skinning and rigging

skinning and rigging has been quite fun to learn, and seemed very easy from the exercises I attempted. The issues I had were then re creating it within my design.

I wanted to achieve a very similar effect as too the cylinder exercise I previously did, with a cylindrical element bending when required to make the line which attaches the engines to the 'ship' look more 'flexible'.

The First issue I had was the bones were far to big for the lines, as they are quite thin and long, This meant re sizing the bones to fit within the area required. That proved to be simple to change using the bone parameters. 

Having added the IK solver it appeared to be going smoothly, and thought this would be a really quick and easy task to accomplish. The error happened after assigning the skin modifier to the cylinder, it simply wasn't working as expected, and rather then bending with the bones, the bones bent correctly, but the cylinder simply moved in the direction but stayed straight. Looking through the 3DS max help and tutorials online I couldn't see what I was doing wrong, and in the process changed and ticked a lot of unknown boxes trying to figure out the problem. 

I eventually reloaded the project to an earlier point and decided to run through it again, this time using a new cylinder, This time it worked correctly. The issue was the original cylinder was actually a 'line', which had been modified with the bevel profile modifier, this obviously created an error with the IK solver making it behave in a different way. So I had to delete the original lines on the ship as they were not a mesh which could use the bones technique and recreate them as cylinders and then re-size and move them into position. 

The end result is exactly what I was after, and I simply need to replace the texture. the bones have been attached to the holders on the ship and engines, so when the engines are moved the lines bend as shown in the picture above, this makes it look tethered and will be much easier to animate this way. 

lighting!

The main issue with lighting I have encountered is due to the sky dome added before hand. It has created a slight issue with what the light has an effect on.

The best way round this was following a tutorial around 'omni' lighting, and then adding the sunlight. It took a little while to get my head round the idea of a sky dome, and I have noticed the size of the sky dome is going to have to be very large for most designs. 

The sunlight appears to be very useful, but also harder to control then most of the other light options, placing it by compass and time etc as opposed to manually positioning. 

I have found a few tips that really help with using a sky dome, and lighting it. 

the best thing for a sky dome when working is to go into its options and cull it, so you can effectively see through some of the sky dome, allowing you to see what is going on in the scene a lot easier. 

it is also a good idea to do the same with the plane. There is a lot more in depth lighting options i wish to look into, as i want to make specific parts of my models glow for example, this uses a specific render-er known as a mental ray render-er  but, when rendering the scene at the minute it makes everything black and white, so i will have to research further into this before i can use it, it will also add a lot of render time to my animation later if i do choose to use it. 

Omni lighting is the best lighting solution I have found so far, and Can change the color, it could be possible to use this and focus it independently on the parts of the models i wish to stand out and glow in a different light.  

additional lighting -

I have now added sunlight, using the sunlight and compass, an omni light to just light the sky, and 2 omni lights as engine outputs for one of my models, it has added to the rendering time, but is a lot easier, then adding a mental ray render-er, which was a little bit too much too look into for this project, and I believe would be more beneficial for still shot rendering then animation anyway. The lights give off a nice glow for the engines. the sunlight gives good shadow for the ships as well, which shows they are hovering and will help show the speed as it travels across the sand, and pick up on the hills and dips in the environment. 

texturing

Texturing has proven to be an eye opener. 

I didn't think texturing would be so hard, but to produce good looking textures takes time, and effort. 

From 3DS Max it is possible to Map components of your model with the UV Map modifier tool.
This is a simple way of telling the texture what the object is like and how to wrap round it, using the gizmo sub 'object' of the UV map. But, you need to have a good texture to place onto the model in the first place, or its not really worth it!

I also went further as to unwrap some of the more advanced components. this is done by applying a UV map, and the the UV Unwrap modifier tool, this allows you too select faces and then unwrap the model flat, creating an image I then imported into GIMP too really allow me to add more detail to each individual polygons / face. 

Problem - Creating the models originally I feel I have no created enough separate components. Meaning it is a lot harder to make sense of the UV unwrap! especially as I wanted different sections to have a different texture on it. 

Solution - The way i got around this was too detach the sections creating separate components from them, this would not be the best way to do it, and I understand now that i should have created separate components in the first place, as to me this is a very messy way of doing it. 

Using GIMP is good, but I have not used it for a while, so have found it difficult remembering the tools, you do need to be a good artist to create good textures. 






The textures themselves are very easy too apply after the uv map has been applied, and quite often if the component is mainly one color  it is better not too add the unwrap complicating the process. 

the details - all pod racers

Each of the pod racers I have created have undergone further development with details on each pod racer. 

these were created using standard primitives and sizing shaping. One of the best techniques used here was snapping to grid, and also using the snap tool, but snapping to a face as opposed to snapping to a vertex or edge. This allowed me to create simple details on the side of engines very fast, the only trouble being with curved faces, the best way i dealt with this was too use the shape line and manually add a vertex along the curved face, whilst snapping too it, allowing it to connect to the face at a number of points kept it close to the original curve. 

the finished pod racers are good, but I personally would not add so much detail to each model. In reality I would texture some of the details on as opposed to modelling them. this would save on the number of polygons, BUT I also understand that within the game if someone needed to use a button, or if the detail required warranted it to be modeled on, then I would model it on, for example if one of the pod racers was seen very close up by a character, or is used often, it would warrant the details to be modeled, but if it was only seem from a specific distance, where the level of detail could be covered in a texture, I would assume the texture would be the preferred method. 

the details added would be of use within the final product, and is not stupid amounts of detail.
it is more items which could be used and seen close up in detail. changing the look of the model.

the third pod racer

My last pod racer has become much better then expected, This is due to my increasing knowledge in 3DS Max, looking back over my models I believe I can see the pod racers improve as I have improved with 3DS Max.

For this pod Racer I wanted to create a 3D studio within 3DS max using three different images of a pod racer, showing each profile, front, side and top. This was so I could ensure the pod racer was too scale and correctly proportioned.

This was created using planes, alligning, and then adding the pictures, The pictures orignally came from one picture showing all three profiles, which I found on the internet. I then cut out each profile in GIMP. There was a slight issue as one of the profiles was not the same size. I had too physically stretch the front image in GIMP to ensure each file had the correct proportions so it would line up in 3DS Max. failing to do this leads to all sorts of problems, which I found out from experiance when I tried to model a Plane.

Using Alt + X to turn the selection see through made it possible to really create the shapes seen from the drawings, BUT it is also important to remember its 3D, theres no point creating a square from the side view, if its round in the front view, You must have a good understanding of the drawings and the object you wish to create.

I found this section to be very tricky to get right, it was a lot of vertex movement manually, and also cloning, shrinking, cutting, and then cutting into the shape to create the desired area shown in green. the engine itself was quite simple other then that, I specifically chose less segments to each curve to get a better balance between polygon count and look.



The engine used a lot of standard primitives, the 'rings' being made with tubes, the exhaust made from a cone, and a chamfer cylinder, the front a sphere, stretched and shaped. the issue was I created the outer 'shell' which is red from the drawings, but missed the inside bit, shown within the circle, I created another curve using a tube, and then had too attach this onto the larger section and manually move the vertex to where I wanted them, I did this using the Boolean tool and union, but found a lot of vertex were left, I deleted these and then manually added faces to fill in the gaps which I had created. This was a lot of work, and In future I would have continued the curve round and manually moved the vertex and deleted where I wanted. The rings seen and the 'fins' at the bottom and back are clones, saving on the work load where possible. 

The ship itself seemed simple, but a few errors here and there made it harder then I thought. during construction I believed it to be symetrical, using tools and selecting edges which ensured to me it would remain symetrical, such as the scale to along one axes rather then manually moving edges. At some point I must have seslected vertex unknown to me and moved them slightly, as towards the end I realised it was not symmetrical.

As I had done more work I couldnt find a suitable way to go back, so I decided to carry on for now, knowing I could cut and mirror the ship later.

Things that went well -

• Boolean cutting
• Standard primitives and editing
• cloning / mirroring objects
• following drawings from perspectives
• Using Slice tool on the ship and then mirroring to create symetrical object

Things to work on -

• Vertex... at some corners it appears to have two vertex as opposed to the one, target welding helped elimanate this, but should not be an issue in future
• Saving, I must save work more often, having corrupted files and creating errors without noticing is time consuming
• Cutting down on polygons, I think there is clear ways of improving this within all three pod racers, from selecting number of segments, but also unwanted and hidden areas do not need as many, also the models are detailed, where it could possibly be textured

The final Ship -



 

The Second Pod Racer

My Second pod racer has been an enjoyable project, using my mood board I decided to go for a less round design to see if I could lower the polygon count further by not using so many curves, which to me means more polygons!

The basis was a rectangular engine with large intakes which go through to the back where there is large rotary piece.
Again I started with the engine.

Step 1 was to create the basic shape, using two standard primitives, creating the curved sides using a large sphere and the boolean technique to cut into a basic box.

Had I redone this i would have used a Chamfer box, which would have created slightly softer edges, which would have been useful for the overall look, a lesson learnt for next time! but this would increase the poly count too.

 

this picture shows the beginning of my first engine, the 'intake' areas were created by insetting and then extruding the faces inwards. it was a balance between look and polygon count for the base of the engine.

The hard point was cutting the smaller intake in the blue section as it still had the main base section sticking through, to get round this I manually added vertex and cut out the piece I did not want

The next stage was adding the grills to the intakes, I created one and then cloned it for the smaller, reshaping as I went to fit snug.

The next stage was addign the 'exhaust' where the rotary blades will sit, This was a simple Tube. The Main error for the polygon count I made was here, it has a large number of faces, and also has used a smooth modifier to make the end more smooth, as it has a slight angle, The finished exhaust looks good, but at a hefty price! In the future i would not use so many segments, and try and manually make the end smoother then I have currently, rather then applying a smooth modifier which has smoothed the entire object and made even more polygons. I may even change this before the end.


The next stage was the exhaust rotary blade, Made from a cylinder, inset a number of times, stretched and then manipulated, to creat the smooth curved circle around the base, I made a sphere again and used the boolean technique.

To create the spiral, I used two shapes, a circle, and a helix, Using the Bevel Profile modifier to make the circle follow the helix shape, thus creating the spiral. this is wrapped around a standard primitive and alligned with the allign tool.

I have then added smaller details to the side of the ship, using standard primitives and the scale and general manipulative tools.

 

 The Ropes were hard to get right, I used the bevel profile technique with a pre drawn curve to create the organic rope shape, But to make two different ropes I moved some sections, but this had a slight impact on the smooth curve look.





 
I Felt the ship itself should not have too much detail, as I intend to use textures to provide the detail, and also feel the ship itself isnt the focal point of the model, it also will not be seen as much, and also will be closer to the camera from behind, I think a good texture on the back will be all the ship itself requires, leaving the detail to the engines of the racer itself.

The final Pod Racer -

 

 

The first Pod Racer

My first pod racer model is complete. It started as a simple cone and has been cut out using the Boolean tool, it has been clear to me that components are key to future designs, rather then trying to design it all from one element. The polygon count for my model is relatively high, but was a lot higher before hand, shown in some of the earlier pictures.

I cut down the polygon count by manually deleting unneeded vertex and edges to create larger polygons, I also used the pro - optimizer modify tool, which cut down the number further, it was hard to get it right by cutting down the polygons without loosing the shape of my pod racer.

also in future I will try and cut down the number of segments within round objects, as this was a slight error on my part, I will also try and cut down the number of polygons within areas you cant see, as the detail is unneeded in those areas. for example under the engine section could have less polygons. 

I chose to create this racer from standard primitives as I felt it gave me a good base to work from, and created the shape required well, the other way of doing this would be either from the lathe and drawing a circle or extruding a circle and editing further. 

the finished results before and after the pro optimizer -