hey look, Mazer’s back! … again.
anyways, remember that ninja i made a while back? didn’t that just suck? (answer: yes, yes it did) well, i’m going to make another one, and it’s going to be damn cool. but i decided to start off making a katana, so here it is.
keep in mind it is a WIP, so i’ll keep tweaking things like the envmap and probably that ornamental thing i stuck at the end of the hilt. now how about some comments and suggestions before i stab you with the thing? 
Okay -
Ornamental thing - I don’t like crap wacking me in the elbow when I’m swinging around a 3-foot piece of sharpened steel.
Is the red at the top of the blade part of the envmap? It looks a little odd.
Also, it may be just the perspective (or, again, the envmap), but it seems that the blade gets wider towards the point, which would be wrong.
24 views (not counting when i posted and now when) and NO replies? damn, i hate this! :<
doesn’t anyone want to say something? if you tell me it sucks more ass than… than a vaccuum connected to an ass then you’re still helping! whether or not it sucks, i still want to know what you think.
Oooooo - I tried to slip my comment in just before you posted ON PURPOSE. Ha!
yeah, i’m probably gonna be changing that. it’ll likely be much smaller and maybe a different shape or something. i might even get rid of it altogether i only put it there because in most of the pictures of katanas i’ve seen they’ve had something hanging from the handle.
nope, i just added that so the blade is less boring, maybe that didn’t work out as well as i’d hoped 
must be the perspective/env map/combination of the two, the blade is the same width for just about the whole length, except for the very tip when it comes to a point.
thanks for the feedback harkyman!
:o you dirty sonufa--
here’s another pic, the same render but with edges on so you can see the width of the blade a little better. i’ll do some different angles later, as well as seeing what i can do about the red part of the blade to make it look better.
Mazer, having some actual training in constructing/mounting a Japanese sword (in Japan), I will be happy to offer my technical expertise and criticisms, but I can’t see the image while at work. I’ll look at it tonight from home, or you can email it to me at Karim AT karimnassar DOT com.
kick ass! thanks karim, that’s very nice of you, i’ll send you the pic
Nick Coutsos wrote:
> here’s the picture. i’ve looked at pictures of katanas on the internet
> for reference and added a few changes of my own to make this one
OK… not bad.
It does indeed at first blush look like the blade gets wider towards the
Kissaki, but I think that’s an optical illusion.
On general proportions, the blade should not be deeper (from edge to spine) than the hilt. In fact, the hilt ought to be deeper, as the tang is nearly as deep as the blade, and the hilt wraps around this.
You appear to have a Kashira (pommel) but I can’t see if you have a fuchi… which is a collar just below (to the hilt-side) of the handguard (tsuba). The Habaki (blade-side collar) looks good, but the Tsuba itself looks quite strange. Not wrong, per-se, since scabbard hardware varies dramatically by province, era, and school, but it looks more like a european crossguard than a Japanese tsuba.
The tsuka-ito (braid) is nicely done, but you appear to be missing the Menuki (ornamental crests wrapped against the hilt by the braid).
Also, the mekugi (pin), while a small detail, ought to be just visible, and I think will help the overall look.
Finally, the blade itself. This will really make the model stand out one way or another, so you really need to spend a lot of time on the textures. I would UV-map the blade, since there are very precise texture variations that need to be visible, especially along the Hamon (differential firing line). Also, the variations will have distinct effects on Specularity and Reflectivity, so you should spend a lot of time here.
If you are going for a traditional look, kill the red stripe… The natural color/texture/character of the steel is a source of pride to the swordsmith, and I’ve never heard of a dyed or painted Japanese blade.
The Jihada, or skin texture, of the steel itself should be pretty easy to do well using procedural shaders (probably Cloud & Stucci), but the Hamon will need to be image mapped, I think.
Finally, here is a starting point for very detailed information on the web:
http://www.geocities.com/alchemyst/glossary.htm
Hope this helps! Let me know if you have any more questions.
holy crappamoly. 
thanks alot karim, i’m gonna need some time to read through all of that. it seems i’ll be doing quite a bit over again.
EDIT: hmm… perhaps i should’ve pointed out somewhere that i was going more for stylistic than accuracy? 
ah well, maybe i’ll try both
Nice modelling mazer…
anything that’s asian always catches my attention… i have that weakness… :-? …
that’s a hell of a page for reference! THANK YOU!
I would put a little more work into the tsuba. On some swords it can be very ornate, sometimes it’s a dragon, sometimes a crane. Almost a wire frame type setup. What I mean, is there is often a certain ammount of empty space in it. Looks very cool I think. (oh and I must agree about the dangly thing.)
yeah, i was thinking about making a cooler tsuba, probably with a dragon design, but that didn’t work out very well, so right now it’s a fairly plain round tsuba. i’m likely to go back and UV texture some of it, and then i may paint a dragon design onto it.
as for the thing dangling on the end, are you saying i should get rid of it? i originally kept it there because i thought it kinda looked cool but i can definitely see how it’d be impractical. if i get rid of it though, i guess i’d get rid of the string it was hanging on too.
just a little update. changed the tsuba from that dumb diamond shape to a plain circle, got rid of the thing dangling from the back of the handle and got rid of the red stripe on the blade. still need to fix up the env map and i still have no idea how i’m going to do the ‘hamon’. ah well:
http://users.mnsi.net/~mdss/katana3.jpg
EDIT: forgot to mention, i also added the menuki and the mekugi (yeah, it’s in there.) on the handle.
Mazer… much nicer. It’s looking good.
I tried my own hand at it to see if I could build a good blade texture. I compared it to one of my real swords as I was making it, and I’m quite happy with the results.
The textures I used on the blade are:
a Cloud, a Stucci, a Marble, another Cloud, and finally, an Image map for the Hamon.
looks a little lost
Wow, I like the results alot, but still WAY over my head. 
Nice job on the swords. Wish I had one in real life that looked like that. lol
thanks alot. i wished i had a picture like you’re for reference while making mine. honestly, it took me hours to figure out how the mekugi is supposed to fit into the handle. every picture i had labelled the mekugi as a tiny area near the menuki, so i just figured the menuki was supposed to be covering it up.
i wish i could see the image map you used for the hamon, i’m really not sure how i should go about making my own.
actually, screw that, i wish i had a katana! 
(but really, do you think i could see the image you used? it’s not very easy to see it on the blade)
thanks again for the comments
Mazer… check your email.
The mekugi has to be exposed so that you can dismount the blade without tearing apart the hilt wrapping. One periodically breaks down the sword & mounting for cleaning, much like one does with a firearm. The mekugi is popped out with a special pin and the whols thing slides apart.
ah. well, that makes much more sense. thanks for clearing that up
anyways, a little update. i added the hamon on the blade, hope it looks better now. something weird i noticed: i have the OSA cranked up to 16… why am i getting jaggies on the top of the blade?
