AM, I haven't done much with it for a few years. This Battle Juggetnaut is really me just "flexing" and relearning AM. That said, the tires are straight modeling - no displacement, no booleans. Big tires: 34,322 patches each. Small tires: 4,364 each. Big Tire Wireframe Big Tire Shaded Wireframe Small Tire Wireframe Small Tire Shaded Wireframe I tried something a little different with this model - I modeled it in pieces and assembled them in the Choreography, translating, oritenting and scaling them to the main body via constraints.

Thnaks Martin. The real issue is whether or not the Extras DVD is going to be a dual layer affair - currently, the Battle Juggernaut project is about 295 mb. (That's including all the PSD and CDR support files which take up about 135 mb at the moment.) I certainly have no reservations about contributing it, I just don't know what size limitiations we're talking about.

Some shots of the model I was working on for the Image Contest before I had to abandon it: Front Shock Assembly Thruster Exhausts Angled Frontal View Angled Side View

Core My concept of the powering source for a giant berserker - a small self-contained sun. This image is just some basic shapes and textures before beginning to add lights and massive detail.

I'm not exactly a new user, but I've barely touched the software for a few years. The last version I upgraded to was v11 but I got a new job in 2004 that had me working up to 80hrs/wk for several months. Since then, while the hours haven't been as intense, I've been too busy trying to rebuild my personal/professional life. (I was kind of forced into a career change I didn't want). It's probably been about 4 years since I used AM on any kind of regular basis. I can't say with any certainty that I'll be able to work with it as much as I would like, but I'm ready to get back into it. My focus will be, as it always since I first started using Hash's Playmation v1.47 in '92, on mechanical modeling.