preview - ww2 destroyer

[papajohns]

preview of the ww2 destroyer im doing by povray......

but i wouldnt be able to do this without the modeling skills of G. McCarter and N.B.


i still have to do the hardest part of the ship....the hull...



i thought might start with the "simpler" model of destroyer..after that...if im not too bummed out cuz its too freaking hard, maybe battleships....

thats assuming i live through the animation sequences..i hate animation..... any ideas would be helpful...

as of now, the ideas i have for the flc are...

default.flc - i was thinking maybe rotating the ship along the x axis a bit to mimic rocking


run.flc - nothing....except a white extending line behind the ship to mimic wake... im not sure how to create the wave at the bow... maybe a increasing sine function???

death.flc - a 180 rotation along the x axis while slowly rising the y plane to mimic list and sinking of the ship....


attack.flc - uh..i have no clue how to create a fire effect... maybe increasing a sphere infront of the turret? but i duno how good that would look...

 

[BeBro]

Wow, looks great, very detailed - why is the hull so difficult? I mean when you managed to model all these things I´d think the hull is no problem...

 

[Nder]

looks incredible so far

 

[papajohns]

the shape.... the front.....and near the bottom of the hull...its kind funky.....unless someone has an simple idea for how to model it..


the model so far are simple boxes and cylinders and other simple shapes combined...

 

[BeBro]

What software do you use? Can´t you manipulate objects somehow there? Some 3d packages also support boolean ops - in that way you "cut away" unneccessary space from very simple basic forms, or merge different objects together. Or can you manipulate the points that connect the various polygons?

 

[Dom Pedro II]

POV Ray, isn't it?

 

[Nder]

looks like the hull should be able to made in the same manner that you made the lifeboats and the superstructure in front of the bridge.

 

[papajohns]

mmm.maybe i should just go with the "roundish" hull like the lifeboats.....

i was leaning more toward the battleship hulls..which if i do it then i can use it for the battleship models as well....

 

[Nder]

Well, no, it should have a sharp edge to the front. I was just sayingn you should be able to use the same technique. But, hey, I've never used any 3D software before, so don't listen to me.

 

[stormbind]

It looks really good. Can't wait to see the finished article.

I don't know much about them but I heard small WW2 ships (i.e frigates) rocked a lot more than a Battleship did. Maybe this will inspire something.

Sorry I have nothing useful to say

 

[Kentonio]

I'd recommend having a word with Akula.

 

[aaglo]

Papajohns, I agree.

The most difficult part to make with pov-ray is the hull. Especially a modern ship hull.

Great job so far

 

[papajohns]

okay..i finally took some break from playing wc3..yes..i do play other games..and finished the hull for the ship....however..i have come accross a dilemma....

the model is finished..and i must admit it looks pretty neat....


BUT.......

 

[papajohns]

when i try to resize it to a size civ3 uses...the unit looks pretty bad in my opinion...nothing like the model in the bigger size..


so......... is it worth it ???

 

[embryodead]

I like the model, it looks very civ3-style. definetely needs to be finished. about the civ3 size preview - to make it look better:
1. raise the hull more above the water level. maybe also make it shorter.
2. i dont know what method you use to resize the unit... seems that it looks strange because the method wasn't good. Can't promise mine is better, but at least try it:
1. render to RGB
2. resize (bicubic, still in RGB)
3. add +5 to +15 contrast, and mild 1px unsharp mask (10-15%)
4. convert to indexed color with pre-generated pallette (with like 5 or 6 shadow colours).

 

[papajohns]

i used povray to render this..the resize was done by just by resizing the render window to 160x120 pixels from 512x384...

increasing contrasts might make the image clearer..but it wont make the unit look "better" in the sense that you still wont be able to distinguish what in the world is sitting on that hull...

im trying to compress the superstructure more in the middle and increasing the gun size to try to see if i can accentuate the model..but it doesnt look that promising

 

[Nder]

The thing is, when making units for civ3 you have to take into consideration that they are going to be at Civ3 Scale. You can't be as detailed as you would like and in fact you have to emphasize some details by making them bigger than you would think is natural or realistic. This is why the original ships all have huge guns that could never be on a real ship and why the original units wield massive swords and axes that would be too big to be practical in real combat.

 

[papajohns]

i have compressed the superstructure more into the middle and accentuated the guns a bit..the unit looks better in civ3 scale..but still not as good as i would like...and it kinda lost the real life ww2 destroyer look..but heck...better than nothing

 

[Nder]

I like that one even better. Can we see it in CIv Scale?

 

[papajohns]

and here it is...

pardon the lines..i use em as axis lines so i know wheres where