Draven Ashorn-Hejl: 3D Scan Project - Isabelle Statue

Concept: In the game Animal Crossing: New Leaf, the player becomes the new Mayor of whatever town they move to, and to aid them in their mayoral duties comes the obscenely-hard-working-and-ever-peppy-yet-sleeps-2-hours-every-night secretary Isabelle. However, despite all she does for you, she never gets any real reward outside of occasionally being given a day off if you know how. I feel like it's time to change that, so I wanted to give her a nice sturdy statue that could be put in town to celebrate all her hard work.

Techniques: I followed standard procedure to create this 3D scan. I scanned the chosen object with the NextEngine scanner and ScanStudio software and tediously aligned the alignment pins (while learning there's a limit of nine pins) to ensure the best alignment I could. I then moved the scan into RapidWorks to fuse all the meshes and did some cleaning to get rid of the bumps caused by my alignment paint dots and added some general smoothing to ease the remaining general roughness. I lastly put the model into Keyshot and created the final renders.

Materials: For my scanned object I used an Isabelle Amiibo which was scanned by the lab's NextEngine Scanner. For the Keyshot material I used Pink Granite, a material sturdy enough to match the perpetual-motion secretary herself but in a nice cute color and a slight shine to it to match the adorkably cute secretary and her shining personality. For the real-world backdrop, I used a shot of the yard outside my dorm, as for some reason it has a lawn ornament on one side but not the other, so I decided to place my scan on the blank side of the lawn as it seemed only fitting to do.

Draven Ashorn-Hejl: Box Project - Starlight

Concept: For the box project, after seeing people make boxes to use for things I decided I wanted to try that. One thing that's very common in the homes of my family are small light features, like candles and decorative lights. Also, the running theme in my family's homes tends to be rustic, western style decor. Thus, with this project I decided to make a box to serve as a light feature I could give to my family that would fit in with their decor, and to that end I went with an idea common in western stories: the celestial bodies, namely the Sun, Moon, and Stars.

Techniques: I used Box Maker to create the outer shape of the box panels, then imported that into Illustrator, where I added the Star shapes for inner cuts and added vector images of the Sun and Moon for raster engraving, and also cut a hole in the bottom to place an electric tea light to light the box.

Materials: I bought a sheet of plywood from Home Depot that was just barely smaller than the laser cutter window for the material for the box itself (out of which I got 5 boxes), and used the UTD Fab Lab's laser cutter to do the cutting and engraving of the panels. I then used superglue to ensure the boxes held together and added a small electric tea light for the illumination.

Draven Ashorn-Hejl: Laser Engraving Project - Skateboard

Concept: Ever since I was little playing Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2 on rented PlayStations I'd wanted my own custom skateboard like all the skaters had, with a cool design based on their personal branding. With this project I finally got to fulfill that wish and designed a board based on my personal branding that I've built up online. For a while I had trouble coming up with what to put on the board besides my branding (just like real skaters) and a hex grid (because hex grids are cool), but then it hit me: I could make a tableau listing my completed projects, so that when I had the board kicked up and in hand like a cool skater it would serve as a list of my accomplishments while proudly displaying the branding I had completed them under.

Technique: I used Illustrator to design the board, using layering, masking, and some numerical parameter tweaking to get everything just right and all fitting onto the board. All of the engraving done by the laser cutter was done raster style at maximum depth for a solid, deep engrave.

Materials: I bought one of the skateboards Professor Scott recommended because I trust his judgement, and used the laser cutter at the UTD Fab Lab to handle the engraving.

Corrina Spurlin: Box Project

Concept:
I aimed to keep my theme of flower design going, as it is simple yet complicated, which I appreciate. I combined the flowery look with the symmetrical aesthetic of mandala (as can be seen by the design on the inside bottom of the box). All of the designs used on the box were originally created in Adobe Illustrator.

Techniques:
The main tools I used were in Illustrator. I utilized the shape and pens tools, while creating the symmetrical repeating patterns with the radial tool. I also used the halftone effect to give the raster engraved flowers on two of the sides a hatched look.

Materials:
I was originally going to use wood I purchased, but due to type of wood combined with sizing complications, I was unable to do so. As substitute I used cardboard. The cardboard is fairly sturdy and works well for the elements that were cut through, however, on the designs that are raster engraved it can be a little difficult to see.

Draven Ashorn-Hejl: Week 8 - 3D Print

Concept: My favorite game is Final Fantasy XIV, and in it your character wears a lot of accessories, including a pair of rings. One of the armor sets in the game is the Halone's Champion set, an angelic set of armor with a focus on wing imagery. Unlike many sets of armor in the game however, the Halone's Champion set does not have an accompanying accessory set, so I decided to make my own idea of what the rings of the set would look like.

Process: For the model of the ring, I kept things simple, as in Final Fantasy XIV their ring designs are all simple bands focused on highlighting one feature. In this ring's case, the focus was on the wings at the top, which I made by manipulating a sphere with Gumball until it was flattened, then cut a notch into it using BooleanDifference to add detail and some dimension. I then grouped multiple "feathers" together into a wing, then mirrored the first group to the other side of the ring to make the matching wing. To keep the wings solidly attached to the core band, I used simple cubes the length of the band to fill in the small gaps between the feathers. For some extra detail and flair, I added a 7-sided pyramid to the top as a small decorative gem, and cut small gaps into the core band of the ring so that it wasn't plain and flat all around. After the model was printed, I hand brushed on 2 coats of XTC-3D and then hand painted it with acrylic paint to finish it.

Materials: In Keyshot, I used Brushed Metal in gray and yellow for the core ring band and the wings respectively, but tweaked them to be more silver and gold. For the gemstone I used Blue Gem Stone, tweaked to be less transparent and rougher, with a deeper blue hue. For the physical ring, it was printed with basic 3D printer plastic, and I hand painted the ring with acrylic paints.

Muhammad Martinez: Week 8 3D Print

Ghosted black

Ghosted with colored layers

Keyshot with material - bird's eye

 Keyshot with material - ant's eye

Initial print

In-process painting

In-process painting

Painted model

Concept
A 3D print of my week 1 castle. The print was done through Shapeways with little to no markings. Colors were redone to feel more like a monopoly token. All details were large enough to be printable, and difficult to paint. 

Model Techniques
Minimal modifications were made from it's previous design in week 1 such as size. It was designed by manipulating 3d shapes. However, materials in keyshot were swapped with matte plastics. Their colors were based on the paints available.

Materials
The model was printed using colored sandstone in this case a white polished color. Acrylic paints were used in place the metallic design originally designed.

Chelsea Griffin - Week 1 - Castle

Concept

When I initially began, I was uncertain of what exactly my ideal castle would look like. I am pretty new to modeling and entirely new to Rhino, so I ended up just following the YouTube castle tutorial and messing around with different shapes. I knew that whatever I made, I wanted it to have a sort of lair-type vibe. I started off making the morning star balls and just kept coming up with ideas from there. I had an ellipse at the base of my model and decided that I wanted it to become an eye, as I really enjoy drawing and looking at eye art. I find eyes pretty profound and a lot of my work in various mediums has incorporated them in some way or another so it only made sense that they would be the center of my lair. 

Modeling Techniques

As I was learning about the Rhino environment, I found that I used the rotate and mirror tools quite often for the sake of symmetry. Pretty much every object, excluding the center eye, was mirrored or copied in one way or another. I utilized the pipe tool for the beams around the spheres, as well as the veins that lead into the eye. For the iris and pupil of the eye, I used the split tool as well as the extrude tool. I learned that I had to join these parts in order to avoid any naked edges. The scaling tool came in handy as well to create the larger spiked-beam-sphere centerpiece. The methods I used were fairly simple but I am satisfied with the outcome. 

Materials Used

Although my castle is abstract, it is still an edifice of sorts. As such, I felt the best materials would mainly be stone. I used granite for the iris and eyeball,since I imagine that that would be the actual living space of the castle. I also made the spheres a black granite for the same reason.The veins are mainly for aesthetic purposes as opposed to functional, so I figured it made sense that they would just be red glass. For the pupil, I wanted a sort of reflective pool, so I ended up using the coffee liquid material. The spikes are also mainly aesthetic, though I suppose they could serve as a defense. Either way, I felt using the glass effect worked well

Chelsea Griffin - Week 2 - Duck

Concept

This is Steve. My initial idea was to create a swan as opposed to a duck.  As you can see, I kind of got carried away. While making the swan, the feathers on the wings became a little too complex to execute for me and my newbie modeling skills. I had the body of the swan completed and I was pretty proud of it so I came to the conclusion that I would have to mutate the poor thing. I came up with the idea of bat wings, as those are significantly simpler than birds wings. After that, I decided that this monstrosity needed to have some pretty unique limbs as well, and that's how I came up with the idea for his tentacles. I came to the decision of the three eyes and head spikes in a similar manner. While being created in Rhino, Steve was mainly green and purple, sort of like a dragon. But once I brought him into Keyshot, nothing really seemed to look right in these colors. I began messing with metallics and came to find that Steve actually makes a pretty gnarly robot. And thus, Steve the mutant robot kaiju was born.    

Modeling Techniques 

Although Steve was a bit different from the original duck example, I tried to use most of the techniques that were used in the duck tutorial. For example, for the wings and the head, I used the project tool as well as blend surface to make the body parts blend naturally. I used the project tool for the tentacles as well. The eyes were also oriented on the surface, just like in the duck tutorial. I utilized the mirror tool for the wings as well as the tentacles. The most useful of all in creating Steve was creating the neck, wings, and tentacles using the curve and the pipe tool. 

Materials Used

As I had mentioned before, the final materials I chose for Steve were not what I had originally intended. When messing around with Keyshot, I came to find that scratched metal was perfect for him. I used the infrared gradient material for his eyes to complete the robot look. As for the tentacles, I still wanted that part of him to be natural and organic, to emphasize the fact that he is a mutant. Creepily, I found that the best effect for this was using the human skin texture, which I darkened quite a bit to look a little less human. 

Corrina Spurlin: Week 2 Duck

Ghosted painted black

Ghosted with Keyshot assignments

Concept
The main idea I had when creating this duck was that it would be some form of minimalistic. By forming the body and other parts into simple shapes, or with simple geometry, this was achieved. I also kept this idea throughout the whole composition by reducing the amount of parts that would need to be created. Parts that already seemed connected were combined to continue this theme. I also attempted to make the duck have a more stylized and cute look rather than being realistic. 

Modeling Techniques
The main modeling techniques I used when creating this duck were varying commands relating to the surfaces of the objects. For example, I used commands to orient an object onto the surface of another one. I also used the command Rebuild in order to create the simplistic look. F10 was used in order adjust the shapes of some of the objects. 

Materials
The materials I used for my duck were chosen around the idea of simplicity. I almost used materials that appeared to be toon-like but they lacked depth and seemed too fake. Instead, I ended up using smooth materials that would work well in showing the shapes and edges of the design. The colors I used with the materials followed the general idea of a standard rubber duck but included underlying tones of colors from other objects. For example, the red objects would have underlying tones of yellow and vice versa. 

Corrina Spurlin: Week 1 Castle

Ghosted painted black

Ghosted with Keyshot assignments

Concept

The main idea for this castle was based on how churches often look. A reference image wasn't used as I wanted the idea to be original and see how it turned out. To achieve the theme I included repeating archways with an ascending design. I kept the design more simple than complex because I wanted to combat the standard of how intricate some churches can be. The colors involved were used to also counter how natural-toned churches are. The church idea for the castle was meshed with the idea of making it look mildly human, which was accomplished by putting a sphere on top to represent a head.

Modeling Techniques

The main techniques I used when creating this castle were MakeHole, rotate, and scale. Translation was also involved whenever I changed the location of something as I wanted the design to be different. The MakeHole command was used in varying ways, as I sometimes used it to cut all the way through an object and other times only to cut into it part way. Rotate was used often in order to create the repeating patterns around the structure evenly. Scale was used to copy objects and put them in another part of the work, such as the rings, to make the piece balanced. 

Materials

I wanted to use materials that would allow for a general stylized feel, in order to continue the idea of having a non-traditional church-like structure. To accomplish this I only used smooth / sleek materials. The material used throughout has a metal-like texture to it, allowing for underlying tones that can be intriguing to look at. I used contrasting colors to continue the idea of having something different from a church, which typically can be monotone.