I haven’t done much Blending for a while, but something unrelated that I’m working on right now would benefit from a purpose-built model so I looked up some reference views and started work.
Having started from a flat plane, extruded to make the basic shape, I find that I may have painted myself into a corner. There are details along the sides of the ship which I’m not sure how best to handle. Any suggestions will be considered. Thanx.
Nice mesh. Very clean.
I don’t think there’s any details on the side that you can’t put in with a couple of extra edgeloops and some extrusion (Extruded quads are insanely useful). Mostly more extrusion - You probably want to start by making the base of the hull wider than the decks above by a little – to achieve this, you may need to redo the geometry at the bow as well.
As fudje says,
its a nice shape you have at this point and all you really need to do is some extrusion and add some extra edges. However, the sloping mesh near the bow might prove problematic when you want to add the holes for the cannons (the vertical frames of ships are typically perpendicular to the keel). In case you didn’t know, you can use retopo to reorganize your mesh and to ‘glue’ extra details onto the hull.
/ Mats
Thanks for your help, guys. I hope I haven’t messed up too much so far (I keep history files every time I make a significant change just in case)
I am now thinking about how best to add a rail along the top of each deck:
I would recommend you model them separately and control J them to the mesh when you are happy. I would probably model and uv unwrap 1 rail post before duplicating it so that you wouldn’t have to unwrap them all separately.
The basic shape I like, so far, I just need to see more of it in order to form a real opinion.
Thanks everyone who has commented so far. I have been looking at some areas of the mesh that really need tidying up and fiddling with details for a bit.
Tamarin: I will try the method you suggest. That sounds like good sense.
This is probably going to sound pretty lame to experienced Blenderheads, but I am starting to feel like I can really do this!
It looks to me as though some of the normals are inverted. Is that right? is there a way to select the ones affected and correct them? (other than just Ctrl-N or W,0)
Your model is coming along quite nicely, although, one thing i have noticed about most of you blender heads is you all seem to rely on the Sub-Surf modifier to make or brake your model… I mean this in no offense.
but it seems you all seem to rough out the basic shape of the model, with no thought for edge loops, key masses and forms. This obviously doesn’t apply to all Blender users, for there are allot of amazing artist that achieve production quality models, and truly do understand the core concepts that make a 3D artist, an artist.
I don't mean to slag off Blender (I love Blender) it's an exceptional 3D Package, but rather i want to point out that more time should be spent focused on creating a solid model from start to finish, Than trying to make it look as smooth as possible as early on as possible.
Take, for example, your boat. It's a good model as it resembles the boat in the Refs, but it's not modeled so brilliantly. You'll notice that there are a number of waves running through the sides of your boat, as well as allot of the edges are not so well creased.
Without these key features, applying a Sub-surf modifier can make your model seem sloppy.
I would only use the sub-Surf feature when modeling an Organic model, such a Human, a creature, or an animal, etc etc. When modeling a hard surfaced model such as a boat, i would only apply a Sub-Surf at the end of the modeling purely for rendering, and only if my model could hold it's structural integrity after being smoothed.
I mean all of this at no offense to anyone.
Anyhow, your model is looking pretty good so far, and yes i know, you haven’t applied a modifier yet.
Sorry for ranting:o
Stea_Demon