Ford GT-40

[photoman]

Looking at Stians amazing truck model I got inspired to model a classic mid 60's Ford GT40.

 

This is the first time I have even attempted at modeling a car so I am going to have a lot of questions.

 

I downloaded some blue prints and did a quick once over on Xtaz's car modeling tutes as well.

 

So far

Here is a shot of a modern Ford GT I am using as a visual reference:

 

I REALLY want to finish this model and not forget or lose interest in it.

 

Photoman

[TheSpleen]

wow! Looks like a great start!

[Eric2575]

It is a great start, and with that said, it is also the most frustrating phase of modeling a car. In the beginning I always think: how will I ever get this to look like the pictures? It takes time and patience, unless you are Stian, then you just do it overnight in your sleep . One thing that has helped me quite a bit is to keep splines down to a minimum and only put them where they are really needed. It helps to get you a mesh which is easier to smooth and you can always add splines later where and when needed. Your model looks a bit heavy in the door and hood areas. I know, there are people that take the exact opposite approach and delete as they progress, but I like to go simple and work toward the complex. I also live and die by the best rotoscopes I can find and make sure they are the same scale, top, side, front, and back. Keep up the good work.

 

-E

[photoman]

I realized that my model is patch heavy, I will try to weed it down a bit (To get the curves/surfaces smooth) Then I will add more if needed.

I scrapped most of the original model and tried again (I kept the side splines).

It looks better, but I need to work on the creases, crinkles and depth.

 

Here is the blueprint Im using

Photoman

[robcat2075]

looks like a solid start. Probably can be even thinner, but you'll find out.

[agep]

Nice start. Here is something I sometimes do when working with a shape like the GT40. Try to draw as many lines viewable from two or more bleprints. Take the wheelwell as an example. From the sideview its straight forward. Draw the spline

 

but once you look at the frontview you see that it curves inward very much, try to match that as best as you can. move the spline inwards to matc the front blueprint

 

 

Do as many of these as possible (outline of the headlights, windows, outline of the rear, the groove on the hood and so on), then you can start bridging the parts. Hope this helps

Best regards

Stian

[agep]

Ten minutes of work and I already have a sense of the shape

 

 

I have attached the project. This was quick and dirty (I'm at work), and I therefore didnt to much effort into it where I put the cp's. Load the project and rotate around in the modellingwindow to see what I mean about the sense of the shape

 

ford_gt40.zip

[photoman]

Thanks!! That seems like a more logical approach, I will have to try that!

 

Hmm It seems that you topped all my modeling in just 10 minutes

 

That definitely helps! This will be my 3rd restart on it, though I am in it more for the experiance, knowledge, skill, etc than for the model itself.

 

Photoman

[Eric2575]

Stian's method is also the one I use when modeling a car, although I usually only model one side first. To check how the whole body is coming along, I will copy and flip on the x axis without using copy/flip/attach. That way I get a sense of how it looks, then I delete the copied side with no fuss and keep working on the primary side. Once I get basic proportions, I will concentrate on really ironing out body panels such as the fender, door skin, quarter panel, etc. Just remember to keep continuous splines flowing and almost never peak splines in a car skin. Btw, don't think twice about Stian's effort of 10 minutes, he's not human

 

edit: To start out, re-work the area below the front headlight, there are way too many splines converging there. Run a couple of the splines coming from the wheel well into the headlight opening, instead of curving down below the headlight. You can also eliminate a couple of the splines running from the wheel well running to the front grille. One more tip: try to keep your splines from making drastic changes in direction -

[robcat2075]

those are great tips, guys.

 

You should do a car-modeling tut. Car modeling seems to be a pretty frequent desire.

[photoman]

Ok, I redid it using Stian's and Eric's way:

 

I think I got it down, at least for the body/shell. I just need to tweek and add wheel wells and the interior and the wheels too.

 

Thanks

 

Photoman

 

Note: Those patches that didnt render have hooks, AO doesnt seem to like that

[Eric2575]

You just earned yourself the Most Improved Modeler in a 24 hour time period award! What a difference! Outstanding!

[robcat2075]

Is this one of those cars where the driver must crawl thru the window to get in?

[Eric2575]

Almost.

[agep]

Very nice improvement! Currently the skirt looks to be way to flat, I think it should curve inward at the bottom

[Zaryin]

Looks great so far. I agree about the skirt. The roof looks like it oculd use a little more rounding as well. Nice job so far, way better than any mechanical I can do.

[photoman]

Minor Update.

 

I did some additional modeling (Not much unfortunetly) and I set up all the materials in the car (Paint, Environment, Chrome, Windshield, etc) Though I didnt add shots of those to the thread.

 

The model itself still needs a lot of work, little things that add up to a lot.

 

I hope to have more soon since its summer and no school (Yay) but I may have to work this week so who knows

 

 

More coming up.

 

Photoman

[photoman]

Ok, I finished it. But by that I just modeled the outside and made the windows more reflective to hide the lack of interior. The wheels are the a modified versions of those that Tralfaz donated with his Gallardo model (THANKS). I can spot various flaws which should be fixed (spline issues on grill....) but Im counting this one done. I will probably come back to this project later and fix it up.

 

This is the beauty pass, with faked GI (I used a couple of point lights). I have set this scene up for radiosity (Everything is literally ready) but havent had the time to let it render (14+ hours guessitmating)

 

 

Thanks for everyone that helped and pitched (Eric, Agep).

 

Photoman

Oh and the final patch count is 8685.

[TheSpleen]

That is a sweeeet model!

And quick too!

[Zaryin]

I like everything except for the reflectivity of the wheels. That doesn't look right to me. I would love to see a radiosity render, but like you said 14+ hours...

[photoman]

The wheels are giving me problems... I rendered those in a different project than the original. (It had the scene already) ... and in the orginal I had set the whole car up in an action window, and when I exported the action to a model, I lost half of my groups which held the proper shader for the rims so they just took up the shader that the rest of the car had (Paint), but... I didnt catch it til halfway through the render and I didnt want to lose the 50 or so minutes it took to render that (3x3 pass @ 1080p)

 

I plan to start the radiosity render before I go to bed... 1 million photons

 

Photoman

[photoman]

Heres the radiosity render. The model had a high speculartiy and I had to rerender it and to make up for lost time I reduced the resolution.

3:10:05 5pass 720p

 

Canceled render with specularity off.

 

Fun headlight shot w/ slight DOF:

 

I enjoyed modeling the car and I have gained a wealth of experiance and knowledge. Mostly in modeling but also in radiosity (From playing with different scenes )

 

Thanks to all and Enjoy!

 

Photoman

[robcat2075]

That's a snazzy looking car! But that garage isn't going to help much in a hail storm!

 

Is the underside of the car red? is that what's causing the odd red shadow underneath?

[largento]

Great job, Josh! Nice looking renders!

[photoman]

Thanks!

The red shadows are from the reflectance (right word?) off the paint, and are also due to the fact the car had no bottom and is empty

I wanted to render in radiosity to get some of that. Also some metals that are colored reflect their color on objects around them, but thats more of a caustic thing.

Ex:

Photoman

[Zaryin]

Yeah, that turned out great! I think I'd put some type of bottom on the car and maybe color it black or grey and rerender. I know it takes a while to render that pic, but that red shadow is a little much .