Welcome back and greetings to all new readers. Continuing where I left
off from my previous post I had been looking at the functionality of
movement for my model. The silhouette also needed some work to benefit and extenuate the robots
character.
Like most aerial vehicles most tend to include fins that give certain characteristics to their shape as well as adding functionality. If we were to look at a model of Concorde, a guided missile and a old 1950's style Cadillac each style of shape given by their fin characteristics and styled shape. With that in mind I set out to design some fin like additions to my robot. With the addition of fins to the top and sides it should markedly increase its characteristics to players from the underneath whilst it would be flying as well as front and sides when landed.
I wanted to give the drone some flying combat options so copied out the top gun and modified it for the under carriage. I used the space I had left by adding few plating variations that flowed in direction of the face. I hoped this would help in creating a focal point in the over all model in the eyes of the robot.
With the exterior done to at least a good first standard I wanted to block out some of the interior. This would be where all the computer and power reactor would be housed for the robot. With the model I had so far I knew I didn't have to go over the top with core interior geometry as the player would only be seeing this through gaps in the armour or if the drones plates of armour fall off when being destroyed. Any extra details that I would like to include could just be added via normal maps or clever texturing.
When modelling the interior I was constantly checking how what I was doing fitted with the current design. I modelled parts that would like to see in the model externally then merged them in the model where they fitted. I built the interior as I went along rather than worrying about extensive designing by paper. At this point in the robots design I had a lot of reference imagery from the model itself so used that to aid the flow of its construction. The images above show the progress of blocking out where the main shapes were going to be to where it finally ended up. I had left enough room in the interior to add a structural frame over the inner body that would provide points for the plates to sit on.
On the whole I am pretty happy with how everything had gone so far so I did a few tweaks to clean up the topology, removed some unnecessary objects that werent benefiting the model and then did some rearranged to a few elements to aid the robots movement qualitys. The model at this point is around the 14k poly mark. The final game model I guessed would be within the 16k poly range considering the extra additions left to be put in. This wasnt bad for current gen purposes (this also meant I wont have to go back later and rigorously remove geometry and details I would have liked to keep). Its pretty good to set yourself a realistic poly budget when modelling for games as it will only kick your self later if you just go crazy and model every last detail. Most beginners do the mistake of creating over the top geometry. I know I did when I was learning but then I burnt out a laptop so had to learn pretty swiftly after that. Good knowledge in how your geometry positioning aids your texturing is so important when creating assets for games so to dedicating a bit of time to your understanding if pretty much vital as a beginner artist.
This takes me up to date with what I have done so far but keep checking up for more updates.
