Saniyah Zaheer: Week 16 Serial Slicing

Research

Sketch

Inspiration

When I started this project I knew I wanted to make something dragonesque, and that meant including horns in my model. I also wanted to make sure I had a strong base for my sculpture, but most of the creatures I found had curved necks. But then I found a mechanical creature that looked like it had a very firm neck, so I decided to incorporate that into my model. Other than this I allowed myself to play with my model while in Rhino. I knew what my basic shape would look like but I left myself room with the details to decide how things would be as I worked. 

Rhino Orthographic

Process

I used the pipe tool in order to create the horns on top of my model’s head. Then I used mirror in order to have two identical ones on either side of the head. The align tool helped me make sure that my head and neck were in a straight line. For the little spikes at the back of the head, I drew out the shape using the curve command and then extruded it out. Learning from my previous mistakes, I boolean unioned my model together as I went. This helped me solve issues as they came, instead of having a huge issue at the very end and trying to figure out where I went wrong. The pro about 3D modeling is that even with really simple shapes and commands you can accomplish a lot. The con for me is that you can’t control individual points in a 3D shape (at least not that I found). This was really frustrating and would have made things so much easier if I could.

Keyshot Orthographic

Keyshot Environment

Keyshot Close-Up

Keyshot Proposal

Physical Environment

Physical Orthographic

Physical Proposal

Materials

For my keyshot model I kept it very simple. Since it would be difficult to show the final piece, I just made it look like what my pre-processed physical model would look like. I slapped on a wooden material and changed the color to make it look like cardboard. While I was preparing for laser cutting, I knew logically it wouldn't look exactly like I imagined, but it wasn't until I actually put everything together did I realize just how different it was. It was really difficult to translate the tiny details into my physical piece. Fitting the cardboard together was easy enough, but sticking on the extra pieces was very tedious. The paper mache was also much more difficult than I imagined. Taping it up first really helped create a solid base, but fixing the paper mache around corners and tiny spaces was really tough. At times I wished the entire thing was clay so I could smooth it all out. Painting was also not very easy. The piece was 3D and I had to maneuver it as I painted so I could get all the sides, it was very rocky.