Hi everyone!
So I recently set myself a goal - I’m gonna model a car FINALLY! :yes:
The chosen one is abovementioned Dodge Challenger 1971 and my goal is to make it quite detailed, make some nice shaders for it as well as render setup/s. So as you might have noticed - it’s for the sake of improvement in those areas - HS modeling, shading, texturing, lighting and rendering.
I start this thread for a couple of reasons:
self-motivation
learn a ton! or two
getting feedback along the way and hopefully some tips&tricks from you
have fun with y’all!
and I hope someday somebody migh find something useful here…
I got blueprints from HERE
And my reference photos from HERE
All will be done in Blender, though I may use Photoshop for small enhancements/color corrections on the final render.
I will do my best to post all updates (screenshots) as soon as I make them, along with the .blend files.
This is my first bigger project, so If I will suck at something (which I most definitely will), please bear with me, tell me, correct me, suggest changes!
PS: ANY suggestions, tips and tricks regarding to anything about this project are more than welcome!
It’s just a base shape, far from finished… I’ve been wondering how to actually model it, so those curved shapes would be as precise as possible - I hope I’m going the good way with it
Changed topology a bit (added trangles to simplify it - hopufully )
Feeling a bit lost though, to what extent should I polish things now? Creases vs loopcuts? Shoud I even use triangles?
Hi, you didn’t read much of the resources I linked for you on BlenderSE, did you The polycount site is also a directory for all other topology related material on the web, you should go through it all, it’s worth it. All the answers are there.
You picked very challenging model for starters, but I guess it’s ok because this car is beautiful and it will motivate you.
So about triangles: no. Unless you have really reaaaaally good reason for it and you have like 5ye+ worth of experience with hardsurface modelling, then you can place a triangle:) You can place a triangle(s) inside a perfectly flat surface anytime no problem though.
Creases in Blender are tricky. The amount they crease is also dependent on the subdivision level - the higher the subdivision the sharper the crease. So if you plan on rendering with higher subdiv or being able to change it without affecting shape I would go solely with loops. You will also learn more that way.
Thanks @Jerryno for your useful tips! To be honest, I did read a bit, but saved it into Pocket to read it later as I didn’t have much time then. Gut now I guess it’d be better to read them ahead
Those were great cars in their day, one of these days I have to tackle a car project. Just curious regarding the add on you linked, did it work OK with 2.75 official?
Having quads is important, but you should also watch the vertices with too many edges connected, for now it’s not too problematic, but it can cause bad shading, for example in the front I feel like that 5 edge vertice can be avoided
Then again the way you place the topology is pretty interesting so far!
I found using matcap (some reflective chrome-like one) is great for easily spotting problematic areas and unevenness which need to be smoothed! (and for spending hours correcting them…)
Shift+h (hide all but selection) is great for editing selected areas separately, especially when dealing with larger amount of vertices
I used a lot of edge/vert slide feature (press g 2 times), snap to edge and vertex feature. extremely helpful!
Well, here I am again!
After a couple of hours (but I’m getting more and more confident along the time) I managed to almost finish the hood and the base of the side!
top of the car hood reworked, as I had many issues with then-current topology
old:
Keep it up! I appreciate how you are taking your time to do it well, and for being willing to go back and rework an area multiple times. It will pay off in the end.
Thanks! Let’s hope so. I feel like learning more doing it
BTW, amazing Dodge you made!
I get your point, but IMHO (might be very well wrong ) this process is way too tedious and slow compared to the subtle output, that it is not quite worth it for me I guess
A looong time has passed, and sadly, this project has slowly become abandoned, as I moved doing entirely different things (front end web development namely).
But then, after some years, Aidy Burrows & Gleb Alexandrov released this:
which instantly rekindled my passion for 3D modeling
So here we go: I’m going to continue working on this project!
Yeah… that’s the spirit… I very well relate to the on and off blender routine… till I stumble on a very well topologised wireframe and off I run to click on that blender icon
The 
) this process is way too tedious and slow compared to the subtle output, that it is not quite worth it for me I guess 
