Work in Progress: Gothic Revival Cathedral (Part IV)

Well, I should probably start off with some kind of good wishes for the New Year, but I feel it is a bit late.  I have been trying to make this post for two weeks, but for some reason, every time I went to add a new post, the page was not fully loading.  Of course, it is hard to believe that it has been two months since I posted last.  Normally, I would fill this post with all kinds of delusions about what I would like to accomplish in the coming year, but since it is nearly one-twelfth over, I am going to leave that idea alone.

So here is the Gothic Revival Cathedral project revitalized.  I had a bit of work I was meaning to post in December about this and have added to it since, but here is where it stands at the moment.  The modeling is almost finished, all that is left is the front doors and scattered decorative items for the structure proper.  A small gate encircles the front still needs to be modeled.  Despite this project being on the back burner at the moment, which I will explain in my next post, I am really hoping to have the model modeled by Friday.  Aspects like UV mapping and texturing will be coming in the coming weeks and hopefully I can wrap this project up some time in February.

For those keeping score, the central spire and the front door's iron work are both new since last post.  Like I said, this project has been on my back burner while I am trying to find something to make a bit of money from my modeling ability.  I am hoping to have a post on that in the coming weeks, but like a said previously, that is for a later discussion.  Well, now that everyone knows I am still alive, I will leave my plan making for later.  Until next time,
~gunnah

Work in Progress: Gothic Revival Cathedral (Part IV)

Another week has come and gone and here I am showing what I have done during the week.  I finished the main window, meaning the only objects still needing to be modeled in the spires or the top portion of the main building are detail pieces.  The door has been coming along nicely.For the frame itself, I am only missing a handful of detail items.  Once these items are finished, I can quickly model the door which just looks like an iron gate.  With the door blocked in and nearing completion, at least to an equal point to the spires or windows, the only major piece to add is the central spire.  I am hoping the central spire goes together quickly, so by next weekend I have a fully modeled cathedral.  Once I am done modeling, I am thinking of posting the finished image of the gray model on a few sites to get some feedback.  From the people I have shown in person, they have all been very impressed, so I am hoping to get something a little more constructive out of the internet.  While waiting for replies, I will try to get the building UV unwrapped.  After unwrapping all that will be left will be to texture, make a final render and a bit of post production work.  If I continue to work like I have been and nothing comes up in the foreseeable future, I would expect this to take until mid December.

Besides the cathedral, I have been working on one other piece.  It is nowhere near complete enough to show off, however, I am hoping to eventually offer the 3D model for sale.  I have thought about trying to work the cathedral into a 3D print, but it would be on a very small scale since the model is over one hundred meters tall.Hopefully when this project has a slow point for visible progress, my other project will be in a decent enough completion that I can show it off.  I have also been considering going back to a project which I nearly finished and see if I cannot just add the final details and get several pieces done at once.  With any luck, I would like to have those two projects finished by the end of the year to at least have something to show off for a year's worth of effort.

Well, I think I dreamt enough for this post.  Until next time,
~gunnah

Work in Progress: Gothic Revival Cathedral (Part III)

So I got a bit more done on the cathedral over the last week.  Not quite what I had been hoping to get done, but I do feel I made decent progress.  The most obvious change is probably the sky I added.  I had been hoping to put it off adding it for a little while longer, but there is not much point to doing so much modeling and not seeing it in the best light.  The spires are almost done, I just have some decorative elements to add which do not add a whole lot to the structure as a while, but I feel would be noticed if missing.  I also began adding the main building.  The top bit is finished, except for perhaps a decorative element or two.  The main window has been blocked out and I just started adding the window framework.  This should be finished easily this week.  Once the main window is done, I will move on to the front door.  This is one of the more ornate pieces and may take some time to get everything modeled.  The last piece of the building after that will be the main spire rising from the center.  Once all of that is finished, I will add a few decorative elements to really sell the piece along with the steps and fence in front of the cathedral.  This is probably a few weeks away and I will not go into more detail on what follows because that is even further away.

Hopefully, everyone is liking how this is shaping up and that it will look even more complete next week.  Until next time,
~gunnah.

Work in Progress: Gothic Revival Cathedral (Part II)

So last post I had been fairly brief about this new project and why I had moved away from the original Gothic cathedral.  Probably the biggest motivation to change was because my computer died and I had been unsure of when I would be able to re-access my old files again.  The good news is that this time around, I did not loose them, so I am not starting over from square one like the last few times my computer died.  But now onto what separates Gothic Revival from Gothic architecture.  The spires to the left are nearly done, I will briefly mention what is missing, but for the most part they are complete.  The obvious difference, much less ornate.  In my original Gothic cathedral buttress, nothing was bare.  In very few spots were there straight, flat, vertical walls.  If it were not an arch it were a pillar filling up the space.  These spires are quite different.  Outside a few windows, it is not until above the buttress that there is any sort of complexity.  Almost two-thirds of the height is taken up by an uninterrupted sheer face.  However, this simplicity makes the parts which are ornate stand out that much more.  Many of the stylings are quite similar between the two projects, especially the detail in the vaulted windows.  Hopefully, I will have the spires completely modeled for the next post just to show the difference between the two designs.

Now to quickly go over what is wrong or missing.  The windows near the top of the buttress need some work after looking at the image again.They just do not seem vaulted enough.  Also, the are suppose to sit flush against the wall, though I think this, if textured well enough, could make the model look better than the reference.  Next, the small corner spires are missing the cross on top.  Also missing the cross are the small little projections from the corner spires.  The central spires are missing a projection window about two-thirds the way up and a cross on top.  The brace going between the spires has a cut out in the reference, but I am unsure if it would even be noticeable in this image.

Once the spires are done, I can move to the main door and start filling in the gap between the spires.  After that piece is complete, the only piece left of this project will the the main spire, but that is likely a decent way away.  My goal is to get the building modeled and then texture, trying to keep focused on one task at a time.  Until next time
~gunnah

Long Story, Work in Progress: Gothic Revival Cathedral (Part I)

I will talk more about the new cathedral I am doing next week, I am just going to leave it at the fact I went from a true Gothic to a Gothic revival cathedral.  So far I have the lower two/thirds done of the front towers.  Now for why I have been silent all October.  Shortly after my last post, during that first week in October, my parents got me a new graphics card.  It is a real nice one with twice the memory of the previous and all kinds of other really nice bonuses.  However, when I went to install it, my computer started giving me problems.  I only got it to turn on twice before I could not even get to the BIOS.  It took me a little over two weeks to get the parts to repair my computer.  I still do not have everything the way I had it, but it is slowly getting back to normal.  So far the computer has been running for about two weeks and I have not had any problems.  While I know it is unlikely in the next two months, I would like to eventually return to the two posts per week style had had going so long ago.  I really feel that forced me to produce more.  Plus if I missed a few in a row it would not be a month between posts.  Well, I think I am done venting, until next time,
~gunnah

Work-in-Progress: Cathedral (Flying Buttress Part II)

So, I did not get much more of the modeling end done this time around.  I had really been hoping to be further along with that aspect of the project, however, I did make progress.  Left is the textured model of the Flying Buttress.  Obvious changes including fixing the lighting and adding a ground plane.  Also, I changed the angle from which the render was taken.  I like this angle since it gives a sense of how truly massive this spire is suppose to be (the camera is now at the approximate height of an average human head).  I started beveling some of the spire, but I cannot see it enough to justify the increase in polygon count.  Finally, for the materials, I am happy with most.  There are a few spots with the one material which look overblown and I am going to need to find some way to fix those spots, but overall I think it came out decent.  I am unlikely to post another picture of the buttress since any further changes are going to be very minor.  Hopefully next time I post a buttress it will be in a full cathedral render.  Next up, the front doors of the building leading into the front two spires.  This building has three spires, two in the front and one where the side wings and main hall meet.  I do not know if I will get to that spire which is significantly smaller and from this angle it may not even be visible..  Until next time,
~gunnah

Work-in-Progress: Cathedral (Flying Buttress Part I)

To challenge myself to bring my modeling to a new level, I have picked to model something that is probably at the limit of my modeling skills: the Gothic Cathedral.  I have always found these structures to be very impressive, but what I feel is unique is the high level of detail on the exterior of the building worked into the stone.  So far I have made the most repeated unit of the cathedral, the flying buttress.  The model, not textured, is to the right, though the image is slightly warped just from the scale of the model.  I am making the model in real units and the top of the highest cross on the buttress is just over seventy meters tall.  I feel fairly pleased with how the model came out, though I want to texture it before I put it on a forum or two for critiques.  Hopefully, I can get the textures done fairly quickly, though there are quite a few pieces to this model and that is likely to slow down the overall speed.  My only concern is the amount of memory it is going to take to render the overall scene.  This model alone has about 125,000 polygons and is going to be repeated quite a few times around the finished model.  Of course I am going to try every possible way to cut back, especially when putting together the final model, but for the level of detail in this style of building, I needed that many polygons.  There are section I would have used more, but I had to cut back, trying to remember objects a few centimeters in size are unlikely to even be noticeable in the final render.

Once this section is done, I have broken down the rest of the building.  The doors will be next and while not especially difficult, they do have sculptures all around which means a high polygon count for them also.  Then comes the spires, one of the defining aspects of this kind of building.  While the doors will likely have a higher polygon count, I know I will need to devout a sizable number to get the overall shape, even if I am not going for an excessively high level of detail.  The spires also have several sculptures, most notably the gargoyles which stand sentinel over the building.  Finally comes the building of the cathedral itself.  This will be of moderate polygon count since most of the detail is handled in one of the other pieces, but the large amount of stained glass will eat up polygons.  While probably not realistic, I am hoping the final model will be about three million polygons.  I am not completely sure if my computer can handle this, but I know if it gets much higher the chances will go down drastically.

Finally the schedule.  I am trying to do this for a contest, though I do not want to sacrifice the render for finishing on time.  With that in mind, I am hoping to finish one section of the building each week, which means I am already behind.  Until next time,
~gunnah