Viper MK2 Sharp Corners

[under9stars]

Hi Community,

So, I am endeavoring to build my own MK2 in subD from my much beloved BSG. I have a nice cage so far of the fuselage and I am starting to work on the cockpit area and will soon tackle the side opening that exposes some of the internals. I am having some serious challenges figuring out how to achieve some of the sharp corners needed in the indicated areas. Right now I am at the cockpit, but I see the same issues coming up once I get to the side details. I tried adding additional cuts to sharpen up the corners in question, but I am sure you can guess that I will start to experience unwanted creases when I have too many cuts to close together.

These are the sharp corner areas I will have to create, outlined with red lines.


This image shows the uncut cage.

This image shows cuts made and edges moved to sharpen up the cockpit surrounding edges and its several corners.


This image shows the result in subD mode. Corners are not sharp enough and to add more cuts will certainly result in unwanted creasing that has already begun to happen.


I would be forever grateful to get input and advice on how to approach these areas.

Thanks for looking.

-Jeremy

[JeffrySG]

Yes, that is always an important decision. Go with subd or just poly, or a combo. This viper is a case where I would probably start with subd to get the nice smooth look of the fuselage, and then I'd freeze the mesh and clean it up to remove the unneeded loops. Then you can start to cut away areas that you have picked out in red. Many of the really small elements will look nice with a single bevel on them or some small amount of rounding but I don't think it's necessary to have the full power of a subd model on those parts. And as you're finding, you're going to get to areas that are going to be incredibly difficult to subd model.

So, I would recommend getting the base fuselage done - nice and even and smooth - save a copy - and then freeze - clean it up - and then start to work in your detail elements.

I'm sure you'll get some other good input here too. You might even get someone who has worked on the show to give you a few tips.... one never knows...

--J

[JeffrySG]

ps. if it helps, you can look through my WIP on my viper. You'll very quickly see how my viper is not very detailed but it holds up in the renders. Mine was all poly modeled so it get's smoother as the wip images progress. It will at least show you how good a really crappy model can look. When I go back and look at my wires, the look really poor. But it will at least show you how I started building in some detail.

Viper Mk2 flicker wip images

Maybe WIZ or al3d could chime in with some advice as they have both built really great vipers...

[JeffrySG]

ps. you do have the zoic orthos for reference? if you don't let me know and I can email them to you.

[under9stars]

Jeff,

Once again, thank you so much for your help so far!!! Your suggestions definitely shed light on the situation and give me confidence to move forward.

I will most certainly spend some time looking over you WIP, which is really what I would like to get from you and others. I have put so much effort and faith into subD modeling lately that I think I have lost touch of the benefit of utilizing polys at times.

I do have the Zoic images and they are setup in my scene as the ref planes. Thanks for offering that.

I will continue to post my WIP and I look forward to anything else you have that comes to mind.

[under9stars]

Well, thanks again to "JeffrySG", I explored not trying to keep my mesh in subD, and froze to polys. This made a world of difference. It really opened a big door to hear that G.K.'s Viper for the show was done in LW and was most likely a poly model. So, after freezing, yes, there were many edge loops to select and delete, but Modo is great with this operation and I was able to clean up the resulting dense mesh in a matter of minutes. I then went on to give a trial run to creating that multiple angled edge around the cockpit with some point editing and then Modo's powerful beveling tools. I am feeling good about the results and will probably go to bed without cursing to myself. I hear "Al3D" did a very nice Viper (I was not able to find any posts of it, though) and some others, as well, so I would still love to hear input on the whole to subD or to poly topic, and any feedback on my WIP.
Tomorrow I shall repeat what I did tonight but take more care in order to produce a nice, clean mesh. The following images are of my test run.

Thanks for looking!

[JeffrySG]

Looking nice!

No problem on the input. Al's Viper was done a while ago (before the big server crash on SFM) so it's probably not available here anymore. Keep on posting updates as you have them.

[JeffrySG]

Also, if you edit your first post and attach a small picture using the forum file attachments, you'll get that as a thumbnail in the WIP section.

[D.M.J.]

When I built mine, I started with NURBS for the main hull, it was a surface lofted over cross sections placed at logical locations (the tip of the nose, tip, that little ridge across the nose half way down, the cockpit etc.), then converted to a sufficiently dense poly object to add details. That way I got a really nice complex curve to the hull AND the arbitrary geometry advantage of polys.

If you're determined (or restricted through app) to use Sub-D, although I gave up after a while when I tried it, I got some mileage out of it by not trying to model that ridge that runs along most of the length of the top of the nose (aaaargh @ imprecise descriptions, these things have no proper name that I can think of...) instead I modelled the nose smooth and added that in with extrudes and bevels after converting to poly. Otherwise the mesh tended to pinch horribly where the ridge merged in to the hull because of all the points clumped together.

[under9stars]

Originally Posted by JeffrySG

Also, if you edit your first post and attach a small picture using the forum file attachments, you'll get that as a thumbnail in the WIP section.

Sorry, Jeff. I am not quite sure what you were suggesting. Do you mind clarifying a bit more?

-Jeremy