Jesus Vela: Week 1 Castle

Ghosted Shot

Concept

     This castle was based off of the Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico City. As a concert hall adorned with vibrant windows and a clear stone, the palace is significant as a cultural torch for many Mexicans. I innovated the palace by adding additional towers to the structure while also reducing some details. The materials I used in the rendering of the images gives my castle an equally vibrant personality, making my castle an adequate residence for the Muses.

Layered

No Naked Edges

Techniques

     Throughout modeling, the gridsnap aid made it easy to arrange solids into the castle. When constructing the castle I first laid out a polyline around the castle's perimeter. Next I used the box tool to construct the main frame layer. The rest of the layers include more boxes (Entrance and Roof), paraboloids (Pillars, BigTowers, and SmallTowers), and extruded triangle and arc/half-circle surfaces (Roof and Windows). When running the naked edges diagnostic, all of the pillars and tall/small towers had naked edges. Since paraboloids are not originally closed solids, I employed to solutions to get rid of naked edges. First, the pillars which are composed of mirrored paraboloids were joined into a single solid. Second, The tall/small towers to closed using the cap command. All in all, layers simplified troubleshooting by allowing me to address issues in chunks.

Opening Shot

Materials

     The Palacio de Bellas Artes was built in an art Art Nouveau and Art Deco (Wikipedia). To reflect a similar importance in decoration through linework, materials and lighting were important to convey the aesthetic theme of the castle. Materials used in Keyshot for rendering the castle include: Anodized Aluminum, Ginger Bronze, Glass Red, Gold Polished, Soap Bubble, and Tiles Hexagon Dark Grey. The latter material worked perfectly as the ground layer because it accents the symmetrical character of the castle. While the metal pillars help define the glossy main frame, the metallic towers and entrances add volume to the structure. Soup Bubble material is very glossy and without edges, so brightness and contrast were increased to help distinguish the curves around the castle. Soup Bubble material was very exciting to work with, as color was manipulated when capturing shots inside as well as outside the castle.

Exterior Pedestrian View

Interior Pedestrian View

Andrew Rowan: Week 1 Castle

Establishing Shot

Concept: My castle's design is based loosely on a Tesla coil. Tesla coils are mainly thought of as scientific but I think they are also fascinating as sculptural objects. I tried to separate out some of the main elements that defined a Tesla coil and apply them along with my own style. There are many circular shapes in my design that are meant to mimic the inspiration.

Ghosted

Techniques: The main technique I used in this project was ArrayPolar. I essentially built a single side and used the polar array function to make the four supports and the eight pyramids. I also used it on two different planes for the cage of the lowest sphere. I also used curves to make the tubes as I was comfortable with this from previous engineering graphics experience. I could have used the taurus command in some places but went with what I knew. I also used a boolean union on the cage so it would remain one object, which made work much easier.

Layered

Materials: One of the main goals I had was to make my castle appear more sculptural than scientific. After doing the initial design I could tell one of my main ways of continuing to push into sculpture territory was though materials. The spheres, rectangles, and lower support arms are brushed aluminum, which is shiny enough to get attention but not overly bright. I used polished black marble for the base and main supports. This black grounds the piece, while the stone makes it feel more substantial. Finally, I used polished brass to highlight some of the main features.

Pedestrian

Charlene van Zyl: Week 1 Castle

Ghosted

Concept:

I wanted to base my project off of a traditional castle, adding elements of a medieval fort. I went to Google Images for some ideas and liked the castles that had towers. Forts are typically fairly simple in design, but I also wanted to try to add some point of interest.

Layered

Techniques:

I started off by making a rectangular prism for the base of my castle, then made the doorway and interior with a Boolean difference. I went on to use cylinders and truncated cones for the towers, using another Boolean difference to make the top of the turret hollow. I copy and pasted this tower onto each of the castle's corners. I then went on to create the central tower, using the same techniques as I did for the first tower. To made the tower hollow, I used a Boolean difference in the center and through the wall for the two windows, which I used ellipsoids for. I added a tall, narrow cylinder to the top of the tower and added a triangular surface to it to create a flagpole. Finally, I surrounded the castle in rectangular prism walls, using a Boolean difference to subtract from the wall and create an overhang.

Detailed Shot / Pedestrian View

Materials:

I initially planned on having my castle be made of stone bricks, but when I wasn't satisfied with the look of that in Keyshot, I decided to go for a glassier look. I used a blue gemstone texture for the base of the castle, and diamond for the turrets. I wanted some solid color in the castle as well and decided on using polished copper for the outer wall and flagpole. For the flag itself I used blue velvet, the floor was made of textured aluminum, and the windows used frosted glass. I only had access to the trial version of Keyshot on my personal computer, thus the watermarks on the final renderings.

Establishing Shot

Asa Rodriguez Project 1 Castle

Concept

My inspiration for this project was an article on an abandoned housing project in Turkey referred to as a "nightmarish blight on a beautiful landscape". I wanted to simplify the design of the house for expediency, while also communicating the core elements that created the reaction in the article

Techniques

To create the main mass of the building I combined squares and cylinders in order to simulate the silhouette. For the arches, I first combined a cylinder on its side and a cube and then subtracted the resulting solid from a larger transformed cube. Lastly, I used truncated 4-sided pyramids for both the larger and smaller roofs.

Materials

I used a drywall material for the main walls of the chateau in order to simulate the matte texture of the inspiration as many of the rock materials had much more specularity than what I wanted for this piece. A very basic glass was utilized for the windows, while the roofs have a fine-grained wood. The grass is a matte green paint in order to not reflect too much light from or onto the castle.

Sam Franklin: Week 1 Castle

Concept:

My intent in designing this castle was to emulate gothic architecture. When first starting the assignment I knew I wanted to use both organic and hard surface modeling techniques, and the first "organic" structure that fit with gothic themes was a skull. I also wanted to my design surreal in some sense so I decided to make the towers protruding from the skull. I often referenced European gothic architecture while modeling the castle.

Techniques:

While I can appreciate the utility of NURBS, I found that it didn't suit the design that I had in mind, so all of the castle pieces were built in Maya then scaled appropriately in Rhino. My goal with building the castles was to build one, and the essentially create a library of castle pieces that I could mix and match to make the other towers. While all the castles are unique, they all share certain modular elements. When making the skull, I created the base mesh in Maya, then once I had created all the detail I physically could, I cleaned it up and added more detail in Z-Brush.

Materials:

In keeping with the surreal theme, I opted to use the stained mahogany wood texture for the skull, to draw the eye to the central part of the castle and to liven up the color. For the architectural elements, I used the black glass and foggy quartz materials. This decision came from experimenting until I felt comfortable with the whole composition. The darker glass is used to accentuate certain elements of the castle and make it feel more textured. The glass and wood turned out well in the end I think.

Marissa Hernandez: Week 1 castle

ghosted

ghosted with materials

Concept: My inspiration for this castle was a birthday cake. I thought what was cylinder shape and that could be a fun design for a castle, and then I thought of a cake. I thought I would keep the center of attention as the “cake.” The rest of the design such as the two towers are based on candles. Then it looked a bit empty so I added on the back square part of it and got even more additive and added the diamond like things to class it up a little.

pedestrian View

bird's eye view

Techniques: For the different techniques I used a lot of the poly surface tool to create the basic shapes. Then I used the tube tool for the main cake part with the tiers and as well for the decoration rings around it. For the windows scene throughout it, I used the Boolean difference tool to cut out sphere shapes I learned in the flashlight tutorial. I used the copy command tool as well to get the symmetry of the castle.

Materials: For the materials I wanted to keep it the same color scheme and I focused on what a cake would have, but I wanted to spice it up a little as well. I kept the main wall, and cylinders surrounding, it to a matte white to keep that same element a cake with frosting would have with no shine. Then I thought adding metallic decorations would help bring out the essence of their importance. For the big diamonds I thought it would take too much away from the cake if I made them a metal as well, so I went with a more subtle look for them and used a dull material. Then I went with a studio lighting with three lights because I felt all of the outdoor/indoor lighting took away from the color of the metals.

  

Charlie Chang: Project 1 Castle

Ghosted

Concept:

My concept was a decorative, "just for show" kind of ornamental castle. I had no clear image to take inspiration from, I just created it. I wanted it to appear intricate, but not habitable. The castle's design is very much an appearance- based one. The architecture of the model would be simple, but the materials would elevate the design and aesthetic.

Layered

Techniques:

Creating the model involved using join and Boolean union. I created the pillars themselves with the Polyline tool, and the rest of the shapes were solids. I used Boolean difference to make the cutouts within the bases; the large rectangle, window indents, and the shapes in the front base part. I extruded the shapes made by the Polyline tool and joined them to the solid pyramid shapes. Creating symmetry was a bit difficult, but the Mirror was helpful in that, as was Copy and Paste.

Bird's Eye View

Pedestrian View

Materials:

The materials used in the model were Brass Rough 10 mm Hexagonal Mesh for the base, and Gem Stone Tourmaline for the top turrets. Gem Stone Rose Quartz was used for the lower base spikes, and Gem Stone Smoky Quartz for the pillars. The turrets all match in materials, to create a sense of unity. The strange cutouts of the brass add interest to the base rectangle. Overall, the materials come together in a dainty, ornate castle.