who-y media projects

Hello I am posting on here because I recently started building a dalek in blender and am almost complete now thanks to tutorial thanks to someone called Stek on project dalek, however I started planning my next project, a 7 sided tardis thing, such a relief to be able to talk about fiction and stuff without a mod having a go, well suffice to say that while I love project dalek I’ve kind’ve out grown it but here’s where I am with my dalek:
dalek wip render 8.jpg
I will outline what I plan to do in more detail later but please help.

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Okay so you might have guessed that when I started this topic I wasn’t in the best of moods, I said some stuff, annoyed some mods and realised I needed to start using a different forum. I would just like to check though that, if I reference fictional workings whilst explaining the actual working, I won’t annoy the mods. Oh and whilst I will be using blender for the most part, I will probably have to model some stuff in other programs but I’ll keep that to a minimum.

Here’s what I’m planning, for a media assignment, I will have a dalek wondering a city when a shed materialises, from which a flying glass probe exits, upon seeing the dalek it goes back into the shed and the dalek follows. (the next bit is a tad unlikely but I’d like to do it if possible) we cut to the interior and it is seemingly a normal shed but the probe has gone so the dalek places it’s sucker on the back wall and (I don’t know how to show this) hacks into the computer core and then the ceiling and walls disappear to reveal a seven sided minimalistic, classic series type tardis that has 7 sided roundels mounted in a pattern on panel walls, after chasing the probe round the tardis console and accidentally materialising the shed in a different place, the dalek leaves.
I am working on the console controls as I already have a basic console made in anim8or.

Oh yeah, included are a lever switch and a button, or a tleast a render of each of them but if you’d like, I will upload separate blend files.

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Well I grabbed that basic console I made in anim8or and after aligning the pedestal and sorting out the colours, I made a 7 sided roundel by first adding a 7 sided circle with a radias of 5. Tabbed into edit mode and added a 7 sided circle with a radias of 4, added faces then a new circle with a radias of 3, placed it 2.5 units from the filled ring, added then extruded the back edge and merged it at the center. I then used duplifaces to create 3 columns of 6 rows in a 60X120 template. Next I boolean-differenced, then joined them to a 60X120X5 cube and after appropriate parenting I moved and scaled the panel into shot.
I will, of course, now begin piecing this thing together but I would like your help with creating the wooden exterior/interior

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As you can see I have added a floor and finished a side wall, my shed (that’s what this particular tardis is called) is really taking shape, I should be able to get the walls set up within a day, even without computerised duplication but I would appreciate tips on how to duplicate something on each side, I know there’s dupliverts and duplifaces so presumably there’s dupliedges.

I am though, I confess, floundering on the controls and have made no further progress in that respect, please give me ideas, diagrams, anything to help me make them.

Oh yes then of course there’s the time rotor and the question of how I’ll get that to rise and fall whilst cycling clockwise and counter-clockwise.

And that’s before addressing the problems created by the exterior.

Oh and I have to finish the dalek and start on the probe.

until next time C

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I had to take one step backward in my build by redoing the side.
This meant joining all of the panels and all of the roundels, this was complicated by parenting issues and meant the deletion of one panel and its roundels but after creating new centers for the panels and roundels I took 2 steps forward rather quickly, by not only easily creating the wanted panels and roundels in the right places but also finding space for the supporting pillars in my design and learning how to duplicate them easy (spin dup, degr: 360, dups 7, keep original). I also created a 3d mouse, so I think I’ll just make a keyboard then get started on screens and lights.

I’ll save the columns for my next post as I have a surprise for you.

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You can use this as a reference if you want the original version…

Download blend file here http://www.blenderwho.com/downloads/tardis/tardis.html

Richard

Thanks Richard, I spotted your work months ago when I first got into building daleks and I have recently downloaded that blend file but I can’t make anything of it at the moment. It’s rather like struggling to make a unicycle and being told to study a tank, by which I mean you’d love the opportunity but can’t fathom how.

Now I present you with 2 renders, one is of the basically finished interior of my interior tardis set (console needs column and general console gubbins, while the panel walls need a door each (with each door needing an appropriate texture i.e. a wooden door to fit with the exterior form) and an appropriate door mat (portion of interior floor from the other side of the door, don’t ask me why, I just think it adds another dimension to the design) then there’s the shed itself, (it’ll need a standard exterior and interior aswell as being able to hide the walls and ceiling so I can have the floor used as the door mat (As an exterior door, it would be stupid to provide a patch of exterior space inside the ship for health and safety reasons so, it is thus then fitted with the floor of the false interior and actual exterior instead of a standard doormat, this is one of the many reasons that owners choose to name their machines after, and keep their exteriors locked onto, a certain exterior setting, as it makes it so much easier to remember which door mat leads to the exterior. (sorry or the fiction, I am a writer after all lol))

And well I couldn’t resist producing a render of the exterior of the set

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I wasn’t sure whether I should post this but seeing as A. It’s a good wip render. B. A friend might be watching this thread. C. It’ll probably be the last piece of work I do on it to today. I decided to post this render up. As you can see I’ve now started work on the shed, it is made from 1X5x0.5 cuboid beams, currently no texturing has been applied but I feel that the un-precise and general low quality construction lends a hand made feel. I just have the roof to do and then I can start work on the door and floor. I am learning lots about lighting and stuff by accident, this render for example has been ray traced for better effect. I am getting there.

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for a texture, try this tutorial: http://www.blenderguru.com/introduction-to-texture-nodes/
it doesnt have to be specifically bricks, this tutorial is good for learning diffuse, pattern, spec, and normal bump maps. i’m sure it will come in handy. there is also the blender material repository: http://matrep.parastudios.de/

just google “blender material repository”

you should also learn how to use gimp: http://www.gimp.org/
or photoshop. it will help you a lot with textures in the future.

Will do thanks.

no prob just pm if you have any more questions.

another thing, for some good textures try cgtextures.com: http://www.cgtextures.com/

Okay it’s been a while since I updated this, well it it hasn’t but after days of filming has left me to knackered to make any progress it sure feels like it.

The roof is finally done and the purely shed part of the shed is as a whole but the door and floor still need to be done, however as they are simple small things I think I’ll take a break then continue my dalek because impressive as my set is, without a dalek to wander around in it it’s useless.

Oh and has anyone got an idea of how to model a holographic pop up desktop of space as I have reached the point in the build where the new ideas for switches have run out and I’m resorting to my old fan lit for ideas.

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Yes with a paraphrase of a famous doctor who quote as my title you can tell that one important element of my build is back, the dalek has now been fitted out with gun box detailing, a dome and a blast of lazer.
I would now like to clarify that I and project dalek are on good terms now so go find Stek’s tutorial, it’s great.
On other news my shed is finished bar texturing and a rudimentary test fit has been done to put the door and floor in the interior but I’m having trouble fitting it so I fear that I may have to make the door shall be a virtual decoration on the interior of the ship and have all actual door opening or closing sequences happen within the shed.

So there we go oh and the probe is what I’m working on next :smiley:

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Remember that lonely button, that singular handle and abysmal 3d mouse? Probably not, but they weren’t great so I tweaked them then added symbols to the handle and duplicated the button 40 times and parented it to a board, this gave me enough experience to create a block of 25 big red buttons and they are all arranged on one board in preparation for duplication and then there’s the 7 holographic desktops to make and consider not to mention the time rotor and the fact that the anim8or made console needs a complete overhaul.

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hay this is getting a little better. keep at it!

Thanks bojo600, glad someone still cares lol :smiley:
As you can see I’ve duplicated the console but I had to resort to rotating by eye and the closest I came to automation was by 'shift-s’ing the centre of each panel and that’s another thing I can point out. I gave my old dimensional console a good going over and I like it a lot now and am so pleased with this render as you can see the shadows of the keys.

I plan to next add the time rotor and holographic desktops but after that I think the room could do with some more furniture, notably sofas, then once my dalek is complete, he shall join the scene.
Oh and I have to get a wood texture for the shed at some point aswell.

I have to say that I feel as though I’ve learnt a lot already so I’m overjoyed plus I took the ‘blender for dummies’ book out from the library and it’s not due back till the 8th January so christmas should be fun.

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Well I just wanted to show off my rather fab, yet admittedly rather basic at the moment, console column or time rotor though to avoid confusion I have worked out that this is basically just a rather complex dashboard for a rather complex craft and am thus terming it the Dash, Dash board or Dash column. As you can see the actual read out area is only on view some of time (i.e. when in flight or maintenance) and when stowed its adornment of a septagonic pyramid (septagonic in cross section and in the base ala a triangular pyramid) really comes into its own as a decoration.

You may notice that I’ve titled this update “Back to my roots” and wonder why?
Well the answer is simple, whilst working on the probe I asked Stek (Writer of the rather excellent tutorial of how to build a dalek in blender that led me here) to help me and when I was stuck for a transparent look for my Dash I simply imported my probe and used it’s texture, which was of course made thanks to Stek’s advice so yay!

I am rapidly realising that I love modelling bhut I know from experience that I’m not too fond of animating so I’m thinking that when this is finished I’ll let you lot download it.

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oh yeah, a few crits: i think you should add some more texture, especially to the floor, and another thing, where is all this light coming from?

First things first: I added the interior glowing lights, I used the gun fire material from my dalek to create a halo around each vertex then tweaked them (gunfire material made thanks to Stek’s amazing help) there are 3 septagonic prizms with 42 vertices and thus halo effects each when I first tried to render you couldn’t see the halos but the Dash cover bit was fine so I tweaked the material trying to get the dash view area to be more transparent and it worked but screwed up the Dash cover and after resorting to making the Dash cover a separate object and reimporting the probe and about ten other fiddles if my latest render numbers are anything to go by, I still ended up with the same result. you can probably guess which renders which.

Now onto bojo600’s crits: Fictionally the light and lack of texture can both be summed up by it’s a spaceship but in terms of detailed answers, the shed is owned by a very lazy man and is thus self cleaning but I do plan to clutter it up with furniture and the light is supposed to be coming from the dome which can emit light.

However in reality both things can be summed up by my lack of knowledge or inclination and in terms of detailed answers, the texturing will come later and the light is probably caused by me using AO to achieve an easy and rather professional effect.

I suppose I could turn off AO then make the dome and roundels emit light to evenly cover the room.

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Well I played around with the lighting and materials this morning and have ended up with a good enough result I reckon but the controls can’t be seen and I’m a tad annoyed about that but I’ll have time to fiddle later. I have rendered the column in 3 positions, peak height whilst in flight, lowest height whilst in flight and finally docked. The docked render is actually my 42nd render, quite a milestone for me but it is only the beginning.

I plan to next add stairs to the upper walkway and create the 7 different holographic desktops and am currently thinking of having them rise and fall with the column.

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