Welcome to the Highlander Studios blog.

I won't promise any earth shattering revelations here. What I will be trying to do is post some new products as I release them, share some thoughts on gaming and show some pics of games and other stuff that I enjoy. So come in and make yourselves at home.


Monday, April 7, 2014

The Fun Stuff - The Dizzying World of 3D Sculpting


     During my convalescence and website tribulations I was busy working on digital sculpting. #D design is easy to drop at a moment's notice and pick up where I left off in the event of interruptions I also have a couple of design projects to do for customers so this got the attention instead of traditional sculpting.

     Just before Cold Wars I bit the bullet and purchased a license for Rhino CAD. I've used Blender for most of my work so far, but there are some things that Rhino NURBS modeling does more easily and quickly that the subdivision surface modeling in Blender. Things like cut holes out of objects, making smoothed objects with a smaller amount of data, fillets, chamfers and blends between objects and projecting images onto non-planar surfaces. All things that would make the workflow faster and easier.

     So I started playing... The first project was from an article a friend posted on FB. Reaction makes temporary housing that nests together for transport/ storage like coffee cups. It was a small, simple design to start my Rhino learning experience.

     I added a few parts. One to connect the units.


     And a set of windows and an AC unit to add.


     Someone on TMP posted a link to Wallace Neff's bubble domes so I made a small one.


     These are all available at Shapeways in 15mm. Hopefully I'll be producing them in resin here before fall this year.

Highlander Studios Shapeways


     I got a little more adventurous with the next project.


     Then I saw a tutorial on T-splines for Rhino. This is an add on that makes modeling a bit more like the subdivision modeling I'm used to. So I've been playing with the trial a bit.


     Smooth organic shapes are easy to combine with hard edged mechanical bits and cut out sections. Interesting stuff to play with at least until the trial runs out.

     This post is a little long so I'll continue with the new Blender work later.

 

3 comments:

John Bear Ross said...

Another wonderful manual sculptor tragically succumbs to digital crack!

Resistance is futile.

;)

Best,
JBR

Rodrick Campbell said...

I still haven't found the cookies, though.

Funny thing is I was working with CAD and 3D while I was taking my architectural drawing classes just a bit before I started the traditional sculpting. It was crack then. It's crack now.

I was learning some basic rigging and animation this week to make posing easier.

John Bear Ross said...

Well, you've taken to it like a fish to water.

It goes to illustrate the point I've made for years that it's not the medium (clay, wax, putty, digital), it's the artist.

Keep it up.

Best,
JBR