I haven’t done much with blender in quite some time… lack of inspiration I guess.
Yesterday however I got an idea, not very spectacular, but idea nevertheless: I’ll model a chessboard as it’s relatively easy to model…
Here’s the progress so far:
and a larger (1000x800 px, ~477kb) in here: http://koti.mbnet.fi/jllgnome/kuvat/shakki_iso.jpg
comments are more than welcome… the material on the black and white tiles isn’t yet ready, but it’s almost the thing I want
Nice detail and choice of colours. Can’t wait to see some chess pieces.
the wood texture is -very- nice, image or procedual texture? :o
Keep it up 
I agree on the wood. Very, very nice!
The marbled squares can use some work though. THey are way too specular IMO. You could also add a SPEC colour to that instead of the white that is there.
BgDM
about pieces: I’ll propably end up just doing classical chess pieces with some decorations
wood texture: it’s an image I found somewhere in the net, but I can’t remember from where… it most likely came with some zipped package. I uploaded it to my site, in case you’re interested:
http://koti.mbnet.fi/jllgnome/kuvat/wood01.jpg
marbele squares: yeah, I’m not all that happy with the texture either… it’s just Blender procedurals, but I’m planning to make some imagemaps with PS.
Thanks for the supporting comments
Thx - now i have it in my texture library 
Simple, but done very well. The render looks very clean and clear, great job!!! 
Matt
Blend on, and blend well!!!
Cool
There is a general interest in chessboards lately… good modeling job, you beveled each tile
Like the colouring scheme too.
You might want to add pieces…
Stefano
Why ofcourse 
Not only tiles, btw…
here’s a detail of the wooden border:
I haven’t used any bumpmaps, exept for using “Nor” button on the wood texture to give it some character 
Now I’m thinking of redoing the tiles, to make them more decorated…
well, you can imagine what my first reaction was…“not another f_cking chessboard!” but this is amazing!!
Great work! Good bevelled tiles and lighting effects. The textures are great too. I’d love to see some chess pieces as well!
Number one, thank you for getting the correct amount of squares. You’d be surprised as you look at chess boards across the web how many people can’t count. (Which may just be why I haven’t tried one yet.) 
Number two, wow!
Number three, I did take advantage of your generous offer and added the wood texture to my collection. I have just the place for it on a piece I’m working on.
Number four, wow!
And finally number five, wow!
Elsdon
Hahaa!
Yeah, I’ve seen some funky looking chessboards with 6x6 tiles and one with 10 x 10 tiles that had the starting setting of the pieces. I don’t remember what was the additional pieces, but IIRC they might have been additional King and Queen
Number three, I did take advantage of your generous offer and added the wood texture to my collection. I have just the place for it on a piece I’m working on.
Aaa! Don’t thank me, thank the dude who’s site I find that
and for what comes to numbers 2, 4 and 5: THANKS!!!
—EDIT—
I told that I’m not sure from where I found that wood texture, but it was in a .zip file, and I found the link to there from http://www.3dlinks.com 's “Free textures” section (http://www.3dlinks.com/textures_free.cfm)
