Week 9-Completing the Finishing Touches

To begin this week I will continue to prefect the piping on the box section of the steam engine. At the end of last week I did notice an error with the modelling on the pipe where I had not created all of the bolts and other shaping. To correct this error I entered editable poly mode and chose the edge icon. I then selected one of the edges in the area where the extra shaping needed to be added and clicked the ring button.

Afterwards I opened the connect edges window. Before setting the number of segments I looked at my photos and tried to count the number which I needed to add. This task was more complex than I anticipated as I had to make sure only to include the segments which I had previously missed. From this I decided to add 8 new segments.

I used the move tool in vertex mode so I could separate the rings of vertexes out. When doing this I looked at the shape I was trying to recreate and moved vertex rings accordingly, therefore where there are two sections next to each other which were a different radius I placed two rings of vertexes next to one another so this could be created.

Next, while still in vertex mode, I selected the rings of vertexes which make up one section of the pipe and with the scale tool increased or decreased the width of these parts to recreate the pipe in the photograph. Where a bolt needed to be created I scaled the vertex rings larger than necessary so they were easier to work with. I then selected every third vertex in both rings before scaling these further to create the six sided shape needed.

When I had achieved the shape I needed I scaled all of the vertexes in the rings down so this part was proportional to the rest of the pipe.

Now that the extra sections had been produced and shaped I decided it would be a good time to give each section the correct height. To do this I remained in vertex mode and started by highlighting all of the vertexes which were above the area where the height needed to be increased. I then used the move tool to slide these vertexes upwards.

When I felt this part of the pipe was now to the correct height I deselected the vertexes towards the bottom of the highlighted area and repeated the process of stretching the polygons with the move tool on the section of pipe above the one just edited.

I continued to repeat this process until I felt that all sections of the pipe were proportional to the image I was working from.

At this point I did realised that one of the original parts of the pipe which I had not missed was slightly too wide and therefore not proportional. To resolve this I selected the vertexes which made up this area and with the scale tool reduced the width accordingly.

I was now pleased with the shaping of the pipe, but as a result of these alterations the sections which joined onto this pipe were no longer positioned next to the correct part. Therefore I selected each of these objects and using the move tool I realigned them, all the time referring to my images to try to get it as accurate as possible.

Also, I repositioned the dial and top section of piping so it once again looked like a whole shape.

When I looked at the model as a whole I realised these alterations had affected the pipe which went from the metal pipe to behind the machine. This now intercepted one of the cylindrical shapes on the back. To correct this I selected the troublesome pipe and in the editable poly rollout went into vertex mode. I then highlighted the vertexes at the bottom end of the pipe before turning on soft selection. This resulted in some additional faces of the shape being highlighted also, but not as many as I felt was necessary to prevent polygons being stretched and the shape of the pipe no longer being fluid. To make sure as much of the pipe as I wanted was affected by the alterations I was to make I increased the falloff value to 323.325cm. I then used the move tool to lower the pipe so it no longer cut into the cylindrical shape.

Afterwards I went on to create the clamp bolt positioned between the metal and rubber pipe. To begin I drew out a box with a length of 11.794cm, width of 3.905cm and height of 0.936cm as I felt this was roughly the right size. I also set the length segment value to 5 while leaving the other segment values at 1. I then converted the shape into an editable poly before going into vertex mode and using the move tool to shape the vertexes around the pipe.

This went reasonably well, however it had not created the smooth shape I was looking for and I believed this was due to there not being enough vertexes to enable me to get a smooth shape. To correct this I changed to edge mode and selected one length of edges. I then selected the ring button so all the parallel edges were also highlighted. Following this I opened the connect edges window and 1 extra segment in between each edge already there.

Next I returned to vertex mode and continued to position the vertexes around the pipe as I did before. This time I was much happier with the outcome as the shape was much more realistic than my first attempt. Also I move the vertexes on top of this shape downwards to make the shape narrower as I currently felt the height was unrealistic.

I was pleased with the progress I had made until I rotated the viewport and noticed there were still gaps between the pipe and the clamp bolt.

I initially tried to resolve this using the move tool to reposition the vertexes but this made little improvement. Instead I selected all the vertexes which should touch the pipe and with the scale tool made these sit inside the pipe. This would assure there were no gaps between the bolt and the pipe.

This lead to quite an improvement, however it also caused the visible width on the outside of the pipe to become inconsistent as the bottom vertexes had moved up. To resolve this I entered vertex mode, selected the vertexes which no longer were positioned correctly and with the move tool lowered them so the correct width returned.

I was now satisfied that the objects shape was realistic and so mirrored a clone. I set the clone type to an instance so that if any alterations were necessary then they would be made to both. Also, I set the new shape to be mirrored along the Y axis so that it would be ready to use for the bottom of the clamp bolt.

I then used the move tool to position the clone underneath the original so that it covered the bottom half of the pipe. When doing this I was careful to make the same amount of the clamp visible around the bottom of the pipe as at the top. It was during this task that I noticed I had forgotten to model the part of the clamp which comes out of one of the sides of the clamp. To improve this I returned to editable poly mode where I chose the polygon icon. From here I highlighted the polygons along the side of the clamp bolt where the additional part needed to be added and opened the extrude window. I set the extrude value to 2.06cm.

The addition of these segments had gone reasonably well, but the shape I had created still did not resemble that in the photograph as the extruded area was too square and box like. Following this I changed to vertex mode and highlighted the vertexes with the paint selection marquee which I felt needed to be repositioned and with the move tool I made the alterations to the amount I felt necessary. This went very well and resulted in the object being perfected and having a greater likening to that in the image.

Following this I also smoothed the edges where the top and bottom of the clamp bolt were held together. The way I built this up meant that it would not be possible just to reposition the vertexes as the section was made up of one large polygon on each side. Instead I selected the polygon on each end and opened the extrude window where I set the extrude value to 0.587cm as I felt this would be enough to work with to enable me to get a more curved edge.

The last step when editing this part was to use the scale tool to reduce the length of the end polygon along the Y axis to remove the points at the corners.

I now felt this part of the clamp bolt was complete and so decided to go on to add the screws which hold the two parts of the clamp bolt together. For this I started by drawing out a cylinder with a radius of 0.373cm and height of 1.853cm. I also set the height and cap segment values to 1.

Next I made the shape into an editable poly and went into polygon mode before selecting the top cap segment and deleting it. I then went into edge mode where I selected all the edges along the top rim. With these selected I dragged out two new rings of segments by incorporating the use of the move tool whilst holding down the shift key. I was careful of the height of each section as I wanted the screw to look as realistic as possible.

Afterwards I entered vertex mode and selected the top two rings of vertexes before selecting the scale tool to make the radius of the top section wider so it would represent the top of a screw head. To do this I scaled the vertexes in the top viewport so I could assure the circular shape remained. I then highlighted every third vertex around the ring and scaled these out further to make the circle into a bolt-like shape.

The last step for this area was to cap the top border.

Next I deleted the bottom polygon before entering edge mode and dragging new polygons out the bottom of the shape. I dragged out a few new segments as before and then went into vertex mode so I could make some parts of the edited cylinder wider than others using the scale tool. When I had increased the radius to a point which I felt was proportional I selected every third vertex and scaled these outwards as well, once again in the top viewport, to transform the circular shape into a hexagonal one.

After this I returned to edge mode where I dragged out a couple more rings of segments. Once I had dragged out the final edge I selected the scale tool and with the bottom ring of edges still selected I scaled the radius of this part down so it formed a slight point to complete this end of the screw. The final step was to cap the bottom end.

Lastly I lowered the bottom two rows of vertexes to assure the segments above were the correct height.

I now felt the screw was complete and so positioned it at the side of the clamp bolt by combining the use of the move and rotate tool. When I had aligned this I found the gap between the screw head and the bolt was too big and so I went back into vertex mode, selected the vertexes which made up the bolt and area below and used the move tool to remove the excess length.

Following this I made some small alterations to the size of the head of the screw as I felt it was currently a bit too small.

I was not happy with the appearance of the screw and so cloned a copy in case any alterations needed to be made in relation to the gap between the screw head and bolt on the other side of the clamp bolt. I then used the move and rotate tools so that I could position the cloned screw.

Once positioned I did find the screw head and the bolt were not wide enough apart. To resolve this problem I went into vertex mode and moved the bolt further away from the screw head so that one was visible above the clamp and the other visible below.

The last step was to come out of editable poly mode and use the move tool to make sure that the screws were in the middle of the width of the clamp on either side.

At this point I felt the clamp bolt was complete. Below is my part of the machine so far.

Next this week I will smooth the model with the mesh smooth tool. Also, I hope I will have time to start the modelling of sphere before the end of the week.