Week 5 - Continuing the Y-Wing

With the deadline approaching, I must continue work on my Y-Wing model and start the third model. The basic shape of the Y-Wing is done , but there are a number of details that need adding. The first is the turbine/exhaust at the back of each engine; these are made from a single cylinder, tapered at one end.

Fig.1: The turbines at the rear of the engines

Continuing with the engines, I add the four rods that connect the disc vectrals and steering plates to each turbine. First of all, I created two cuboids and positioned them within the engines so that small portions of them stuck out in an X-shape. These allowed me to accurately position the actual trailing rods, using the align tool; the X-shape guides were then deleted.

Fig.2: The X-shaped guides within the turbines

Fig.3: The actual connecting rods, having been positioned (the X-shaped guides have now been deleted)

The disc vectral is made of a thin polygon pipe. Both it and the steering plates inside it have been tapered to be narrower at the rear.

Fig.4: The assembly at the rear of the ship's engines (there is an identical one on the other engine but only one is shown here so that the details are visible).

Next is the cockpit. The upper canopy must be added, as well as an assembly at the bottom that helps connect the cockpit to the main body of the ship. As with the lower part of the cockpit, the upper canopy will be crafted from a single block, but split into four parts rather than six.

Fig.5: The top of the upper canopy, having been sculpted into shape; the top still needs to be made narrower than the bottom, however. The blue cuboid in the lower-left is a guide block, used to help re-size the subdivisions.

Fig.6: The side view of the upper canopy, having been sculpted into shape. The bottom contours should join up with the upper contours of the main cockpit.

Fig.7: The completed upper canopy of the cockpit, having been narrowed down at the top and moved into position.

Fig.8: The assembly under the cockpit, connecting it to the main body of the ship.

There are also some extra details to be added to the main body of the ship. Finally, there is a turret-mounted laser cannon on top of the cockpit canopy, and two separate laser cannons on the front.

Fig.9: The additional details added to the main chassis

Fig.10: The laser turret mounted to the top of the cockpit

Fig.11: The laser cannons mounted to the front of the cockpit

The Y-Wing, like the TIE Phantom, is now essentially finished. It still needs to be textured, and there are perhaps other small details that can be added to it, but it is good enough for now. I will now set about choosing and modelling my third and final ship, before producing my moodboard and storyboard.

Week 4 - Y-Wing

Initially, I intended for my second model to be an X-Wing, however I was unable to find suitable blueprints for it, so instead my second model will be a Y-Wing. This model is slightly more complex than the TIE Phantom, but should not be overly difficult to model.

The starting point for the Y-Wing is in fact easier: the basic chassis can be constructed from three cuboids. The first, central cuboid forms the main body, the second cuboid extends to the sides to connect the wings, and the third extends forwards to connect the cockpit.

Fig.1: The basic body of the Y-Wing. Additional detail will be added later.

The engines are a complex construct, but their basic shape is a cylinder with stretched hemispherical front. As with the TIE Phantom's wings, the engines are duplicated and moved into place; the model is centered on the X axis to make this easier.

Fig.2: The Y-Wing with the engines attached.

From this point onwards, modelling the Y-Wing becomes far more complex. The next stage is the cockpit, which has two separate parts; the main body and a raised upper canopy. I will attempt to model the main body using a single cube split into six sections, as shown in the annotated diagram in Fig.3 (I find using this modular topology much more useful than importing image planes into Maya).

Fig.3: The top view of the Y-Wing with various shapes drawn on it to help me scale each section. The cockpit is to the right, with six parallelograms drawn onto it.

Fig.4: The cube having been milled into the cockpit shape shown in Fig.3. The blue box in the bottom-right was used to help align the subdivisions and then to move the edges inwards.

Fig.5: The finished cockpit body, roughly positioned on the main body.

The basic shape of the Y-Wing is now complete. Next week I will add the finishing details and move on to my third and final model.

Week 3 Pt.2 - Phantom Wings

In comparison to the rest of the model that I have created so far, the TIE Phantom's wings are far more complex and detailed: therefore, I am writing a separate blog post to detail their creation. Fortunately, I only have to craft one; I can then group the components and duplicate the group to create the other two.

First, I created the base that the wing is mounted onto. This is made up of three cubes and a cylinder. To make it easier to create, I used the "Live Surface" function, allowing me to draw each object directly on top of the previous one (see the Week 1 post). The rear of the base is sloped slightly; rather than using the Boolean - Difference tool, I simply moved the vertices of the cubes and rotated the rear face of the cylinder to create the desired slope.

Fig.1: A close-up of the wing mount from the front, showing the shapes that comprise it

Fig.2: A close-up of the wing mount from the side, showing the sloped back (note: the top part of the wing mount has a harsher slope, equal to the slope at the back of the wing; this will be done once the wing has been added)

The wing itself was constructed from a single cube, with the bottom edges stretched to create its uneven trapezoidal shape. To provide additional detail, it has been framed with slightly thicker edges, also constructed from cubes (these are highlighted in Fig.3 for clarity).

Fig.3: The assembled wing, with extra details highlighted. If you look closely, you will see the top of the wing mount, which was not sloped in Fig.2, is now sloped at the rear.

Even now, the wing is not complete: there is a laser cannon mounted beneath the wing tip. The edge jutting out of the front of the wing provides a good guideline for positioning the wing-mounted laser, hence why it was not tapered off.

The main barrel is made from two cylinders, with the second, shorter one being tapered off slightly. Moving this second cylinder once it had been tapered with the Flare tool led to it being warped noticeably; to correct this I had to move the Flare handle in tandem with the object itself, preserving its original form. Beneath the barrel is a second, thinner cylinder secured to the wing with three hexagonal prisms of varying thickness: I created one such prism, then duplicated and scaled it to make the other two.

Fig.4: The gun barrel on the end of the wing. Notice how the edges of the wing have been tapered off compared to Fig.3

There are two additional laser barrels mounted to the chassis, just below the cockpit. These have a slightly different shape, as seen in Fig.5. Again, one was created, then duplicated to create the second. It is possible that I could have crafted each barrel out of a single cylinder by subdividing it, but I find it easier and more precise to use multiple cylinders.

Fig.5: The underside of the ship, with the twin guns highlighted

With these added, the last major detail left is to add the remaining two wings. First, the components of the existing wing are grouped to create a single, moveable object. This object is then duplicated and moved into position on each side of the craft.

Fig.6: The wing as a single group

Fig.7: The "finished" model, with all three wings

The TIE Phantom model is now more or less finished. It still requires colouring and/or texturing, and there are also several minor details that could be added, but for now I need to prioritize working on the other two models. Starting with my next blog post, I will be detailing my work on those models.

Week 3 - Phantom Cockpit

Having created the base of the TIE Phantom model, I now started constructing the cockpit. This is made simply from three stacked cylinders, with the outer two tapered into frusta. While I could have created these frusta by using the Boolean - Difference tool to cut the top from a cone, I used two different approaches. For the first, larger frustum, I experimented with using the Flare tool, which allowed me to linearly taper down the end of the cylinder.

Fig.1: The first two cylinders comprising the cockpit. You can see how the second has been tapered with the Flare tool (the Flare tool window is shown in the bottom-right for clarity).

I found the Flare tool to be too imprecise to create the second, smaller frustum, as it works within a certain area rather than on the shape itself. To create this second frustum, I instead simply selected the outer edge by double-clicking then scaled it down, using a fourth cylinder (which was later deleted) as a guide. This approach is even easier than the Flare tool and is probably the one I will use in the future.

Fig.2: The third cylinder at the end of the cockpit. The outer edge has been selected and scaled down. 

Week 2 - Start of Assignment

This week I began work on my assignment. I must create three spaceship models, based on Star Wars craft, and then storyboard and animate a 30-second animation featuring them. The first six weeks will be focused on creating the models and storyboard, and during the following six weeks I will produce the animation itself.

The first spaceship model I have decided to create is the TIE Phantom, as it appears to be a simple enough model to create. Its basic main body can be created by intersecting two hexagonal prisms, one regular and one irregular, and its cockpit can be created using two truncated cones. It will, of course, require more detail than this, but the basics are easy enough.

I started by obtaining various reference images of the Phantom, including front, side and top views (see Fig.1). I sketched over these views in PowerPoint to help me gauge the scale of the basic objects that would comprise the model (see Fig.2).

Fig.1: The reference image I used to create the model...

Fig.2: ...and an annotated version of the image, showing how I can construct various sections using basic shapes.

Having drawn these basic guidelines, I was able to start work on the model itself. Fig.3 shows the basic chassis, constructed from a hexagonal prism (the light grey structure in the centre of the model in Fig.1) and a triangular prism (as seen in Fig.2).

Fig.3

Producing the irregular hexagonal prism was difficult, but I achieved it by constructing three smaller triangular prisms, aligning them with the corners using the Align tool, then using the Boolean - Difference tool to subtract them from the larger one. It could alternately be done by carefully stretching the vertices of a hexagonal prism.

Initially, my chosen method did not work perfectly, as an overlapping face would be left behind (see Fig.4) and proved impossible to remove. I solved this simply by moving the smaller prism a minute distance so that it completely overlapped and removed the offending face. The finished chassis base can be seen in Fig.5: you may also notice that I have translated the model upwards slightly so it no longer intersects with the grid, making it easier to see.

Fig.4: The face left behind after subtraction

Fig.5: The finished chassis base

Another difficulty worth noting is that copying and pasting an object within Maya will automatically place the pasted object within a new group. This makes it difficult to manage objects, and if you repeatedly copy-paste a single object you will end up with several groups-within-groups, which is inefficient and impractical. Instead, using Duplicate (shortcut Ctrl-D) will produce a perfect clone of the object, just like copy-pasting it, but without placing it in a new group, making it easier to manage one's objects.

Week 1

In my first week, I concentrated on learning the basics of Maya, and practicing the techniques that I will use to create the 3D models for my animation.

I started by making a simple steering wheel, as one would find on a ship. First, I created a short cylinder to act as the centre of the wheel. By changing its Subdivisions Axis (the number of sides the cylinder has) to 6, I turned the cylinder into a hexagonal prism (see Fig.1). By setting the resulting prism as a Live Surface, new polygons would automatically snap to its surface rather than snapping to the grid, allowing me to position the spokes of the wheel much easier.

Fig.1

With the addition of the thin torus round the outside, I had created a simple steering wheel. The central cylinder's subdivisions were then increased to restore its cylindrical appearance and enhance the wheel's level of detail (see Fig.2). The outer torus' subdivisions could also be increased, but this would also increase the model's polygon count, which may impact game performance, so for the time being this will be left alone.

Fig.2

The next model I worked on was a house. Unlike the steering wheel, the house was created by manipulating a single 100x50x25 box, and so despite being fairly simple, its creation required more advanced techniques. First of all, by hovering over an object and holding down the right mouse button, the sub-selection menu is brought up (see Fig.3), which allows me to select either individual faces, edges or vertices of that object, or the object as a whole.

Fig.3

Using this menu, I could select and manipulate individual faces of the house. Fig.4 shows how the front of the house was subdivided into three vertical sections, with the outer two then "extruded" (pulled forwards) to create an extension. Fig.5 shows how the right-hand face was further subdivided and extruded in order to create windows. One window has been left unfinished in order to better show the subdivisions used to create the window frame.

Fig.4

Fig.5

Fig.6 is an aerial view of the house, showing how various points on its surface were connected to create additional edges. The highlighted edges were then dragged upwards to create the sloped roof of the house.

Fig.6