Week 6

At first I wanted to model a full base camp however once I had shown my tutor, he told me that that was going to be too big and I needed to keep the size of the environment to a minimum. So I then decided to create a base tent. This was going to be inspired by an image I found on the internet.

I started off by creating a base floor which in this case was a cylinder.  The next step was for me to create the tent. For this I simply created a rectangular primitive and moved the top faces inwards so it becomes more like a roof. I then added an entrance which was just a hole on the side of the tent.  I then added the frame of the tent this was too add stability and support. This was a set of cylinder pipes with extensions to fit into each other. I had one long pipe running down the middle of the roof whilst having one in the middle of the back and two on either side of the tent.

The final part of the diorama was to add an entrance sign. This very simply and easy to model.  I simply created a cylinder pipe and moved the top half inwards to create a curve.  I then added a rectangular primitive. Bevelling the edges and extruding inwards gave me this sign looking shape. Once I had done this I could start to UV un-wrap the model and environment scene so that I could then add textures.

Week 5

Now that I had a fairly detailed shape I started to add more aspects that would make the model look more realistic and accurate. These included mirrors, lights, exhausts and a few other features.

I started off by creating the outer pipe cage that would protect the grill and headlights. I did this by creating a cylindrical pipe and then simply extruded, rotated and changed the size to match the reference photo I took from week 2. The next process was to model the headlights. I did this by selecting rectangular primitive and simply moved vertices into the correct place to get a headlight shape. I then made 3 duplicates of the light. Out of which 2 I made smaller as these were going to be the smaller headlights which would sit at the edge between the front and side panels. After I had modelled both the cage and lights I combined the two objects together.

Following on from this I then modelled the 2 door mirrors. After several attempts I managed to get something that resembles a door mirror. Similarly I combined both mirrors to the body of the car, so that now these were all 1 object.  The next step was to create the top light that sat at the back of the car roof. This was very easy and simple to do. I used a rectangular box and basically extruded the top and scaled the top face in, almost like a rectangular pyramid.

The next step was for me to model an exhaust. I did this by creating a cylinder and stretched the width using the scale tool. I then added a separate cylinder and extruded the face outwards whilst adding a slight curve. Using the combine tool I combined both parts and attached them to the car body. I then made the tow bar which is situated in the middle at the back of the car. For this process I used 3 separate rectangular primitives and combined the meshes together.

The next development was to create my set of wheels. I did this by creating a cylinder and extruded the face outwards. I then highlighted both edges of the wheel and bevelled them. This created a smoother edge and gave the cylinder characteristics of a wheel. I then added 2 mud flaps to the back wheels; these were created from a simple rectangular plane and then extruded.

Finally for some extra detail I modelled a tyre bracket at the back of the car. This is because usually military vehicles that off-road have a spare tyre just in case something goes wrong.  I simply found an image of a tyre bracket and copied the basic shape. Once did was done I could now start on modelling a diorama/environment to showcase my vehicle in.

Week 4

It was within week 4 that I had occurred a problem within my model, I was advised to start again as trying to manually fix the error would take me some time and also I would have lost crucial detail within my model.

I then discovered it would be more time efficient to model from a side view perspective plane and then extrude half way across the width of the military vehicle, lastly mirror the geometry of the object and connect the two separate objects together using the merge vertices tool.

Whilst creating the side plane panel I decided to add the necessary detail as I go along as this would also save me time and considering that I had to make up for lost time this seemed the best option. These details included door windows and bevelled edges to add that extra curve. To help myself I decided split the side panel into 3 parts, the front bumper, front and back doors and the rear bumper. This was so I could help myself later when it came to unwrapping the model.

Once this was completed I switched views from side to top and by using the mirror geometry tool, I created I mirrored duplicate of the original side panel. All I then needed to do was combine the 2 separate objects together and merge the vertices together.