Anim8or Community

G'day,

I guess this is a minor one in the scheme of things, but would make things a lot easier. When experimenting with materials (in the dialog), it would be useful to see an example of the 'shiny ball' of this material in realtime. It would make it easier to gain an idea of what the material looks like (rather than guessing, then having to close the box to look at it).

g'day all,
just tried a simple, elegant rapier model. To experiment a little with meetallic materials, and to do some basic, clean looking shapes (my previous modelling attempts have been a mess). I think i mostly succeeded. I also saved an extra copy of the hilt section (while still WIP), because I realised I had accidentally created a perfect mushroom shape. I know my rendering still needs a lot of work (maybe a fancy background / scene around it?), but I'm mainly concentrating on getting my modelling right. So please, I am vey open to criticism

You simply won't find models in the an8 format.

Luckily, anim8or can import from the 2 most common formats: .3ds (3d studio) and .obj. Just go to object -> import and load the file like that.

Though perhaps it would be more intuitive if you could load / save for all formats in the same load / save command, rather than treating .an8 as a 'special case' with its own save command. I know I've also had trouble finding the command to import.

never done rendering before. i did turn down the specular (from .2 to .08): I thought it looked good shiny: since horses do often have that shine to them, but realised it basically looked like plastic.

However, my attempts to render failed. I clicked on Render -> Render image, and it mostly worked, except the textures wouldn't show.

Anyway, do you know why that 'seam' is there? the wireframe doesn't show that area as being any pointier than the other curves. I don't know why the texture it darker on one side.

got it: found lithunwrap and found that yes, it is superior to uvmapper. It was simple to split the map into bits, then map each one separately.

It's far from perfect, but I'm sick of this horse anyway. I learnt quite a bit, as it is my first proper model (of something organic, rather than simple metallic weapons / boxes etc.). I know I missed a few faces with the texturing. I'm not sure why there is a 'seam' running through the middle of my model though (I made half of it, then mirrored after applying textures).

Not sure how to upload a textured model, so here's a screenshot. The model seems to be too large anyway :S

I finished the modelling and am now up to the texturing. As I predicted, most of the unwrapping options (in UVMapper classic) just look like a mess. Perhaps the best one is planar, which isn't ideal since it would stretch the flatter areas on the head and rump (correct me if i'm wrong). Could someone please have a look and tell me how to unwrap properly?

G'day all,
first post here in the Anim8or community (well, at least on this board). I keep trying to get into 3d modelling, for about a year now. I keep reading books and tutorials, but can't really think of a full project to do, so lack practise (I like developing games, but haven't really come up with an idea that can be easily implemented in 3d yet). So I decided to make a horse, since that can be used for heaps of projects, and should be simpler than a person, but challenging enough.

I've made a basic model from 3 cylinders (torso, 2 for legs), then realigned the points to follow the reference image. Then I paused before adding a head or tail. I remember some weird stuff when texturing: I may have seen it in tutorials. How would I texture a model which clearly wouldn't fit into the normal UVMapper shapes (cylinder, sphere, box etc.). Should I join the legs to the body now, or wait? Should I mirror the legs now or later? I guess I'm just confused as to what needs to be done next, to make it as simple as possible to finish.

I've attached a pic of the model. The back leg looks weird because I still haven't decided how low poly it should be. It's amazing how much less smooth a hexagonal cylinder is than an octagonal cylinder (front leg) :S