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.

Week 3

Now that I had my chosen vehicle I began to start modelling. I created box deleting faces I didn't need so I had a side, front, back and top view. I then added a blue print of the vehicle so I could use as a reference to model from.  The next step was for me to create a block out of my vehicle using simple primitives like cubes and cylinders.  This was going to be my starting point and I was going to add more detail as I go along. 

As you can see I have now started to build the basic shape of the vehicle, however I still need to finish the top half as well as adding in all of the detail like side mirrors, groves and curves within the body of the car and windows. 

Week 2

Now that I had bought my camera is was able to go around town and take some pictures for my texture library. I took some interesting shot from church doors to marble slabs. In the same week I also went on a University trip to visit tanks and other military vehicles on a farm site. It was here that I managed to gather a reasonable amount of reference images for me to choose and model a vehicle from.  

After looking through my pictures I decided to model the Land Rover Military Police vehicle as this was one of the vehicles that I took more pictures of and simply because of the polygon restriction. I didn’t want to choose a more detailed vehicle and struggle in getting the main detail in within the 8,000 polygon limit. So I opted to go for a less detailed model but make sure that I can add as much detail as possible within the 8,000 polygon limit. I then started to gather more references in the form of blueprints and images of the vehicle. It was now time for me to start to model my chose vehicles.

Week 1

This was my first week and I had just got introduced into the module. I was advised to buy a camera as we will need to take reference and texture images, so I decided to go and buy a camera after the lesson had finished. I then started to gather images from around the house and halls.