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Hey folks,

I am completely new, green, wet behind the ears, etc... to modeling. Up until yesterday I had never tried anything like this.

I watched a dozen tutorials. "Just press U while left clicking and crtl-e and stand on your head and bla bla bla bla..." lol!

All kidding aside, I just can't follow these guys. I have to do to learn. They move too fast and explain too much for me so I just started banging on the keys and figuring stuff out.


What I know... or at least think I know...
(I am well aware that this is missing UV mapping and textures. I'm working on learning the basics of modeling for now)

1. build model

2. join parts

3. subsurf parts

4. smooth parts

5, make object single user

6. resize

7. export


I made the attached model and very bad texture (no laughing!) and imported it with Entity Maker.

First, the .x file is huge. Is this normal? Is there a way to reduce the size without making everything look blocky?

Second, I created a translucent alpha texture for the model but it appears see-through in all alpha areas.

Lastly, does anyone have a checklist style cheat sheet for Blender? I make one for everything. Half the battle is knowing what button you are digging through a dozen menus looking for

Thanks in advance

Hi rodent042,

You're off to a good start. Best thing to do to get used to any modeling program is to stick with it, and learn as much through trial and error as you do through tutorials. My advice, regardless of what anyone else here may chime in and tell you; stick with Blender. Granted, some seem to think it has a higher learning curve than other modeling programs, but you'll be glad you stuck with it in the long run because it can do so much more than what else is available within the same budget.

A bit more on topic, your model looks pretty good for being new to the trade. However, when you're working in Blender, make sure you always add new shapes to your mesh in EDIT MODE, so they will become part of the same object (unless of course, you want them to be seperate objects). Right now, your model consists of 5 seperate meshes, which can become a problem during the export process.

Simple fix. SHIFT + RIGHT-CLICK on all five of the meshes in OBJECT MODE (the TAB key toggles between OBJECT MODE and EDIT MODE), and then press CTRL + J to join the selected meshes.



You can scale your model up or down in Blender by pressing the S key in EDIT MODE while all of the faces are selected. If this is going to be an FPS Creator model, you can also scale down the model in the entity's .fpi script (scale=x where x is percent).

If this is going to be a game model, it's worth mentioning that 21,000 polygons is way too high for a single entity. In the top-right corner of Blender, you'll see these values;

VE: 10692 FA: 10624

The FA value tells you that there are 10,624 [quad] faces in the .blend file; which total 21,248 when converted to tris. A typical static FPS Creator model should fall under 1,000 quads, or 2,000 tris. This, of course, depends on what the model is. But for a potion vile such as what you have here, I would say that you could pull it off in under 500 polys.




Don't worry about the mesh not looking smooth in Blender. Your texture will take care of that, and help to smooth it out once it's applied.




Once you get used to Blender's hotkeys, it becomes a very efficient tool for modeling and UV mapping. Here are Blender's hotkeys;

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikibooks/en/8/82/BlenderHotkeysObjectMode.png

http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Blender_3D:_Noob_to_Pro/Hot_Keys

Kravenwolf

Thanks, Kravenwolf. I hate being the new kid with the tired old questions.

I assume what you mean is that when I create a sphere, for example, I should drop the segments and rings to something like 8 or 12 and disregard that it still looks slightly bumpy when smoothed.


Any idea on the transparency issue? Will mapping take care of that as well?