Began learning Blender the past few months (Blender 2.56). I decided to tinker with shapes, I came up with an idea for making trees. Basically, it involves making a trunk by scaling a cone along the Z axis, then duplicating the trunk multiple times to make the branches. Crude, but a good way to learn some of the keys and controls in Blender.
Of course, both my mother and youngest brother think the trees I’ve been making look like thorns. Of course, I’m just a beginner, so I’m still ‘learning the ropes.’ :o
hard to give any CC without a wireframe and or a AO render. but in all honesty, from what i can tell, it looks better than my first attempts of modeling more than just a sphere.
Well, it’s a start Kam. After all, this is one of my first models. I admit it isn’t the best model, but I am trying. Besides, it gives me a creative outlet. I usually like to think things over and try to figure out how things work, or figure out a good way to do things. Not only does it help my creativity, it gives me a chance to use my analytical skills. It took some patience, but I did learn from it. I probably can come up with other ways to make it better.
No i definately understand I was attempting to complement your work… I know it isn’t easy. all i am saying is in order to get help, we need to see what exactly youve done in terms of how you modeled it.
I’ll see what I can do Kam. I’m just wondering how to upload the mesh or wireframe. And I do realize you meant that as a compliment. Thank you. I guess I’m just not used to getting compliments from people.
Yea =\ but remember! This is an Anti-Troll zone. This site is here to help people / show off work. Not to bash people without providing help. so let us help ya! hehe
It’s probabbly not the “proper” way of creating a wireframe pic, but i usually just take a screen of the shaded model, then without moving the camera, switch to wireframe and take another screenshot, and blend them in photoshop to look like the wireframe is on a solid model.
I do realize that. And I knew there was something else I needed to do to the tree. Rounding it sounds about right. As for using the cones, I thought that would be the easiest way to do it - at least that I know of so far. Can’t learn anything if you don’t make a few mistakes though.
Too bad I don’t have Photoshop. I’ve heard of GIMP. Would that work too?
As for posting this, I’m hoping someone else could learn from my ideas - and possibly run with it. Someone else might also have ideas on how to improve this model.
To make your tree more organic looking and to add a bit of randomness , select the edges of the cone and use the knife tool hold down the K key in blender 2.57 to cut in extra edges or ctrl R for extra edge loops once you have quads. select the edge loop and move it with edge slide ctrl + E add some scale rotations etc and very soon your thorns will look like branches and then you could add some leaves if its spring
@bigboy4006,
the way i take pictures of wireframe is by taking a screenshot when in solid edit mode (you have a printscreen button built into your keyboard so no software required) and then open up paint/gimp and past the image in there. then you can crop out the part that you dont want…and walah! you have a wireframe! hope that works!
I think it was a creative approach, and that’s great. I recommend taking a look at real trees, and then practice extruding branches that look fairly realistic. Here’s a low poly tree of mine. It’s intended to be an ancient oak for my medieval themed game. Good luck.
You guys are giving me a lot of food for thought!!! I’ll have to try some of the examples given on how to take a screenshot of the wireframe. And as for polys, I’m hoping to start working on custom meshes in the future. I’ve already done some sculpting in Blender, which I’m sure could help with making the trees in Blender.
I just discovered a Java-based program called Arbaro, and I just starting using that program. You can use it generate trees, which can be exported to Blender. It only seems slightly better than what I did, so I’m going to try some of the suggestions everyone has given here.
And as for the trolling - that definitely is something I don’t do. I hate having it done to me…
ngPlant, Gen3(for blender 2.4- I think), and arbaro tree generator might be a good place to start. Since you probably want make it yourself these are a good start for references and will give you a good idea about tree structure.
A tree was one of the first things I made in Blender as well. I thing I used ngPlant for trunk and branches, but Blenders particle system(since that was what I was really interested in) for needles, ornaments, and light. The species is Chinese plastic(its modeled after out Christmas tree). My Plastic Tree
If you insist on doing it by hand, you should try using bezier curves.
add a bezier curve, and in the edit buttons click on 3D, and click off ‘back’ and ‘front’
turn up the bevel depth and bevel resolution
make some extrusions, and form your branch or branch segment
select the control point at the base of the curve, and use alt-S to bring it to the desired thickness
select the control point at the end of your branch and use alt S to scale it way down so it’s very thin
select all of the control points, and hit W, and select ‘smooth radius’
repeat for additional branches / branch segments
(edit) then you can use the treefromcurves script on it to make it into a mesh tree with leaves and additional branchlings if you want
Well, as I mentioned I know about Arbaro. I’m already starting to use it. ngPlant I haven’t heard of yet. I know I’ve got a link to a website to generate trees, but they’re 2D PNG files. As for a screenshot, that’s something I haven’t done for a while, so I might be a bit rusty.
I decided to start with a tree because it would be a good way to start learning how to make complex objects in Blender. I’ve been working on Blender since February or March, and I’m learning a lot quicker than I expected. I guess I just needed to learn some of the controls first.
I have seen bezier curves mentioned on YouTube tutorials for Blender Modron. I have yet to get to them yet, but I’m sure I will. I’m wanting to learn everything I can on how to model in Blender - and I’m loving every minute of it! But considering I’m the curious type, I’m going to probably get to it eventually. There’s a lot of neat stuff to learn about this program.
I found some software to capture a screenshot of the wireframe for the tree I made. I slightly altered it after the above rendering was done, so the branches might be slightly flat.
I’ll try to add screenshots of my wireframes from now on.:o
I was attempting to complement your work… I know it isn’t easy. all i am saying is in order to get help, we need to see what exactly youve done in terms of how you modeled it.
