A week ago I was in a serious mood for some 3D modeling. I've been away from 3D modeling and serious graphics design for nearly 2-3 years since I finished college. So my goal was to learn the software (Maxon Cinema 4D Studio R12) my ma bought me back when I was at DigiPen, With the software as my medium I was ready to do a 3D model of my favorite gaming headset....The TurtleBeach X12.
June 28th - Lets Launch this beast
At this time I was nervous in attempting to create even the simplest model of a glass mug due to it being so long since I've done any modeling and barely remember what functions such as a Boole, spline tools, NURBS (Non-uniform rational B-Spline), or even what the knife does (its not used to cut shapes like you'd think). So I decided to spend about 2 hours just tinkering around and for the first 30 minutes it was really irritating thinking the software was broken. Nope, it was just me.
As a side note, all my college training and free lance 3D modeling experience was all learned and done in NewTek Lightwave 8 (one of the most complicated 3D modeling programs out there) and the simplicity of Cinema 4D (C4D) was scary cause i was trying to do things that would normally take 4-5 steps in Lightwave could actually be done in 1-3 steps in C4D.
In the last hour of tinkering with C4D I was starting to remember what specific functions did to do basic modeling techniques. However, I couldn't really create anything due to the fact there's the tiny button you have to push to fully design anything with objects, and I didn't know anything about that freaking button called Make Editable.
2.5 hours later. I was ready to say F you C4D i'm going back to Lightwave. But I just could not let this $3,500 software my ma bought me go to waste. So i was now on a mission to learn this software and become semi pro once again. This was the time i found this amazing YouTube Playlist.
After watching the first video I was literally so aware of everything in the software I had no need to watch a more videos. Everything was just starting to come back to me and I was modeling and animating things like i've been using the software for years. (in the sense that I knew how to use the software. I was still rusty in modeling).
June 29th - It's time to animate
It's my second day and only 9 hrs of messing with C4D and I was pretty confident i could animate something descent. I was messing with the Dynamics in C4D and I was really impressed how easy this feature made it in modifying every aspect of animations such as Damping, Flexion, Volume Conservation, etc. (no those are not misspelled words. Its the names of specific mechanics in Dynamics)
To get to the point I began working on using Emitters and Dynamics to start on this new title for my YT videos.
(Please visit the site to view this media)
July 4th - 9am to 3pm Time for some serious modeling.
As I just said, It was time for some serious 3D modeling. I wanted to make a 3D model of my favorite gaming headset the TurtleBeach X12 that I use for PC. So after i was done doing my morning business and got my computer booted up i was ready do some modeling. This was when my mission started. I wanted to get the entire 3D model done before heading to my brothers where i was to meet the rest of the family for the 4th of July celebration.
In this time I had so many problems in terms of having negative poly's, structuring entire shapes from scrap to look just like odd shapes on the headset (mainly the connecting polys from the boom mic to the ear piece). In fact that object shape started with only 2 very small cylinders and after 2 hours straight of about 300x zooming into the 2 tiny cylinders and creating about 150 individuals polys by connecting certain points to create 2d shapes and having the ending result of what you see now in the picture below. It was a serious pain in the rear.
The worst part is that in the last 30 minutes of modeling I had didn't think I'd be able to finish the entire model. I was really concerned that I'd have to finish it today (7-5-13) which would mean the project may have even more issues since 3D modeling is something you should never take long breaks in the middle of modeling anything. Ff you do you run a high chance losing your thought process on what you were doing and how you planned on finishing a tiny aspect of the model. Thankfully all I had to do was the top head piece that has the cushion and i was done. That way all I had to do today was the texturing.
July 5th 2013 7am - 9am. Its time for texturing.
After an amazing 4th of july celebration and only 5 hrs of sleep. I was so ready to finsh this mission. This is the normal for me, when i sleep less and feel tired, I'm actually more productive and ready to do things and when i'm near exhaustion i actually perform better and think a lot clearer on digital media work. This is why i always took 24 credit hrs every semester including summers that way I'd be at the top of my game.
Anyways,. 2 hours of texturing with a few issue dealing with UVW mapping, (UVW doesn't really mean anything. To explain it when you do 3D modeling you work on 3 axis. X, Y, and Z. So, for mapping textures you move the texture in a "sub axis" using the next to the last 3 letters of X, Y, and Z, which is...you guessed it. UVW). However, UVW is similar to UV mapping which is kinda like Ultra Violet mapping. But that's a totally different technique in texturing and used more in Lightwave which is what I'm use to but this UVW technique of mapping is way easier).
My Final Product.
(I put my channels trailer I made a long time ago in the beginning of the video since i did not want to upload another video that was only 10 seconds long)
(Please visit the site to view this media)