In this multi-part Blender video tutorial we are going to be taking a close look at how to model a Porsche 911 GT3 RS. Due to the nature of the car these tutorials encompasses a lot of techniques from both organic modeling and hard-surface modeling styles. A particular emphasis is placed on creating good topology that will enable you to easily modify the shape but also to accurately create the details.
Part 06 of the this Blender video tutorial series switches over to Blender 2.5 and goes on to model the tire and wheel by using a series of modifiers to leave you with a model that is easily modified later.
Due to some changes in the original author’s Flickr album, we are now linking you directly to references. These links are available for everyone, regardless of Citizenship and are subject to the Flickr License linked on the authors photo page. Source files do not contain reference images.
Side | Front | Back | Front Perspective | Back Perspective
Awesome! The car feels a tad square/orthogonal, but you could probably fix that with a lattice, or even sculpting.
This has been another awesome tutorial!
PS: First!
By putting “first” in your comment you have completely made your opinion completely invalid. It not only makes it seem as though you are un-knowledgeable but also incredibly immature.
Maybe it is a kid ? And yes it is first and his comment it is valid cause it is free to say ,write his ideeas toughts etc. You the other part you think you are above the law constraining his communication and bullying him.
You are imature and selfish , were him it is acting his natural character.
On this video I see him first , yes it is : Be happy boy you are first to comment!
This debate demonstrate the frusration of so called “mature”.
I rofl’ at first, then I realized you are an extremely boring/bland person. Have some fun. ;/
I see use a lot of the loop cut tool.. if u wana to perfetly center u can just press MMB wnen the pink loops apear no need LMB and then RMB…
The MMB for a center cut does not work in 2.5, unfortunately.
@Corniger Yes there is. Atimed said you can press LMB first and then pres RMB to ‘nullify’ any Edge Sliding you may or may not have done. Alternatively, you could press LMB and then press 0 on your keyboard to center it perfectly. =)
@Jonathan Thanks for the tutorial! I really enjoyed it, though I was a bit disappointed you didn’t go for the 10-spokes-5-nuts wheel.
i’m just pressing Escape button and thats it
Looks waaay awesome .
Great series Jonathan – so many great little tips to pick up within these bigger projects that you’re probably not even aware you’re giving out.
I have a query regarding the way you use control loops after an object has a subsurf applied to it. Do you have a preference for eyeballing the placement of these control loops (just what looks right), be quite precise (hold down CTRL, type a number, etc. to get exact values) or does it depend on the situation?
For example, in this tut you modelled two identical wheel spokes that required the exact same control loops in the same places but in other areas of modelling, it looked like they were placed where it felt right (i.e. no precise measurement).
Any other tips on control loops and different situations in which they can be used would be great (might even be a good subject for one of those mini-tips vids). Thanks Jonathan.
To all and Jonathan.
I will try to put my 2 cents in this nice tutorial.
The usage of curves is a bit rigid. I agree.
Axis alignement is consistant with the Curve modifier IF :
You let the curve aligned flat in the top view. (you rotated it in edit mode to align to the picture)
If the curve and the profile have their respective pivot sharing the same Pos and Rot.
If you move the profile in Editmode, this translation will be interpreted as an offset by the Curve modifier. (As you did)
The profile should point in positive direction (x or y).
If my english is a bit hard to understand, here is a blend file :
http://rapidshare.com/files/350180981/Tyre_and_Curve_modifier.blend.html
I haven’t played around with curves too much but I think I understand what you mean by this “offset”. Could that be fixed by applying Loc/Rot? Thanks for sharing!~
@Jonathan–awesome.
@Wes–give this man a raise!
Lovely!! Can’t believe multiple background feature was implemented too… just what I’ve been waiting for.. I prefer a single modeling view. Awesome news and awesome tut, thanks as always Jonathan. Multiple backgrounds FTW!
Nice tutorial, I am learning a lot with these tutorials. Thanks a lot!
Just found this series of tutorials, I’m only up to the second one so far but my model is coming together really well! I’m picking up tons of new techniques and your explanations are easy and meaningful, which is perfect for an intermediate-beginner like me.
Thought I’d jump ahead and glance at part 6 to see where this will all lead me and I must say that the results are impressive! This is the most complex model I’ve attempted so far, but I’ve had no troubles in following your tutorial.
Keep up the good work!
jonathan, i apologize for what i’m about to say, but sir, please read a book on how to model a car of SOMETHING. your inaccuracies and unnecessarily high poly modeling style is driving me crazy. a lot of it makes sense, but is overcompicated and in the end, much higher poly than just doing it yourself and then refining it. you’re ignoring the obvious. like subsurfing insane amounts, not using the edgesplit modifer to clean up weird normals after flipping. personally, i dont believe anyone should learn from these tutorials as they teach the wrong way. like not using spindup. spindup is efficient and so much less buggy when modelling treads. i’m sorry, but this tutorial absolutely pushed every one of my buttons.
Hi fstar,
There is no need to apologize. However, I would like to respond to each of your concerns as I feel there may be some misconceptions.
Accuracy
While yes, I agree that there are inaccuracies on this car. This is not my biggest concern. A car is a very technical object to model and to create one as a precise copy of the reference car takes many, many hours. Out of the scope of this tutorial. My primary focus throughout this series, is to provide a resource which gives users the techniques necessary to create their own car models. Some of these techniques also seem to be a concern of your’s and so let me answer those as well.
High Poly
This car model is high poly, yes. And yes, there are some areas that may have unnecessary numbers of faces, but the car is not yet complete and there is a lot of tweaking/optimizing that remains. However, it is important to keep in mind that we are not restricted to a low polygon count as we are not modeling for a game engine. Also, the vast majority of the polys serve a purpose and are not ignorantly placed. Many of the polygons you may be referring to serve to sharpen up the edges of the model, providing a more finished look. Also, the subsurf being placed at level 2 is quite standard. This ensures you do not see any edges while rendering.
Edgesplit Modifier
I am assuming you are referring to me not using the edgesplit modifier to create sharp edges? The reason for this is nothing in reality (particular car panels) have perfectly sharp edges such as the edgesplit modifier would create. The edges on the car panels, even though they may appear sharp, are actually lightly rounded. By using perimeter edgeloops and subdivision surfaces I can create this effect and thus create a more accurate representation.
The edgesplit modifier is wonderful when working with lowpoly surfaces that do not have the geometry necessary to create the sharp edges. It works well to define edges while still being able to set the faces to smooth. With highpoly models this is not necessary and does not give you as much control in the end.
Also, the edgesplit modifier creates the illusion of a sharp edge by adjusting the vertex normal at the edge, but it has nothing to do with the surface normals before/after flipping.
Spin Duplicate
No one can deny that Spin Duplicate is a valuable tool. However, it has one vital flaw and that is the inability to go back and modify the mesh easily in the future. When using spin duplicate for something like tire treads, it requires you to first delete all but the original tread and then modify it if you ever need to change any of the replicated attributes. By using an array and curve modifier we are left with the option of going back at any time and modifying it as we wish, affecting all of the arrayed treads. Without the need for deleting or respinning.
All that said, if someone were to port spin duplicate to a modifier I would be the first to give thanks. The array and curve technique is a bit finicky at times, but in my eyes it is far preferable to the other method due to its non-destructive ability.
—–
I am sorry to hear you have not found this tutorial series to your liking. If you ever have any other concerns or wish to discuss this further, please feel free to email me personally: jonathan(at)cgcookie(dot)com
Cheers,
Jonathan
I was working on the wheel, and i must have accidentally deleted the rest of the car instead of hiding it… i only just realized. and I made the “mistake” of saving often… i lost 6 tutorials worth of car
i’ll keep watching the rest, but i don’t think i’ll start over…
it’s an awesome tutorial series, that’s for sure
i’ve learned a lot… the only thing i have to learn now is to differentiate the “X” command from the “H” command 
lol
really awesome tutorials, Jonathan
Hey Jonathan, is this technique to make the tires the same you used creating the tracks for the Excavator?
The technique is nearly identical, the main difference is just that you do not merge the edges on the tracks.
Thank you
I’m modelling Wall-E right now and this tutorial was very helpful for the tracks.
LOL, exactly as you sneezed a couple of minutes in I randomly coughed (with a mouth full of tea, had a cupe nearby of course though to catch it)
Also I didn’t know you could do this in 2.49 too, I saw this tutorial on 3Dtotal once on modeling a tyre this way but never thought I could do it in blender.
Thanks for all these videos
How do I add a background reference image in Blender 2.5 Alpha. I go to properties and check background image yet it doesn’t give me a way to load it. I just started the Porsche tutorial part 6 and it starts off using the new interface. But how do I add the reference image to the scene?
Press “N” on your keyboard and you will see a panel appear in the View. Scroll down on the panel and you will see one of the dropdown menus called background Image. I think you will figure out the rest by yourself.
First of all, thanks for these series. They are really helpful for beginners like me.
As for this part of the series, it’s awesome too. By modeling tire this way, it’s easy to change anything you want without much hassle. This is what I got following this tutorial (except for actual thread modeling): http://img641.imageshack.us/img641/5350/render04.jpg And for me curve modifier worked fine. Kinda.
Just one question tho. When I added Array and chose Fit to curve length, it was working fine. But as soon as I added Curve, it was rotating around the circle nicely, but the Fit to curve length stopped working. Thread covered like 1/5 or 1/6 of the circle. Scaling the circle made no difference. Except it was bigger and thread covered even smaller part of it. It’s not much of a problem as I just used Fixed count instead, but I wonder why this happened. In video it was all nice, it covered all circle, not just part of it. By the way, I’m still using blender 2.49.
And as for rim modeling, I do understand this was just to show the technique, but it can’t be applied to all rims. Just as that 7-spoked rim I made. I see no way how it can be done with mirror modifier.
The same thing happened to me. However, when I used the fixed count to complete the tire, the size of the tire got distorted. It began to look like a short fat go cart tire.
amazing tut mr.williamson just got 1 little hitch (being the noob that i am) everytime i apply the mirror modifier to the plane it will only mirror along they y axis and not the x axis anyway to fix this problem or did i miss something
cheers
Thanks so much for these tuts Jonathan. I’ve been following them religiously for a month now and am loving them.
A quick clarification on extruding the spokes at 21:51 in the video, you extrude the hub rim, you extrude it towards the cursor which is at the center of the wheel. This facilitates the extrusion of the spokes. Just thought I’d mention that over here since it took me some time to realise it (I’m a noob). I kept extruding the rim towards the center of the hub which made the spokes flat (2D).
Here’s my version so far: http://i37.tinypic.com/2ugyq11.jpg
Hi guys. Could someone tell me, what´s the link for the wheel, which Jonathan told at the beginning? I don´t understand that. Thanks
Blender 2.5.9 nurbs circle doesn’t wotk for me herein either.
i cant thank you enough
Mr. Jonathan, these series
i am doing and i thank you for
your hard works(tutorials)..
Here’s the link for the wheel reference if anybody is interested: http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-4563222-car-wheel.php?st=6209f7b