Peter Schutze
SOC-12
holy crap I need to learn that many programs ?!!!
I was thinking I could make simple 2D stuff like logo's etc in something like coreldraw which Im used to using to create bits and pieces for my blender models
Helping people make 3d ships for traveller
- Thread starter iron warrior
- Start date
holy crap I need to learn that many programs ?!!!
I was thinking I could make simple 2D stuff like logo's etc in something like coreldraw which Im used to using to create bits and pieces for my blender models
Space Hamster
SOC-12
I use the following.
LightWave
Poser
Photoshop
Sonar (this is a sound package from CakeWalk)
I have Profantasy’s Fractal Terrains and they just received an update for the Terraformer package that is supposed to help make textures for planets but have not had the time to check it out yet. The few images I had seen of the renders looked quite good.
You pretty much need a modeler and a paint package. The paint package is to create your textures that you map to your models with the UV maps. You need a renderer in order to make the stills or animations.
Poser is a tool that is primarily used to animate characters. I have a plug-in that allows me to import animations from Poser into LightWave and have the lights and cameras work with the Poser animations. To give you an idea why people like Poser is that when people post stills on the big CG boards using Poser models the other people treat them like they are cheating.
The free rout is to get Blender and Gimp.
I am 11 PDFs in on the Serenity Tutorial. 26 more to go. :devil: I am getting much faster with LightWave.
LightWave
Poser
Photoshop
Sonar (this is a sound package from CakeWalk)
I have Profantasy’s Fractal Terrains and they just received an update for the Terraformer package that is supposed to help make textures for planets but have not had the time to check it out yet. The few images I had seen of the renders looked quite good.
You pretty much need a modeler and a paint package. The paint package is to create your textures that you map to your models with the UV maps. You need a renderer in order to make the stills or animations.
Poser is a tool that is primarily used to animate characters. I have a plug-in that allows me to import animations from Poser into LightWave and have the lights and cameras work with the Poser animations. To give you an idea why people like Poser is that when people post stills on the big CG boards using Poser models the other people treat them like they are cheating.
The free rout is to get Blender and Gimp.
I am 11 PDFs in on the Serenity Tutorial. 26 more to go. :devil: I am getting much faster with LightWave.
Andrew Boulton
The Adminator
That's all you need.
Peter Schutze
SOC-12
thats all I need ?
How about a blender step by step tutorial that I can get past the 2nd command on ? seriously, I've been starting to think I'm mentally deficient trying to follow anything related to blender . none of the menu's or options seemed to be where they were saying or anything like that.
I tried to do the yellow submarine tutorial and got the greyed "album cover" background into the program (the first bit of the first tutorial) totally by accident on the 5th attempt (not following their instructions) and was totally stuffed at that point because I was supposed to fiddle with all these other options on those menu's I hadnt been able to find
So I decided to try google sketchup since google has a reputation for being usable by idiots {waving hand frantically to be included} .... watched several of their tutorials and managed to recreate what I'd seen .... thank god for the undo command !
Now I need to learn to make something not consisting entirely of straight lines. Im hoping to get something almost zeppelin shaped done with only another day or so of practice. having spent 5 hours today just on the sketchup tutorials I'm really amazed that the learning curve could really be this steep
How about a blender step by step tutorial that I can get past the 2nd command on ? seriously, I've been starting to think I'm mentally deficient trying to follow anything related to blender . none of the menu's or options seemed to be where they were saying or anything like that.
I tried to do the yellow submarine tutorial and got the greyed "album cover" background into the program (the first bit of the first tutorial) totally by accident on the 5th attempt (not following their instructions) and was totally stuffed at that point because I was supposed to fiddle with all these other options on those menu's I hadnt been able to find
So I decided to try google sketchup since google has a reputation for being usable by idiots {waving hand frantically to be included} .... watched several of their tutorials and managed to recreate what I'd seen .... thank god for the undo command !
Now I need to learn to make something not consisting entirely of straight lines. Im hoping to get something almost zeppelin shaped done with only another day or so of practice. having spent 5 hours today just on the sketchup tutorials I'm really amazed that the learning curve could really be this steep
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Peter, it sounds to me like you really need to get your head around the absolute basics first and so I think Blender might be a little 'in at the deep end.' You need a simple package with a relatively simple interface. Shonner is probably the best to advise on this as he appears to have used every 3D package ever - but I'd recommend Sketchup or Wings 3D - maybe even DAZ (if it's free) to start and do some simple modelling. Don't try and build a super-detailed starship to start. Try something simpler. Even just abstract shapes, just to get used to the tools. Create a sphere or a box and find out how to edit and distort it etc.
Don't worry about a paint package yet, either. You use that for creating textures and surface maps (like normals and specular etc) and that'll come later once you've got the modelling sorted.
In recent years I've taken to painting instead of 3D. A single decent cgi image requires hours and hours of work. Modelling is the easy part - and the part I most enjoy. The real labour intensity comes with mapping and texturing surfaces. It's not enough to just slap on a 'hull panel' texture, it really needs to follow form logically and react to light convincingly (and that's where most renders fall down in my opinion) and that requires some complex shaders and a lot of thought.
After that's in place, then it's a case of lighting and again, it's not enough to just slap on an Ambient Occlusion pass and a main light with ray-traced shadows (and I'm as guilty of that as anyone else). Light has to behave properly and convincingly in order to sell an image.
After six months you have a reasonably good render that most folks will either simply say 'cool.' or nit-pick to death - making you wonder why you bothered.
Alternately I can have the same image painted in about six hours. There's no competition really.
That said, there's a nice, satisfying feeling in seeing a decent render, especially when all of the above come together properly.
Crow
Don't worry about a paint package yet, either. You use that for creating textures and surface maps (like normals and specular etc) and that'll come later once you've got the modelling sorted.
In recent years I've taken to painting instead of 3D. A single decent cgi image requires hours and hours of work. Modelling is the easy part - and the part I most enjoy. The real labour intensity comes with mapping and texturing surfaces. It's not enough to just slap on a 'hull panel' texture, it really needs to follow form logically and react to light convincingly (and that's where most renders fall down in my opinion) and that requires some complex shaders and a lot of thought.
After that's in place, then it's a case of lighting and again, it's not enough to just slap on an Ambient Occlusion pass and a main light with ray-traced shadows (and I'm as guilty of that as anyone else). Light has to behave properly and convincingly in order to sell an image.
After six months you have a reasonably good render that most folks will either simply say 'cool.' or nit-pick to death - making you wonder why you bothered.
Alternately I can have the same image painted in about six hours. There's no competition really.
That said, there's a nice, satisfying feeling in seeing a decent render, especially when all of the above come together properly.
Crow
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Space Hamster
SOC-12
I think you will find most 3D software having a steep learning curve. The amount of work that goes into it is extreme. The reason I recommended Blender is that it is free and will give you a taste of modeling. It also has a large community that you can ask questions to get help. Some of their help is in these locations.
This page has links to sites with Blender communites.
http://www.blender.org/community/user-community/
YouTube has a bunch of starting tutorials.
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_type=&search_query=blender+tutorial&aq=0
The Blender site has tutorials.
http://www.blender.org/education-help/tutorials/
While many people will say the software they are working with is easy, I bet they used a few obscenities while they worked with it when they started out. :devil:
Campaign Cartographer is a 2D map making software that makes very nice maps. Even it has a steep learning curve.
Once you learn it then it is not so bad. If you choose the modeling path then you can look into payware. Most payware has a free trial that is time limited. If you think about doing it you will want to plan out the tutorials before so you can maximize the limited time in the trial.
This page has links to sites with Blender communites.
http://www.blender.org/community/user-community/
YouTube has a bunch of starting tutorials.
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_type=&search_query=blender+tutorial&aq=0
The Blender site has tutorials.
http://www.blender.org/education-help/tutorials/
While many people will say the software they are working with is easy, I bet they used a few obscenities while they worked with it when they started out. :devil:
Campaign Cartographer is a 2D map making software that makes very nice maps. Even it has a steep learning curve.
Once you learn it then it is not so bad. If you choose the modeling path then you can look into payware. Most payware has a free trial that is time limited. If you think about doing it you will want to plan out the tutorials before so you can maximize the limited time in the trial.
Andrew Boulton
The Adminator
I only tried Blender once, but it did seem hard to use, so it's not just you!
Like Scarecrow said, the best way to start is just simple shapes - boxes and spheres. Learning 3d is kind of like getting rich - when you first start out, you don't know the rules of the game, so you stumble and screw up a lot. Eventually you reach 'the tipping point' where your knowledge grows to the point one concept leads to another, and more knowledge comes easier. Getting to that tipping point is the hard part.
That said, I've spent the better part of 10 years on and off tinkering with various software packages, and not all are equal. The interface is usually the big stumbling block for me - that's what drove me away from blender a while back. I did most of my basic learning in Truespace, which has a pretty wonky interface of it's own, although it flows pretty well once you understand it. Experiment with what's out there for free, and see what fits your understanding.
That said, I've spent the better part of 10 years on and off tinkering with various software packages, and not all are equal. The interface is usually the big stumbling block for me - that's what drove me away from blender a while back. I did most of my basic learning in Truespace, which has a pretty wonky interface of it's own, although it flows pretty well once you understand it. Experiment with what's out there for free, and see what fits your understanding.
Peter Schutze
SOC-12
>The Blender site has tutorials.
I was trying to follow their step by step series where you can download a pdf with screenshots
since I was using the raw install without any user preferences tweaks etc nothing worked like the pdf said except "open blender and delete default object"
Im going to persist with sketchup for a while
I was trying to follow their step by step series where you can download a pdf with screenshots
since I was using the raw install without any user preferences tweaks etc nothing worked like the pdf said except "open blender and delete default object"
Im going to persist with sketchup for a while
Peter Schutze
SOC-12
I figured out how to make my basic zeppelin shape in google sketchup .... simple once I ignored what I had learnt in the tutorials and went with my instincts .... all i really needed to know in the end was the scaling function and that it works on edges just like the old "anim8or" 3D program I learnt years ago
that learning hurdle out of the way, hopefully sometime soon I'll be able to start posting worth looking at images of traveller stuff here
that learning hurdle out of the way, hopefully sometime soon I'll be able to start posting worth looking at images of traveller stuff here
Peter Schutze
SOC-12
>Excellent. I look forward to seeing what you produce
finished my first model .... the "Metal" freighter from 2300AD which is pretty clean lined in the sketch
havent gotten to the texturing etc lessons so the colors are pretty basic
starting on the thorez courier also from 2300 since its got some interesting overlapping compound shapes I'm keen to learn
I'll edit a link in here once I get them into the art gallery
finished my first model .... the "Metal" freighter from 2300AD which is pretty clean lined in the sketch
havent gotten to the texturing etc lessons so the colors are pretty basic
starting on the thorez courier also from 2300 since its got some interesting overlapping compound shapes I'm keen to learn
I'll edit a link in here once I get them into the art gallery
Peter Schutze
SOC-12
Anyone know how to use google sketchup ?
Specifically how do I add textures other than the standard materials (which Ive done) eg a company logo or scorch marks to my models ?
Specifically how do I add textures other than the standard materials (which Ive done) eg a company logo or scorch marks to my models ?
Space Hamster
SOC-12
I do not know anything about google sketchup but I did see this in Bing.
Check the second post.
http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=663801
Hope it helps.
1: get them into PNG's.
2: copy the face you're placing it upon off to the side.
3: import the PNG, placing it on the copy of the face.
4: Trim the excess
5: move it onto the original face.
