Brad's Dai X work in progress

[felice]

Cool 8)

[AndyThomas]

That's spot on, that is! It really doesn't matter about the internals because we've managed to justify how the fist could be housed inside the forearm. Well done that man... I don't think the sequence needs to be particularly fast because BrainCom is the last to dock, so the fists can be sorting themselves out while BrainCom is coming in...

[CondorJoe]

he's done it again. nailed it right on the head. Good work team.

[Bradster]

Well, now that the mesh is complete (or at least *mostly* complete) I'm moving on to create custom textures for everything. This can sometimes be just as grueling work as creating the mesh itself; so, don't expect a finished product overnight. Manually creating textures isn't always necessary, but it adds a great deal of realism to the model's surface. It can really make a world of difference. For example, have a look at Dai-X's chest armor before texturing (top) and after (bottom):and the texture from another angle:Sadly, the JPEG format really doesn't do justice to these shots. Even at the highest quality and lowest compression, JPEG chews up anything in the red end of the spectrum. Ah well, I'm sure you get the idea.(Edited by Bradster at 6:22 am on Nov. 7, 2002)

[Matt Darcy]

Brad - stunning work of the highest quality.I want to get the software you use to have a play with this - it is genius results.Is it available on linux / solaris / windows or just Mac.

[Bradster]

Cinema 4D XL ships on a hybrid CD for both Window and Mac in the same box.Actually, there's a major update coming out in the next couple of weeks that looks very nice, including a number of features I've been wanting for ages, but it carries a US&#36495 upgrade price. Suffice it to say I'll be keeping my current version for a while...The regular retail price starts at US&#36595 for the standard package to US&#361695 for the XL package and US&#362495 for the studio bundle. The student price (at which I originally got C4D) is US&#36295, but this does not include the additional tools from the XL or studio packages.Though, before you go off and invest a large chunk of cash into 3D software, you should remember the old axiom that an artist's tools don't create the art. The artist does. If someone gives you a chisel and a large rock, can you recreate David?;)Don't think I'm discouraging you! No, no. Even my own 3D work here is piffle compared to what the professionals and trained artists can create. I just mean to say that it takes many long hours to get these to look right. The software alone doesn't do all the work (though, that would be convenient!). If you browse the different software titles you will see that they can all produce stunning results. The biggest differences between titles are the interface layouts and the "extras" included, such as particle engines or fractal texture generators or dynamics systems.Before investing in a 3D package like Cinema 4D, I would strongly recommend trying out some of the free 3D titles to get some practice and a feel for manipulating basic primitives in space. Here are a few of them:Blender is a fairly new item that is also open sourced. That makes it very popular among the *nix crowd (available in binaries for Linux, IRIX, FreeBSD, and Solaris) but it is also available for Windows and Mac OS X (since OSX is built on FreeBSD). I tried using Blender once several months ago, but I couldn't get used to its unusual interface. It does look to be a fairly powerful program, though.The big daddy of 3D, Alias|Wavefront, recently made a free version available of the previously US&#3610,000 program Maya for Windows and Mac. The Maya Personal Learning Edition (aka. Maya PLE) is entirely free and supports saving and rendering. It includes the features of Maya Complete, but has a few restrictions. The biggest ones are missing SMP support, a maximum output of 1024x768, a custom file format that can't be used in other apps, and a subtle watermark rendered on all images.Rhino is a lesser-known software title, but it too can produce nice work. My roommate at university last year was a fan of Rhino and showed me a few meshes he had made. The evaluation copy you can download is fully featured; however, it will only save 25 times. One way I found of minimizing the number of times you have to save is to render to the screen (rather than to file) and then use Print Screen to take a snapshot. Then, rather than waste a save on your rendered image, save the snapshot you took. Sneaky, eh? Rhino is only available for Windows.There are probably other free 3D apps out there, but these are the only ones with which I have first hand experience. Aside from Cinema 4D, the other commercial 3D apps I have used include Lightwave, Infini-D, Carrara, Bryce, AutoCAD 2000, and 3D Studio. Though, I have worked primarily just with C4D for the past couple of years; so, I'd be glad to answer any questions I can about it.Cheers! (Edited by Bradster at 8:00 pm on Nov. 7, 2002)

[NC]

Hi Brad,Just wondering if you are going to make this mesh public domain when its finished, I'd love to have a play around with it, the same goes for the X BomberCheersNigel

[Bradster]

You know... I've given a lot of thought to that, Nigel. In a way I'd like to keep them private since they're my "babies" and also because I'm not exactly happy with the results in certain areas. On the other hand, I don't think that there'd be any harm in releasing them. After all, it's not like you guys are going to run off with them and use them for profit in a full motion picture....OR ARE YOU?!?!?!

[NC]

You have seen right though my plan to send them to Paramount so they can use them in the next series of Enterprise But more seriously no I would never dream of using or stealing anyone elses stuff, I don't like it when people do it to me so I'd never do it.I understand what you mean about them bing you're "babies" I had the same trouble with my Starbug model I couldn't bare the thought of someone else using it If you do decide to release them let me knowCheersNigel(Edited by NC at 12:20 am on Nov. 15, 2002)

[Bradster]

All jokes aside, yeah, I do plan to make them available for download when they're finished.