BlenderArt Magazine - 09 - Space

BlenderArt Magazine Issue 9 | March 2007
Blender Learning Made Easy
How To Make A Realistic Planet In Blender
Making A Sun-like Star In Blender
Texturing An Alien Using Nodes
Modeling A Low Poly Space Ship
Modeling An Alien Using Subsurf
www.blenderart.org 1 Issue 9 March 2007

EDITORIAL
“Space, the final frontier. These are Space would be complete without
the voyages ….” Sorry, I just spaceships and aliens.
couldn't resist. Star Trek was my
first introduction to space as a Whatever your interest in Space,
child. I can still remember watching we have you covered. Also, this
every week with my father. It had issue brings back the popular
such amazing space scenes and, of “Meet the Blenderhead” series of
course, alien races. It fascinated articles by Derek Marsh, (BgDM),
me then, and continues to as he interviews Ecks, (Jean-
Sandra Gilbert fascinate me to this day. Sébastien Guillemette).
Managing Editor
Space is a popular topic among CG So get ready for your own grand
artists and 3D modelers. Much of space adventure that is waiting for
its appeal is due to the fact that you.
there are no hard and fast rules as
to how it should look. Anything
Happy Blending!
goes and often does. The fact that
telescopes have now charted and sandra@blenderart.org
photographed sections of space
only fuels the imagination.
Actual star fields and nebulae

become the backgrounds to frame
our fantastical space ships and
aliens. Meteor showers rain past
alien planets as ships battle
nearby. From highly detailed space
ships to often bizarre looking
aliens, CG art is filled with space
scenes taken directly from our
deepest imaginations.
In this issue, we have a wide array

of tutorials covering a variety of
space topics. We discuss some of
the best ways to set up star fields
as well as discuss some of the
pitfalls of lighting in space. We
have in-depth tutorials on creating
Sun-like stars and a realistic
planet. And of course, no issue on

CONTENTS
EDITOR/DESIGNER
Gaurav Nawani gaurav@blenderart.org
MANAGING EDITOR
S andra Gilbert sandra@blenderart.org
Creating A Heatwave Ex haust Effect With
W EBSITE
Nam Pham nam@blenderart.org
The Displace Modifier 7
PROOFER
Kernon Dillon How To Make A Realistic Planet In Blender 11
Phillip A.Ryals
Kevin C. Braun
Derek Mars h
Bruce Wes tfall Making A Sun-like Star In Blender 16
W RITERS
Kos tis Karvouniari
Enrico Valenza Modeling An Alien Using Subsurf 22
Luís Belerique
Tim Kennedy
Robbert Fos ter
Derek Mars h Tex turing An Alien Using Nodes 37
C OPYRIGHT© 2006
‘BlenderArt Magazine’,‘blenderart’ and
BlenderArt logo are copyright of Gaurav Modeling A Low Poly Space Ship 42
Nawani. ‘Izzy’ and ‘Izzy logo’ are copyright
S andra Gilbert. All products and company
names featured in the publication are
trademark or regis tered trade marks of The Making Of 'Project Utopia' 46
their res pective owners .
C OVER ART
Enrico Valenza - ' Golden S hips '

Blender News
At the time of writing this article, the

price was still at the pre-sale amount 'Essential Blender' will get you
of $26.39 USD. working with modeling, materials and
texturing, lighting, particle systems,
There are Look Inside!(tm) pages several kinds of animation, and
February was a great month for available to give you a sneak peek at rendering. In addition, there are
Blender fans. what to expect. Everyone that has chapters on the new mesh sculpting
already received their copy, is very tools and the brilliant compositor. For
Blender 2.43 released with an impressed with the quality of the users familiar with other 3D packages,
amazing set of new features and book. Well done Tony! BlenderArt there are separate indices that
improvements. It can be downloaded wishes you and your book all the best! reference topics using your
at application's terminology.
http://www.blender.org/download/get-
blender/. In addition to the Release If you've been looking for a way to
Notes, this version also has some very give yourself a solid foundation in the
nice demo videos showcasing the new basic tools and techniques of Blender,
features. 'Essential Blender' is there for you!
The same day Blender 2.43 was March Goodness The book editor, Roland Hess, is a
released, www.blender.org unveiled Plumiferos is presenting a fresh new professional writer and Blender user
its new website design. Sporting an trailer with real sequences from the for almost a decade. He has brought
edgy new look; the website has film at the 22nd Mar del Plata Film together a team of the best writers
completed its first target in the Festival on March 10th. Additionally, and artists in the Blender community
website migration project by they will be presenting several to help on creating this new standard
migrating the core blender.org site to completed sequences in a special Blender guide.
a new server and redesigning the session that day.
content and templates. Since not all
content pages fit nicely into the new 'Essential Blender', is now * Up to date with (upcoming) 2.44
design, look for further changes as available for pre-sale orders. (EUR Blender
everything is redone and placed into 29/34.52 USD) * About 350 pages B&W
* Stitched binding, quality paper, full
the new design. 'Essential Blender' the next book color cover
from the Blender Foundation, is your * DVD Rom with all necessary files and
The long awaited book, Introducing official guide to learning the demos
Character Animation with Blender by fundamentals of this open and free 3D * Shipping expected to start 2nd week
Tony Mullen (bugman_2000), is on software suite. The book can be used May.
sale at Amazon as a step-by-step guide for people
(http://www.amazon.com/Introducing- new to Blender or new to the latest
Character-Animation-Blender- changes in Blender.
DVD/pd/0470102608). This book is the ideal companion for
the previous 2.3 Blender guide.

Izzy Speaks – Space Scenes
standard for space scenes to appear look at a barely lit spaceship sitting in
well lit no matter where the scene is a sea of total black; time to change
staged. locations.
That being the case, let’s discuss how Okay, now I have moved my
to light Hollywood’s idea of a realistic spaceship into a nice galaxy that has
space scene. Now as a normal rule a rather beautiful blue nebula. In fact,
when deciding on lighting, you would this is going to make a nice
go visit/investigate or do some background for my image; back into
research on the type of scene you the spacesuit. Once I have gone back
were creating. But since my spaceship outside, I notice that not only is my
and spacesuit are on back order, we spaceship lit nicely, but that there are
will have to take an imaginary trip to some lovely blue reflections from the
check out our lighting options. nebula that will add a nice effect to
my image. Also, my running lights
So here we are, in outer space. I now appear to actually be helping the
parked my spaceship in the first scene by lighting up areas that aren’t
empty sector of space I came to receiving any reflected light from the
Lighting in Space (wouldn’t want to interfere with nebula or nearby stars.
anyone else’s lighting research),
Outer space scenes can be one of the climbed into my spacesuit and went Back on Earth at our computer, let’s
most challenging areas to light outside for a look. Hmmm, it’s awfully discuss what we learned from our
properly. Let’s face it, space is filled dark out here. In fact, I can’t see research.
with random areas of faint to intense anything. Whoops, forgot to turn my
light from stars and reflected light helmet light on. Hehe, well now I can • Space is very dark.
from planets and moons. But in see my hands, but I still can’t see my
between those areas of over- spaceship. I know it’s over there • Turning on the running lights
abundant light, there is a whole lot of somewhere. Maybe if I turn on my on your spaceship can be an
darkness; serious, inky, black ship’s running lights. Now where did I effective way to light up areas
darkness where you can’t even see put that remote, ah there it is. Beep, that aren’t receiving any
your hand in front of your face. beep; there it is. Now my ship is direct or reflected light,
visible, sort of. allowing the spaceship to
If you are going for a realistic render, stand out better from the
chances are your scene would look Just my luck, I didn’t purchase the space background.
rather poorly lit or blown out, “light it up perfectly” add-on package
depending on where you choose to for my ship. Well this obviously isn’t • Location is very important
stage your scene. Fortunately, or going to work. Not only can I barely when staging a space scene;
unfortunately (depending on how you see my spaceship, but I can tell right make sure there are logical
look at it), Hollywood has set the away that the rendered image is reasons for the lights you are
going to be very boring. Who wants to going to add.

Izzy Speaks – Space Scenes
can add our lights and space elements

• Use stars/suns to create direct to our scene and render out our
light; nebulae, moons and beautiful Hollywood space scene ■
planets to mimic reflected
light.
• Don’t forget, when adding

your light-source space
elements, to set your lamps to
match the color of the space
element. A blue nebula isn't
going to cast white studio
light. Matching the color of the
space element will tie your
ship more firmly into the
scene.
• While it wasn’t overly obvious

from our research, keep in
mind that shadows still play
an important part in your
scene. Use just enough light
to illuminate your model, but
don’t light it so much that you
lose all shadows. Remember,
space is dark.
• Also remember that some of

your space elements should
cast shadows, like planets,
moons asteroids, and space
debris. Try not to park your
space ship fully in the shadow
of large shadow casting
elements. It will end up being
harder to convincingly light
your spaceship.
Well with our research completed, we

3D Workshop – Displacement Mapping for Exhaust
of simplicity and speed, this is a static Creating the Particles

Creating A Heatwave Exhaust scene. The spacecraft is warming up
it's engines in preparation for launch, Each engine is supposed to produce a
Effect With The Displace Node which means I only had to render the heatwave, so we 'll give each a
background image once. I then used particle generator. Add a plane, name
that image in all of the sequence it Particle_emitter_1, press Alt+R to
By Kostis Karvouniaris frames. The particles are the only clear its rotation, rotate it so that it is
moving element. in a vertical position, and place it
inside the left engine just behind the
Level: Beginner to Intermediate Load the engine_warmup_start file. blue lights that illuminate the
The scene is set up and lit, so go fuselage.
ahead and hit the Render button.
Keep in mind that because the scene
Introduction is heavy in polygons and lights, it may
For quite some time, a question has take some time for the render to be
been circulating through forums and completed. The upside is that it's only
mail columns about an uncommon a one time job, and the quality of this
effect in 3d applications: How do I image will greatly define the end
simulate the distortion caused by hot result. So go and make that coffee,
air masses? We've all seen this in real and when the image is done save it as
life - the waviness in the air during Viper.png. You should notice that the Fig 2: Placing the first particle emitter
Formula 1 races, in jet engine elements making up the rendered
exhaust, and above camp fires. scene are gathered in the first 3 Now press F7 twice to get to the
However, in keeping with this issue's layers, so only these layers are effects window, and set up a particle
theme, we're going to use the effect rendered. system with the following options
in a space scene. (these came up through
experimenting, so feel free to do so
yourself too).
Rendering the background
• Amount: 8520 (we will need
The inputs for the displace node are quite a few),
relatively simple: It needs an image to • Start frame: -100 (we want
be distorted, and a displacement to give the impression that
factor in the form of a vector. In this the engines are already
example I've used a particle generator running at the start of the
for each engine, which will generate a animation)
series of black and white images for • End frame: 1000 (for those
use as the displacement factor for the who want to extend the length
node. Confused? Just follow the steps of the animation)
Fig 1: Render layers for background.
and it will become clear. For reasons

Set the particles to be emitted from the animation curve if you think it's should be able to see all the little
both Vertices and Faces, having an necessary. white dots inside the engines. Try
initial Normal speed of 0.44 and a harder...
Random factor 0.05. Remember, We now have a fully prepared particle
variation is always a must (this will generator. With that selected, press M
cause the particles to spread out while and move it to the 4th layer. Now we
moving away from the fuselage, just need two more, for the other two
like real gas masses do).
Fig 4:All particle emitters in action
Press Alt+A to see the animation. The

particles are moving away from the
Fig 3: Particle options engines. Duplicate (with Shift+D) the ship with enough speed and variation,
particle emitter twice and place the so we are ready to render them. Press
As usual, the next thing to set up is new ones according in their respective F10 and set the End Frame to 100.
the material. Press F5, then press Halo positions. Don't create Instances with That should give us a 4 seconds
under the Render Pipeline section. Set Alt+D, since it would be a good idea animation, well enough to
the Halo size to 0.180 (this size is to go and tweak the emission settings demonstrate the effect.
pretty important and I will explain why for each emitter individually (to offset
later), and then set the Halo color to the start values), so that there is a However, remember that we only
pure white. At this point you should unique behavior of each separate want to render the particles, not any
also notice that the sky color in the particle group for any given frame. other part of the scene. Under the
world buttons is black. We need all the Render Layers tab, press only the 4th
contrast we can get from the rendered Set the start value for the second layer button. Then press the ANIM
image of the particles for the displace emitter to -104 and -110 for the third button to get the sequence. Even
node to give the right effect. one. If everything is set up correctly, though this is a hundred frames we
you should now have a result like this want, they will render much faster
As a last thing, while at frame 1 press at frame 1 (only layers 3 and 4 are than the background image - it's just
I and insert an Alpha key. Go to the visible). Note: when the much awaited particles, and not that many in every
frame 25, set Alpha to 0 and add particle rewrite is complete -the next frame. Once they 're ready we can
another key. We do this because we big thing in Blender development- move on to the really cool stuff.
want particles to fade while they there will be many draw option for
move away from the emitter. Adjust particles(e.g crosses). For now you

node to the composite node. Add It would be more effective visually if

another image node and this time we weren't limited to a single
choose the first particle image, displacement factor, like the sequence
0001.png. Since this is the first of a of particles, which can rarely be
sequence of images, we have to perfect. Fortunately, we can take care
inform Blender of that. Press the little of this easily. We 'll use the same
grey face icon on the bottom right of sequence of particles with a slight
Fig 5: Render layer for particles the Image node and choose offset (2), to add some 'depth' to the
Sequence. Now Blender will use a displacement to cover possible 'gaps'.
Putting it all together different particle image for every So add one more displace and one
frame, another long awaited addition more image node, and set them up
You should have now the “Viper.png” of the new v2.43. like this. A word of caution: the
image and a series of 100 images second node won't have a feed in the
named something like 0001.png, Note: You have to manually define the last two frames because of the offset,
0002.png and so on, presumably in number of images in the sequence, in so be sure to press the 'Cyclic' button
your 'C:\tmp' folder or wherever this case 100. Plug the output into the and it it will start using frames from
you've set Blender to store rendered vector input of the displace node, the beginning when it runs out.
images at. Press Ctrl+X to clear the change the X and Y values to 7
scene and start setting up the (nothing too extreme, nor too subtle),
composition. First of all, set the output and there you have it. The values of
dimensions to 800x450, like our white in the particle images are
images. Then set the end frame to multiplied with the X and Y values to
100, and press the 'Do Composite' give the displacement amount.
button and choose avi output format
and a codec since this will be what
you would call the final result.
Switch to a node type window, and

press the right little button on the
header that switches you to the
composite node window. Next, get rid Fig 7: Secondary node setup
of the render result node, as we'll be
working only with our pre-rendered Notice that the second displacement
images. Add an Input-Image node and has multiplier values of 3, instead of
load the 'Viper.png' image. Add the 7, as it is only a 'support effect'. Also,
Distort-Displace node and connect the we wouldn't want it to cancel out the
output from the image node to the effect of the first node in any way. You
image input of the displace node, then Fig 6: Primary node setup are now ready to press the ANIM
connect the result of the displace button once again. When the video is

ready you can set your media player desired effect.

to loop playback and play the file. The
particle movement is random anyway,
so you won't be able to tell where the
video starts or ends.
Things to pay attention to
As I explained earlier, the amount of

white on the image that is used as an
input to the displace node (or better, The Node Displacement in action.
the amount of luminosity) is what Fig 8: Halo size difference
defines how much displacement there
will actually be on the image.
A more important thing for the effect In Conclusion

we want, however, is a constant Keep in mind that the displace node
change of color values at any given can also use geometry as input, not
part of the particle images. It's not just images, which widens its range of
enough to have a white area in the use even further. This makes it a very
picture all along the sequence, important addition of the new version
because that will mean a constant of Blender. A practical application of
displacement. During the animation it this could be the “invisible man“
will look like there is no displacement effect, or anything else that makes it's
at all! What we really need is a presence 'perceivable' only by
constantly changing displace- distorting it's background. Use your
ment. This is why we need a imagination, and keep blending!
relatively small particle size, so that
white will constantly alternate with Thanks to the people of
black, or values in between, providing BlenderGalactica.com for the fine
the flicker effect in the image. This models of the Viper and its Kostis Karvouniaris I'm a 25
example will make things more clear surroundings ■ year old law school student
from Greece. I have been using
The image on the left shows our Blender as a free time hobby for
current particles with a size of 0.180 about 4 years, and I'm still
(material buttons). On the right they amazed by the leaps in
are rendered with a size of 0.280. In development.
the areas marked red, the color will be
mostly white throughout the neogen556@yahoo.gr
sequence, so it will not give the

3D Workshop – How To Make A Realistic Planet In Blender
for rendering but more effective The set

How To Make A Realistic method used a circular set of
Planet In Blender dupliverted lamps to light up the
The first thing to decide is whether we
"borders" of the planet.
will have to do a whole planet or just a
slice of it? For the Ovoships image,
by Enrico Valenza
(and animation), I opted for just a
slice(a "dome") of the planet as there
was no need for a whole sphere in the
scene. The technique, anyway, works
just the same, but with a sliced part
we can easily use very big and
detailed textures.
So, let's start adding a big UV-sphere

primitive to our scene...
Introduction Above you can see the effects of the

both the techniques. Blender 2.4x has
This tutorial works also with versions a true fresnel effect so we don't need
of Blender earlier than 2.30, other ... and then erase the unnecessary
to fake it anymore.
than that I had to fake the fresnel vertices to have the dome as in the
effect in 2.23. To fake the fresnel image above. This way we also are
Following are the techniques I used
effect, I used two methods: the first, able to keep the geometric center of
for rendering the planet scene as in
the faster for rendering used a "blend" the object as if it were the whole
image "Golden Planet", using Blender
procedural texture; the second, slower sphere. This is useful for the next
ver. 2.31a.
step.

With SHIFT-D duplicate the dome two Add a tube primitive to the scene and effect from space...
times, each time increasing the size of scale it to make it larger than higher,
the duplicates a bit, (for this use the N (see the following image). I mapped The planet surface material
key); for example, the starting dome the tube in UV mapping, on each face
will have size = 1.000, dome 2 will so to have a perfect ring, with this Of course, a very important thing is
have size = 1.002 and dome 3 size = "gradient" texture: the kind of textures we choose and
1.004. the way we use it. For the Golden
Planet's main color I used this texture,
This ring must be placed around the (it's a faked Venus color map that you
three domes; more details about the can easily find on the net):
material at page 4.
But before the textures comes the

general material setting for the planet
surface:
Here it is, our completed set. I placed

The first a spot with shadows as key-light, a
dome "quad/sphere" lamp at the geometric
will be center of
the the domes
used as to fake
planet the planet
surface, radiosity
the and
second another
one as lamp on a
cloud side, to
layer have a
and the third will be used for the light blue
fresnel effect of the atmosphere. radiosity

You can see that I used all the eight ("emitvenus"): This is the result, ("maskoceani"); the
texture slots, and we are going to see stencil map works on the specularity
all of them in detail. First, this is the and has a little bump effect too...
setting for the color map,
("colvenus"):
At this point, because the texture

does not have defined continents, it's ... and, as you can see in the image
time to create some. I used this below, (rendered with only the stencil
I applied the texture in UV mapping, slightly modified, (the "rivers") Earth channel active), the stencil map
(a simple "from window" option from map and I created its alpha channel, "splits" the sea from the land.
above), but actually orco mode would (the checkered background is the
have worked too. (Well, of course, if Gimp's one):
you are doing a whole planet you
have to apply it in sphere mode...)
The planet surface material 2

Seems that in Blender the limit for a
The color map applied. Then I loaded tga with an alpha channel is a 4000 At this point we add a procedural
a grey scale version of the same dpi image; bigger targas with texture to the surface; this is just to
texture both for the specularity and transparency don't show in the display the "sphericity" of the planet.
the diffuse channel ("specvenus" and rendering, nor in the texture preview Choose a "blend-sphere" and set it
"diffvenus"): window. But the image has to have an this way:
alpha channel of its own because, as
you can see here, it must work as a
"stencil":
And then also for the emit channel

Of course, all the textures we placed

after the stencil map, ("maskoceani")
will affect only the oceans, that is the
transparent areas of the stencil map.
Well, the planet surface is ready. Now
let's go for the clouds!
Now it's time for another procedural,
stucci, to add a kind of "roughness" to
the oceans surface:
The clouds material
As for the stencil map, I made a tile-

able 4k map with alpha channel of the
clouds. Then I set the material:
I copied the oceans stucci from the
surface material and pasted it into the
clouds one, to have a little more
movement:
The first texture channel works as a

stencil for the transparency of the
Set the stucci's size as little as you clouds; the others are for tweaking
can. And now, a last procedural for color, bumping, specularity, diffusion
the oceans, (damn!... No more texture and a little emit:
And last, I also copied and pasted the
slots...), a "blend-sphere" again:
last blend we used for the surface,
("blendvenus"), to amalgamate the
clouds layer to the surface's one:

The fresnel disturbing flickering of the pixels on

the screen, (at least if you enable the
The fresnel effect is really simple, and motion blur button...). If you are going
there is no need for textures of any to render a whole planet, don't worry
kind: about the atmosphere halo effect; in a
real shot it wouldn't be visible at all
from such a distance (as you can see
in many NASA images of the Earth's
far orbit)■
Two textures for the halo, the first for

the color and the second for the
transparency:
At this point, we are finished.

Rendering all this together we have Enrico Valenza (aka EnV) is a
The atmosphere halo our Golden Planet: freelance illus trator living in Italy.
Bes ides all the traditional painting
All this works perfectly with techniques he us ed for 20 years , he
As I've already explained on page 1, s tarted to us e cg with The Gimp and
the halo is a simple gradient image animations too; but if you are
planning to make one, let me give you Blender almos t 3 or 4 years ago.
mapped with UV on a tube, to have a Thanks to Blender, he’s hopefully
ring around the planet domes. This is two pieces of advice.
moving towards animation.
the material: Instead of the stucci procedural for
the ocean and the clouds, use the
env@ enricovalenza.com
"fixnoise.dll" plug-in, it avoids the

3D Workshop – Making A Sun-like Star In Blender
Making the Sun Green and Blue) values, just be sure

Making A Sun-like Star In that the "Col" button is pressed.
Blender Step 1: Photosphere
The RGB values are R=1.000,
G=1.000 and B=0.200.
First of all, you must know the very
by Luís Belerique
basics of Blender's interface. If that is
not the case, go here
(http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Man
Level: Intermediate
ual/The_Interface).
Open up Blender, and if you have the

Introduction default scene, erase the cube with [x]
Stars are the most famous or [Del]. Now add a sphere;
astronomical objects, besides planets Add>>Mesh>>UVsphere and use the
and dangerous comets and asteroids. default values of 32 for Rings and
When making a movie in space, most Segments. Now change from Edit
of the time they're just specks of light Mode to Object Mode [Tab]. In the
against the blackness of space. But Buttons Window, in Editing context
sometimes it is needed to see a star [F9], click on the "Set Smooth" button
very close to the camera. The in the "Links and Materials" panel to
objective of this tutorial is to do a Sun- get rid of the faceted look. Also, change the specularity ("Spec"
like star that can be seen up close, slider) to 0 and emissivity ("Emit"
that will be animated and using only From now on, most of the work will be slider) to 0.5. These settings can be
procedural textures. done in the material of the sphere, so found in the "Shaders" panel. Change
let's add a new material to the sphere. the name of this material to
In this tutorial I will be using Blender Change context of the buttons "photosphere" in the "Links and
2.43, but it can also be made in 2.42a. Window to "Shading" by pressing [F5] Pipeline" panel.
Before starting this tutorial, you in the panel "Links and Pipeline",
should get some reference images for press the "Add New" button. Now our
studying and inspirational purposes. Sun has a material but it's grey and Step 2: Granules
Just a small note, this tutorial is a dull, nothing like a star.
result of experiments I made when Time to add granulation, an effect
trying to create a Sun, so some The first thing we must change is the caused by "convection" of hot gas at
settings are the best that I found for colour of the material; click on the the surface of the Sun, similar to
my project, as a result of trial and grey-coloured rectangle next to the boiling water.
error. Col(our) button in the Material panel
So you are invited to use them only as to use the colour picker and choose a To achieve this effect we're going to
guidelines, not absolute truths. yellowish colour. You can also change use textures. Press [F6] to access the
the colour by changing the RGB (Red, sub-context Texture in the buttons

window. Now we're going to create a texture can do to a material, and direction of the light.
new texture by clicking on the "Add notice that the "Col" button is
New" button and then in the texture pressed. Below you can see a pink
Type menu choose "Voronoi". This rectangle. Click on it and use the
kind of texture is very good to colour picker to choose a more orange
simulate veins, scales and also the colour (R=1.000, G=0.465, B=0.000).
granulation at the Sun's surface.
Change the name of the texture to Now we can check out how our sun is
"convection" by clicking on the name looking, by making a render [F12].
and editing it. It's a good idea to keep The sun looks more like a planet,
"logical" names in textures, materials because it has a distinct shadow area.
and so on. To the right appears a new We must change the location of the
panel, called "Voronoi". camera and the light for a more
convincing effect.
Here you can change some
parameters of this texture, like the Switch to the front view in the 3D Step 3: Animating the
size of the "cells". Change the "Size" Window by pressing [NUM1]. Align the granules
parameter to 0.050, like the image camera with view by pressing
below. [Ctrl+Alt+NUM0]. Now align the lamp The granules exist for small periods of
with the camera by selecting first the time, usually a few minutes, and give
Going back to the "Material" sub- lamp (selection made with [RMB]) and the photosphere a boiling appearance.
context [F5] we see in the preview then the camera [Shift+RMB]. We can animate the "convection"
texture's offset in the Z axis to
The last selected object (in this case, simulate this effect.
the camera) is the active object. Now
press [Ctrl+C] to bring up the "Copy Change the screen layout to a pre-
Attributes" menu and choose configured layout called "1-Animation"
"Location". We have made the lamp
move to the exact location where the Make sure that the Sun is selected
that our Sun yellow has now pink camera is. and that the buttons window is in
"granules". A texture can alter several
aspects of a material, like colour or Now render again [F12]. The shadow
transparency. By default, every new now is located round the limb. Change
texture affects the colour of the the type of the lamp to "Sun" by
material and this colour is pink. selecting the lamp (with the button
window in the "Material" context)
To change the colour of our texture, Orient it towards the sphere (aligned
go to the "Map To" panel (usually it's with the camera) by rotating [R] in the
the rightmost panel). In this panel we right viewport [NUM3]. As you rotate
see the different kind of effects that a the lamp, a dashed line marks the

"Shading" context and "Material" sub- the steepness by entering in edit and alpha = 1 (totally opaque). You
context. To the right you can see the mode [TAB], selecting one of the can change the attributes of any of
"IPO Curve Editor". Normally, the IPO control vertices with [RMB] and these "colour positions" by clicking on
window shows parameters related to moving it with [G] and finally exiting it and changing the colour by (you
an object, like location or rotation. But edit mode [TAB]. guessed it) clicking on the coloured
we're more interested in parameters rectangle or changing directly the
related to the material of the object, A final step must be made, we must RGB values.
so change to "Material" in the menu change how the texture is mapped to
located in the header of the IPO the sphere. In the "Material" sub- Change the left colour position's
window. context [F5], go to the "Map Input" colour to pure red (R=1, G=B=0) and
panel and modify the settings of the change alpha to 1. In the right
To the right of the IPO window we can matrix on the bottom according to the position, change the colour to yellow
see the list of parameters, known as image below. (R=G=1, B=0) and alpha to 0.
"channels". We can scroll up and
down this list by pressing [MMB] and If you wish, you can go
moving the mouse up or down. Scroll back to the "2-Model"
down for the channel "OfsZ", then screen layout.
select it with [LMB]. The lettering will
become white and a grey rectangle
will appear to the left of the name,
indicating that this channel is
selected.
Step 4: Limb Darkening
Now click with [CTRL+LMB] once in
the main area of the IPO window. A Now we're going to recreate the effect
white dot and a purple line will of "limb darkening" visible on the Sun,
appear. Now click again with with the help of Ramp Shaders (For Change the input type (in the bottom
[Ctrl+LMB], on a different place. A more info on the Ramp Shaders, visit of the panel) to "Normal". So, the way
second white dot appears where you http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Man this color ramp shader is set up, our
clicked and the IPO curve now draws a ual/PartIII/Ramp_Shaders). Sun has a red colour in the limb that
curve between the two keyframes (the progressively blends with the material
white dots). Now, extend the IPO In the buttons window, access the towards the center of the Sun,
curve infinitely by choosing "Ramps" panel and make sure that imitating the limb darkening.
Curve>>Extend the "Show Col Ramp" is pressed. Now
Mode>>Extrapolation. click on the "Colorband" to create a Step 5: Sun Spots
gradient to be used by the Color
The steepness of this line affects the Ramp. In this gradient we have the If you render the Sun, it has granules
rate at which changes the Z offset; left end of the colorband black and and the limb darkening. Now we need
the steeper the line the faster it with alpha = 0 (meaning that is totally some sun spots. We're going to use
changes the Z offset. You can change transparent). The other end is blue

another procedural texture for this. sphere, with default settings;

This will be a similar procedure to the Add>>Mesh>>UVsphere. We're going
one used in making the granules. to use this mesh as an emitter of
particles. Change the buttons
Activate the "Textures" sub-context window's context to "Object" [F7] and
[F6] and click on the free texture slot the sub-context "Physics". Add a new
just below the "convection" slot. Add a particle system by pressing the "New"
new texture and name it "sun spots". end is at 0.600, you can change it in button in the "Particles" panel.
Choose for texture type "Musgrave". A the "Pos" slider, making the colorband Change the settings of the particle
new panel, called "Musgrave" appears become transparent "earlier". This will system in the "Particles" and "Particle
where you can change the settings allow for smaller and fewer patches, Motion" panels to match the ones
related to this texture. Change the looking more similar to sun spots. shown in the image below.
Musgrave type (the menu at the top of Render another image to see the
the panel) to "Hybrid Multifractal" and effect.
change the remaining settings as
described in the screenshot below. If you move the left end of the
Once again we can render [F12] an colorband closer to the right end, the
contrast of the spots will increase,
making them more visible.
Finally, we are done making the To view the animated particles, make
photosphere of our star. Now we sure the cursor is on the 3D window
move on making other elements and press [Alt+A]. To stop the preview
present in the atmosphere of a Sun- animation press [Esc].
like star, starting by the solar corona.
image to see the result, but you will
see the Sun bathed in pink, with only Step 7: Solar Corona –
some yellow patches. The pink colour Step 6: Solar Corona - Material
should be expected by now (see the Particle System
explanation in the Granules section). If we render a frame now, we'll see
But the effect should be reversed...we The Solar Corona surrounds the that the particles have a grey colour.
only want small black patches on the photosphere, and is composed of very Quite naturally, we have to create a
Sun. hot gases but it has a very low material and tweak it. Create a new
density, only visible to us during a material and in the "Links and
How to solve this problem? Simple, total solar eclipse. But here we're Pipeline" panel press the "Halo"
use a colorband. Go to the "Color" going to depart from the scientifically button. This is a special kind of
panel. Here we're going to use a correct. Change to a different layer, material which shows up in the
colorband to "invert" the effect. Use for example if you have been working vertices only. Name this material
the image below as guide. in layer 1, change to layer 2 by "solar corona" and give it a red colour.
Notice that the position of the right pressing [2]. Here we add another Change the remaining settings as

shown in the image below. at 1, press [I] to bring up the "Insert To keep this organized, let's work on
We're going to use a texture to Key" menu and choose "Alpha". another layer. Remember, the
photosphere is on layer 1 and the
We have now keyframed the alpha solar corona on layer 2, so go to layer
value at 1, in frame 1. Now move to 3 by pressing [3]. Here create a circle
frame 51 by pressing 5 times in [Up (Add>>Mesh>>Circle) with the
Arrow] (each [Up Arrow] advances 10 default 32 vertices. Next (with all the
frames and [Down Arrow] goes back vertices selected) press [Shift+F] to
10 frames). Change the alpha value to fill in faces. Now, exit to Object mode
introduce some variation in the 0 and insert another keyframe. Now [TAB].
particles, giving a more irregular look each particle will fade out instead of
to the corona. That's why the simply disappearing when it "dies". It's a good idea to keep the layer with
"HaloTex" button is pressed. Go to the the photosphere visible, so press
sub-context "Texture" [F7] and create It is advisable to increase the sizes of [Shift+1] to keep the first and third
a new texture, called "variation". Use the "corona" sphere and layers visible. If the sphere is drawn
the image below as a guide for the "photosphere" sphere for a better solid and hides the circle, press [Z] to
settings used, but the idea here is to effect. Select the corona sphere [RMB] switch to wireframe mode. Now, move
create a clouds texture with a and press [S] and then [1.4] to the circle [G] to the side of the sphere
colorband to change the colour from increase its size to 1.4. Go to the layer and rotate it [R] in order to make it
totally transparent black (the left end) where the other sphere is (in layer 1) parallel to the surface. Also, scale it
to a totally opaque red (the right end). select it and scale it to 2 (press [S] [S] down to 0.1. Now, in layer 3, add a
We are almost done here, but there's and [2]). curve with Add>> Curve>> Path. In
edit mode, adjust its vertices so it
Step 8: Solar Flares makes a loop, with one end placed in
the circle.
Solar flares are one of the most
spectacular features of the Sun. Now select the circle, and transform it
Titanic plumes of hot gas that can into a particle system, with the
have 350,000 km in length, larger settings shown below.
than 28 Earths. And because of their Also, create a material according to
a small issue we need to take care of, specularity it is one of the most
the fading out of the particles. This difficult aspects to simulate in
will be achieved by keyframing the Blender.
alpha value of the material of the
particles. The method I will show is very
simplistic compared to the real
First, make sure you are on frame 1 phenomenon, but with some more
(check the header of the buttons work and dedication, it can give some the settings shown below.
window). With the cursor on the nice results.
buttons window, and the alpha value For making the particles follow the

curve, we must select it and go the Of course, more detail can be added, context [F10] and in the "render
buttons window, in context "Object" like making more curve guides with Layers" panel, in "Scene:" click on the
slightly different shapes to give more button of the first layer, so that only
randomness and animated materials. this layer is pressed. Change the
name to "photosphere". Next, click on
Step 9: Setting up Render the small button left of the name and
add a new render layer.
The new render layer will have all the

[F7] and in sub-context "Physics". In layers selected, but now we just want
the panel "Fields and Deflection", the second layer pressed (the one
choose "Curve Guide" from the menu. with the solar corona). Press on the
If all goes well, the particles should button of the second layer and change
now be flowing from the circle and the name of the render layer to "solar
following the curve. If they're moving corona". Lastly, create another render
in the opposite direction, select the layer, select only the third layer and
curve, enter in edit mode [TAB], select change the name to "prominence".
all vertices [A] and press [W]. In the See image below.
appearing menu, choose "Switch
Direction" see image below.
Now we have a (very simple)

prominence see image below.
Layers
Now it's time to mix all the three

elements we created, in three Mixing it all together with Composite
convenient layers. We're going to Nodes:
create render layers and then use
them as input for compositing. Let's Now we are going to use the render
create some render layers; change layers we set up with composite
the buttons window to "Scene" nodes. Change the 3D window to

animating them, making two different

particle systems and using the
relatively new composite nodes. Of
course, you are invited to experiment
with the values or try other (probably
more efficient) methods to achieve
similar results. Also, you can add
more complexity to the star by adding
more textures.
And this tutorial works for other stars

too, by changing colour (stars can also
be blue, white and red) or even
putting in some gigantic sun spots or
removing the granules for blue giant
stars.
"Node Editor" window. Then click on (http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Man I would like to thank Jorge Martins for
the button with a portrait, in the ual/Node_Composition). showing me how to make the
header to activate Composite Nodes. granulation effect and Olga Moreira
Automatically Blender creates two The node setup used is shown in the for giving scientific advice■
nodes, one regarding an input and the next image. The "intermediary" nodes
other for the output. To be able to see used were "Blur", "Alpha Over" and
the effect of the composite nodes in "Mix", with different settings.
the final render, press the "Do
Composite" button, right below the Lastly, set the start and end frames at
"Anim" button (in the "Scene" context your desire (the particle systems start
[F10]). emitting at frame 1, you can either
modify the start frame of the render
The input node can be a render layer, or adjust the frame where the
and the idea here is to use the three particles start emitting, putting it at a Luis Belerique is 28 yrs old and
render layers we created, apply negative number), render an lives in Porto, Portugal. He works as
different effects to them (namely animation and see the final result a game des igner and 3D modeler
blurring the render layers with (don't forget to tell Blender where to for doubleMV - R& D, where us es
particles) and then combine them to put the rendered frames or movies). Blender. He is als o a s tudent of
form the final image. You can add a As tronomy.
node by pressing [Space] or Conclusion
[Shift]+[A] and choose from the list. During this tutorial, we have done a luis .belerique@ gmail.com
For more info on using nodes, see lot; tweaking materials and textures,
here

3D Workshop – Making An Alien Using Subsurf
intuitive. It means you don’t need to You should be able to find the vertex,
Modeling An Alien Using be a Blender wizard to make a first 3D edge, and face select modes. If you
Subsurf character. don’t, I wouldn’t give up so easily. The
best way to learn Blender is to dive in
I’m going to make an Alien. Aliens are and make something. The Blender
by Tim Kennedy for NEVAC fun. They have just enough fantasy to community is large and friendly. The
them that we have some room to be buttons have rollover hints. The Help
creative, but also make mistakes. The menu is right on the top of your
Level: Beginner to Intermediate anatomy is easy. Nobody will notice if Blender window. I use mine all the
the hands don’t look quite right or the time. But if you are a high school
head is shaped funny. It’s an alien. student and want more guidance,
They look funny anyway. We can there is another opportunity to get to
simplify it all down and still make an know Blender. This tutorial is part of
interesting character. It will be fun to an introductory distance learning
color and animate later. Once we have class in 3D animation. High school
a complete alien, we can expand upon students can learn all about creating
the same techniques to make a more their own 3D models and animation
difficult model. You could model a using Blender. I’ve included contact
famous person, a friend, or even a information at the end of the article if
strange monster. you would like to get this class offered
through your local high school.
To do all this, I’m going to work with
Subdivision Surface (Subsurf) Starting Up
modeling. With Subsurf, the 3D artist Get started by cleaning up your
Introduction can edit on simple, low polygon Blender workspace. I’ll start with a
I like digital clay. There are many meshes. These are like a scaffolding new file. Pull down File>>New.
ways to model in 3D. Most are very around our models. A push here or a Blender will ask you do you wish to
meticulous and accurate. They make movement there and the model mesh “Erase All?” Hit RETURN or ENTER and
great looking models. They put the (our digital clay) responds. But where you will start with a fresh Blender file.
mesh in all the right places. They we are working with the low polygon
scare off beginners. When I’m starting mesh, the Blender software converts
out with a 3D tool, I want a different our work to a smooth and complicated
feeling. I’ll get more careful after I get mesh. The result is a model that is
over that initial learning curve. But for more organic and lifelike.
now, I want digital clay. I want to get
my digital manipulators dirty. I want This tutorial assumes a very basic
to roll up the mesh in a ball, squeeze knowledge in Blender. By now, you
out a leg, pinch out an arm, and shape should know your way around the
out a head. It’s fun. It’s somewhat menus and windows. You should know
how to move, rotate, and scale things.

Step 1: Reference Images Blender. I’m working in 3D so I also need a side

view of my Alien. My front view will
Reference images guide the 3D artist I’ve drawn a front view of my Alien. I guide my front view of the model. My
in the creation of the model. You can used lots of circles to guide my body side view will guide my side view of
build great models without reference shapes. Anyone can draw a circle. the model. So I’ll end up with being
images. I think it is easier to build Then I traced over the lines I liked able to make the model in 3D space
great models with them. with a felt pen. That allows the even though I am starting with 2D
scanner to see the shape clearly. I drawings on a 2D computer screen.
So how are your drawing skills? Mine also drew it right on a center line.
are OK. I’m not the world’s best artist. That’s because I’m going to save time I could even draw a top view and
But I can comfortably draw an idea on by only building one half of the Alien. team that up with a top view of my
a piece of paper. Drawing is an Then I’ll copy it, mirror it and have a model. That’s great for precision work.
important skill for a 3D artist. You can complete Alien. I’m making something simple for now
doodle out an idea in the morning and so that you can practice on an easy
have a finished model by the end of character.
the day. That’s hard to do if you are
just making it up as you go in your 3D Any two or three images will give you
software. So if you haven’t taken the reference material you need. Take
drawing classes, I would encourage a front and side picture of a friend as
you to do so. Even if you never work a reference. Or make your own digital
as a professional 3D artist, being able reference images in your favorite
to communicate any idea with a quick graphics program. Maybe combine a
drawing is a skill that will help you wolf with a muscle man picture for a
later in life. werewolf reference image. Or draw
your own cartoon character. There is
I’m making an Alien. I’ve put him in a no limit to what you can create in 3D.
sort of da Vinci “Vitruvian Man” pose
with arms and legs spread out. That Step 2: Load Your Images
will make it easier to animate later. into Blender
This is my third or fourth drawing. The
first several were OK. I liked portions Now is the time to put your reference
of each. With each new drawing, I JPEG’s into Blender so that you can
pulled out a sheet of paper and began begin to model.
tracing the parts I liked from each
previous drawing. Then I filled in and First, let’s set up our Blender views so
added new features. By the time I had that we have a good Front and Side
completed several drawings, I was view. Splitting windows requires a
happy enough with this version to RMB on a window edge and choosing
scan the image as a JPEG for use with Split Area from the menu that pops

up. I like Front the left and Side on the File Browser icon and select the JPEG adjustments.
right. But it’s a personal preference image that matches the view.
thing. I put the Top in the upper left
and the Camera in the upper right. I
don’t need much for my Top and
Camera views so I’ve turned off their
Headers (RMB in a blank area of the
menu line) to give me a little more
space on the screen. When you are
done arranging, your Blender screen
might look like the example. But find
an arrangement that is comfortable
for you.
You’ll also note a Blend section that
controls the transparency of the Now you should see your front and
background image. There are side Alien images in their respective
additional Size and Offset options if windows. We’re ready to get to work.
you need to make adjustments to the
image. Your image will only appear if
the window is a Top, Front, or Side
Orthographic view. The minute you
change, it will disappear. The minute
you return to one of those views
(NUM7, NUM1, NUM3) it will
reappear.
Each Blender window can have its

own image. So load the Alien side
image in Side and the Alien front
image in Front. The Background
Choose a Front (NUM1) or Side
Image panel also retains a memory of
(NUM3) view. Then choose View from
recent images. Simply choose the Step 3: Set Up the Cube
the 3D View menu and then
image from the selection window next
Background Image...
to the File Browser button. This can be
Using Blender’s default cube as a
handy if you need to switch views
When the Background Image panel starting point, let’s make a few
quickly. You can even click the
appears in the view, click Use adjustments. Stay in Object Mode.
triangle in the upper left corner of the
Background Image . Show the cube in Wireframe (Z) so
Background Image panel. This will
that you can line it up with the
collapse the panel while still keeping it
In the Image section of the drawing. Using the 3D manipulators,
readily available for any quick
Background Image panel, choose the Grab (CTRL-ALT-G) and Scale (CTRL-

ALT-S) the cube so that it fits the belly Subdivide button 2 times.
area. You can have a little inside and Who are Catmull and Clark? They
a little outside. We’ll reshape it into were two college students who
place. played around with early computers
Step 4: Subsurf the Cube
and created mathematical rules
(algorithms) for computer graphics
Notice that I have SHIFT-LMB Subdivision surfaces will give us a as part of their studies. Jim Clark
selected the Translate (Grab) and smooth shape to our work. Let’s put would go on to found Netscape and
Scale manipulator widgets so that I those Subdivision Surfaces to work. help release the first commercial
can use both in the same window at First, Z to make the wire-frame view World Wide Web browser. Ed Catmull
the same time. This approach gets back into Solid. Then in Modifiers would go on to help found Pixar and
even handier later. Also remember panel of Editing (right next to Mesh currently helps lead Disney-Pixar
that each window can have its own Tools), click Add Modifier and choose Animation. Two great people we owe
choice of manipulator. Subsurf. You might notice that solid a lot to.
cube now has rounded corners. That is
the Subsurf kicking in. The cubes
vertices, edges, and faces help define The Levels setting controls how
the smoothed solid within the cube. smooth your model will look as you
work on it within Blender.
The Render Levels is how smooth the

model will look as it is rendered.
Obviously, you don’t need as many

levels for your Blender work as you
might want for your rendering. If I set
We need to the Levels too high, Blender will be
make our slow to work with. Setting the Render
cube mesh Levels higher is fine since I can let the
just a little computer do the math during
more flexible. rendering. Once again, the higher
That means number, the longer it will take for the
subdividing computer to work.
it. TAB to Edit
Mode. Make But I can go off and do something else
sure the cube while my rendering is going on. So I
is still So let’s take a closer look at the
Subsurf Modifier. First you’ll notice set Levels to 2 and Render Levels to 3
selected. F9 or 4. If I’m done with test rendering
to Editing that I’m using a Catmull-Clark subsurf.
and have plenty of time to burn, I
and click the might turn the Render Levels even
Mesh Tools higher. This will make a very smooth

model. Just realize that this will slow Alien belly. There’s nothing terribly corner of the cube. So I’m able to
the computer down and too much will difficult about our next steps. You just reshape that entire corner of the cube
go unseen for all your wasted need to take your time and work a set quickly.
computer time. of vertices at a time. First, Z back to
Wireframe so you can clearly see the So use RMB to select a single vertex
There is a little gray circle to the right drawing through the cube. You’ll need closest to you. But Border or Brush
of the Subsurf title in the Modifiers to toggle back and forth between Select is a great way to grab a cluster
panel. Subsurf modeling involves Solid and Wireframe depending on of points and shift them all in so that
editing the low polygon cage while what you need to see. So here on out, you can get the general shape
letting the Catmull-Clark do the math adjust back and forth as you need to. quickly. Once selected, a Translate
on your model behind the scenes. (Grab) will move the vertices in the
Clicking that little grey circle will Find the Limit to Visible button. It’s a direction they need to go. Then A to
Apply Modifier to the Editing Cage. button with a cube icon right next to Deselect All and go on to another set
That means the cage will cling to the the Face Select Mode button at the of vertices.
surface. Click the circle on and off and bottom of a standard 3D view. Then,
you’ll see the subtle result on your with Limit to Visible turned off, adjust Occasionally, you’ll have a row of
model in the window. We’ll see this in clusters and lines of vertices to make vertices that all need to be pinched in
use later. It’s a preference that may or the shape of the Alien belly and or spread out. That is what Scale is
may not make editing easier as you behind. You want to shift the vertices for. In the example, the top of the
work on your model. Sometimes it is around uniformly. But there is no one Alien’s belly is tighter than the base.
easier with it off. Sometimes it is way to achieve this task. So I Scale the points in on the side
easier with it on. view before going to the front view for
The one thing to remember is that it is the same general step.
safest to Border Select (B) vertices in
order to grab all of the vertices in a
line. The screenshot image shows an
example of this. Two visible vertices
are selected in the front view. But my
side view
shows
that I
have
actually
selected
all 5 or 6
Step 5: Subsurf the Large vertices Sometimes I move a whole block of
Belly that make vertices as in the section of the Alien’s
up that behind. I’ll work down through rows,
lower left taking 3, then 2, and so on. In this
Now use the Subsurf to shape the
hand

way, I can keep my vertices to look reasonably good. But I do have Image until you come back to the
somewhat uniformly spread out. I a few vertices starting to wander off NUM1 or NUM3 views. But that’s OK.
don’t want vertices all bunching up or the center line. Not a big issue for You’re just trying to round up the
I will not be able to get the right other vertices. But it is a problem for shape a bit and the Background Image
shape later. the center vertices since we’ll be is just a reference.
slicing this model in half shortly.
Simply SHIFT-S to Snap Selection-

>Grid any offending rows of vertices
as a quick fix.
At this point, I find myself adding the

Rotate manipulator to my Combo
Translate (Grab) and Scale
manipulators. CTRL-SPACE pulls up
the Combo manipulator option
quickly. Having all three turned on as I
work through my selections really
speeds up the work. Here, I’m rotating
a set of points to get a more accurate As I work around the cage and adjust
curve to the top of the leg. vertices, it gets easier to work if I am
By now, my Front alignment is starting working with a Solid and I have
Front and Side Views are reasonably Limited to Visible. I keep reworking
lined up. But our Alien belly is still the shape to get it more round.
kind of cube like for the time being.
We can fix that by individually At this point, I have a good feeling for
selecting vertices with RMB and doing my lump of digital clay (mesh). So I’m
a little bit of tweaking on the cage as going to focus on one side (the right)
it rounds corners. You’ll likely want to more than the other. That’s because
spin around the model with NUM4, I’m about to cut the model in half. I’ll
NUM6, NUM2, and NUM8 to rotate use the left side to compare with the
your views at this point. You’ll right and track my progress at
temporarily lose the Background rounding the shape.

Don’t be too concerned about exact discussed earlier. Now the points of X to Erase the Faces. We choose
vertex placement. Your model is like the cage will stick to the surface of Faces so that the center vertices and
digital clay. We’re going for a shape the object and it will be harder to lose edges are left behind.
and the vertices are not going to be them inside the object.
exactly the same for each individual
who works on this Alien. It’s also a great time to make certain
windows full screen so you focus on
that view. CTRL-DOWN ARROW will
take the view your cursor is over and
make it full screen. CTRL-UP ARROW
will return you to your normal view.
We’ve made good progress by moving
a few individual vertices. The right
side of our model is now much more
round. Now it’s time focus on that
half.
As you start to make a more rounded

shape, some vertices in the cage will With the remaining right half of the
begin to disappear beneath the solid model selected, go back to the Editing
surface. buttons and click the Add Modifier
Now is a button under the Modifiers panel.
good Choose Mirror. A Mirror modifier will
time to appear in the stack below your
turn on Subsurf.
the
Apply Step 6: Mirroring the Model Like magic, the other half of your
Modifier model will appear. Now when we work
to Here is a neat trick. Do half the work on the right side, the left side will be
Editing and have it copied automatically with automatically mirrored. The Merge
Cage mirroring. Limit value helps cover for any
button irregularities you have on your center
we From the NUM1 Front View select the line. Some vertices are in line. Some
left half of the model. That also are not. Merge Limit will help smooth
includes the center vertices and the that out. A little does a lot so don’t run
entire left half from front to back. the number up too far. But even with
Merge Limit, we might still have a

little seam Subsurf modeling. We’re going to Translate and Scale the selected
in our model Extrude the legs out from the bottom Faces so that the start of the leg is
until we of the Alien. Press CTRL-NUM7 to see lined up with the drawing.
finish the opposite side from Top (the
and smooth Bottom). Translate (Grab) any points
it out for that need to be squared up. A slightly
good. rounded rectangle of faces will give
the best arrangement to extrude our
Step7:
Shaping E to Extrude leg. Then LMB
the immediately to bring back the
Behind manipulators. Scale and Translate out
a section to serve as the upper thigh.
With Use the Rotate manipulator to line up
mirroring the new section with the direction of
solved, we the leg. You will use Translate (Grab),
shape the behind (buttocks) and Scale, and Rotate continually to
ready the lower body for legs. reshape your Extrude sections as you
Mirroring makes it easier to shape the shape out the body.
behind. Simply roll the model with
NUM over and Translate a few
vertices. But be subtle. You don’t want
the model to look too ridiculous.
leg.
Change to Face Select mode and
choose a set of four faces to build the
legs
from.
Sometimes an Extrude is a little too
cube like and I need to round it out.
Here I switch to Edge Select mode and
Translate a front edge of the leg out.
Just as you’ll use Translate (Grab),
Step 8: Extruding Legs Scale, and Rotate constantly in your
Extrude operations, you’ll make use of
Extrude adds to the model and Vertex, Edge, and Face Select mode
becomes the primary move for to get at your model and shape it the
way you want.

Then end the last Extrude at the heel.

Then start the foot with an Extrude
from the front of the ankle.
Extrude out the foot until the end of

As needed, I tumble around the leg the toes.
with NUM and the MMB to reshape
vertices, edges, and faces of the leg
cross section into a more round Step 9: Extruding Tips for
shape.
the Rest of the Alien
Now that you have the basics down,

you can Extrude your way to a
As needed, use Translate, Scale, complete Alien body. It will take time
and/or Rotate to shape the cross and patience to make the rest of your
section to make the foot shape. If model. But after completing the legs,
needed, adjust Vertices, Edges, and you now have about 90% of the skills
Faces. As you grow more comfortable needed to complete the Alien mesh.
with Extrude and these six You can do this based on what you
adjustments, you’ll get proficient at now know. Just work through it a piece
creating shapes that match your at a time.
reference drawings. But some
extra tips
Do several Extrudes as you work down Go back over your right leg and make will help.
the leg. I’d suggest at least two above any small adjustments to vertices, Let’s add
the knee and two below. edges, and faces until you are happy. a few
These small touches make your more
character that much better. skills to
your set.
That’s it! You are done with extruding
the legs! It’s a good time to take a
break for a test render and save your
progress.

Plan your Extrude steps. Keep an eye direction you need.

on where you need to branch out,
whether it be a part of the torso, an
appendage, or a facial feature. For
example, I know I want four faces to
start the arm Extrude. That will give
me a square and that in turn gives me
the right shape to craft a round arm.
So as I Extrude up the belly into the
torso, I break up the Extrude steps so
that the side faces are already lined
up to go out the side with an arm. So
wherever you need to change the
Don’t stretch your Extrude too far. It
shape or add an extrude, break up
would be easy to complete an arm in You don’t have to move to Extrude.
your model a little.
two steps. But that will not give you You can just LMB and then
the level of control you need to shape immediately Scale up. This is handy
the arm realistically. In the image to for starting a big palm from a small
the example, I’ve used 5 extrude wrist (shown at right) or transitioning
steps to reach the hand. a lower jaw from a neck.
Make your adjustments to the

vertices, edges, and faces using the
Translate (Grab), Scale, and Rotate
manipulators before you start an
Extrude. Tweak your vertices, push There are times when the
the edges, and rotate the faces. In the Manipulators don’t line up in the
image example, I’m just about to direction you want. By default, the
round the elbow and head up the Translate, Scale, and Rotate
wrist. Now is the time to Rotate the manipulators are aligned with the 3D An Extrude can also Scale down. This
selected faces so that the Extrude will World (Global). But you can choose is great for starting a finger from the
start in the right direction. other orientations that make it easier edge of a palm (shown at right) or an
to transform your selection in the antenna at the top of a head.

left and right side of the model. That

will make it more true to life.
Step 10: Completing the

alien
Now we
need to
Finally, you don’t have to model Apply the
everything with Extrude. I only want Mirror and
the basic body shape, the head, the stitch our
arms with hands, and the feet. I’ll two halves
leave other details like the eyes and of Alien
mouth for later. They’ll be easier to together.
create with other primitives and Once you
extrude steps later on. I can even use have
Extruded Press CTRL-J to Join selected meshes.
Blender’s new Sculpt Mode to add
finer detail or modify my base shape. your way
to a
I also leave some details out for when complete
the model is complete. Why? No one Alien,
organic character should be identical select the
on both sides of the body. If I add whole right
details, now, side of the
they’ll be body. You
copied exactly can’t select the Mirror so a Select All
to the other (A) will do the trick.
side. By
adding some TAB out to Object Mode. You cannot
details after I apply the Mirror to the model in Edit
have a Mode. When you are in Object Mode,
complete click Apply in the Mirror Modifier.
model, I Blender will likely ask you a few
guarantee questions. Go ahead and tell it OK.
Even though the meshes are Joined
that there will The Mirror will disappear from your list
we still have a gap in our character. A
be some of Modifiers and the mirror image will
small gap is good since that can help
differences become as a separate part of your
smooth out any sharp edges on the
between the object.
seam. But we still need to seal the

gap. TAB back to Edit Mode. Z to press X and

Wireframe so that you can easily see Erase the Faces.
and select points throughout the I now have a
entire model. Then carefully select the huge hole in the
points in the center of the model. front of the
chest.
Interesting but
needing a good
fix.
After selecting
3 or 4 points (4
in this case), I
can fill a hole K brings up the Knife and Loop Cut
by press F for menu. The Knife is much more
Now find the Rem Doubles (Remove Face. A new flat precise. But a Loop Cut is easier to
Doubles) button in the Mesh Tools Face is added use. Press K for the Loop Cut Menu.
panel of Editing (F9). Click the button where I once Choose Loop Cut.
and Blender will remove the points had two
that are doubled up between the two recessed faces.
halves. The gap is closed. The chest is
Here’s a great now normal.
tip for fixing
problems you Step 11: Knifing the Face
just can’t
transform. As I Loop Cuts can be a quick way to add
check around detail where it is currently missing. I
my complete need to Extrude eye sockets and a
model, I find mouth. My head has the right shape
little areas but not enough edges and faces to
that need work with for my Extrude.
some touch
up. In the As you drag the cursor over your
chest, I have model, Loop Cut shows a line where
an unnaturally deep recess where the the Loop Cut could go. LMB once to
two halves came together. Moving the choose the area where you wish to
faces isn’t working. I decide to delete place the loop. Slide your cursor to
them. I choose the Face Select mode position the cut and then LMB again
and choose the two recessed faces. I to fix it in place.

eye sockets and a mouth. I have also to connect them. Doing that is called
tweaked his head shape a little to Parenting. Make sure you are still in
make him more reptile like. Object Mode. First I RMB one eyeball.
Then I SHIFT-RMB the other eyeball.
Finally, I SHIFT-RMB the Alien. This
will be the Parent since it was the last
selected object. Press CTRL-P and
Blender will Make Parent of the Alien.
The eyeballs will now follow the Alien
Mesh no matter where it goes.
Now that I have more faces to work

with, I can Extrude. I will not Extrude
all of these faces at the same time. I’ll I’m going to cheat on the eyeballs.
do one eye at a time and then the The eyeballs are little more than a
mouth. Sphere. TAB to Object Mode. Press
SPACE and then choose
Add>>Surface>>NURBS Sphere. I
chose a NURBS Sphere because is
automatically smooth and eye like
without a lot of additional smoothing.
Then I Scale and Rotate the eyeball to
make it fit the eye socket. Then I just
slide it into
place with My last detail for my Alien is to TAB
a back to Edit Mode and Extrude the
Translate. antenna from the top of the head.
Since each antenna is unique, it hides
Since I some of the mirroring I used to make
want the the model.
eyeballs to
Step 12: Final Details follow the
Alien
Add eyes and antenna and our Alien is body, it
almost ready to invade the world. would be a
After Extrude work, my Alien now has good idea

NEVAC
This tutorial was originally written
for NEVAC,
Final Thoughts The
NorthEas t Vocational Area Cooperative
So now this Alien model is complete. .
More importantly, this may be your NEVAC is a partners hip of nine
s chool dis tricts in the Northeas t
first real organic type of model. It's
Puget S ound area of Was hington
not made of rigid cubes or perfect
Tim Kennedy teaches digital S tate in the US A. The goal of NEVAC
spheres. It’s an Alien with a belly, is to provide quality and cos t-
legs, arms, fingers, and a scary media arts at Cedarcres t High
S chool in rural Duvall, Was hington effective career and technical
looking head. This model has life to it. education for s tudents .
in the United S tates . He wrote this
Now that you have the confidence to This tutorial is one part of a s eries
tutorial for a NEVAC dis tance
tackle an Alien, go back through other of tutorials included in NEVAC’s
learning clas s (details below).
tutorials and develop your Having to s urvive in a clas s room on dis tance learning offering of
competency in Blender. a very limited budget has made him “Introduction to 3D Animation.”
a huge fan of free s oftware like S tudy and interactive clas s
Add to your model with Sculpt Mode. Blender. dis cus s ion is completed online
Light it. Put an armature in and make through a Module-bas ed clas s Web
it walk. Put it in a saucer and In his pas t life, he was a college s ite. Cours e work is completed in
Blender. Are you a high s chool
composite it flying through your profes s or in all forms of digital
media production. He als o wrote s tudent interes ted in s tudying 3D?
neighborhood. Blender is an incredibly
about s treaming media and the Are you a s chool couns elor or
capable tool, most of the tutorials are adminis trator wis hing to offer a
free, and you are now becoming a 3D S ynchronized Multimedia
Integration Language (S MIL) for dis tance learning cours e in 3D to
wizard. Have fun with it■ your s tudents ? Contact NEVAC at
Internet.com and S ams Publis hing.
You can reach him (or s end a JPEG pam@ nevac.org or
This work is owned by NEVAC and licensed http://www.nevac.org for more
of your alien creation) through his
under a Creative Commons Attribution-No information.
Derivative Works 3.0 License. Web s ite at OnlineDelivery.com.

3D Workshop – Texturing An Alien Using Nodes
of materials and has the added asymmetrical texture details, but for our
Texturing An Alien Using benefit, unlike painting a UV Map, of purposes this will save a lot of work and
frustration.
Nodes allowing you to quickly change the
materials that are being blended.
Let’s get started: Mix Maps
by Sandra Gilbert (dreamsgate) So to that end, I am going to show you First thing we are going to do is set
how to texture an alien using our UV Map coordinates. There are
Nodes/Mix Map. I have already many ways to unwrap a model for UV
Level: beginner to intermediate modeled an alien, albeit a rather odd Mapping and Blender has some great
looking fellow, for us to practice on. tools to get it done.
The “Texturing an Alien.blend” has
four scenes, depending on where you 1. Go into UV Face Select Mode,
Introduction split your screen, and change
Having used blender for over seven want to jump into the tutorial.
the right side to the UV Editor
years, I have gotten very comfortable
• Alien: only contains the alien Window (fig 1)
with the material panels and all their
wonderful uses. So when Nodes were model – to follow the tutorial
introduced, I have to admit, I had from the beginning
quite a bit of trouble seeing the • Alien & UV Map – the alien
advantage of using Nodes over what I already has the UV Map
already knew. I read all the coordinates set up, so you can
documentation, checked out tutorials, jump in at the 'Painting the
and still didn’t get it. Mix Map' section.
• Alien Nodes: Mix Maps are
In fact, the tutorial that sticks out the painted, so you can jump in at
most had you make a blue material the 'Setting up Nodes' section
and a red material, and when you • Finished Alien – everything is
mixed them it made a purple material. done, this scene is to see the
That’s nice, but I can make purple complete final setup 2. Select all faces (A key) and hit
without using Nodes. Then I saw a “U key”, select Cylinder From
great video tutorial (Mixing Materials When you open Texturing an View. You will need to resize
Using Texture Painting (with UV Alien.blend, you will notice that the the UV layout in the UV/Image
Unwrap)-Extended Edition) by Eugene model has a mirror modifier that has Editor so that it fits in the
on http://www.geneome.net. not yet been applied. I find it easier to screen. You will also want to
UV Map one half of the model before scale it so that it no longer
He covered creating Mix Maps to applying the mirror modifier. That way looks like a super skinny alien.
blend two or more materials using both sides look the same. (fig 2) This gives us a pretty
Nodes. Finally I could see the good starting point for our UV
advantage of using Nodes! This Note: Having both sides look the same is
map, but you will notice that
technique allows the smooth blending not always desired, especially if creating a
realistic model/object that has the ears and the arms are not

laid out in a way that is key” with your mouse over 1. We will need to create an
helpful. each section (it will select the image to paint our Mix Map
whole linked section), then onto. In the UV/Image Editor
move them to better locations. window, go to Image > New. A
dialog box will pop up giving
8. Okay, now is a good time to you options on size and name
save your file. Our UV map of the image you will be
coordinates are now set. I creating. When you have filled
admit it is not an elegant it in, press OK. I named mine
layout, but it will work just fine “Alienskinmixmap” and chose
for our tutorial. (fig 3). 1024x1024 for the resolution.
(You can choose higher or
lower resolutions, depending
on your computer speed.)
3. Deselect all faces (A key),
select the faces for the ear, hit
“U key” and choose Unwrap
(Smart Projections). The
default settings are fine for
our needs. Scale down the
faces in the UV/Image Editor,
and move them to the upper
right hand corner.
4. Next select the faces for the

arm, and repeat step 3
Time to Paint:
Now it is time to start painting our Mix
Map. We will only be painting in two
5. I want a front view of the face
colors; black and white. Everywhere
for easier painting, so in the
the image is black, material 1 will
front view box select the
show; everywhere the image is white,
head, hit the “U key”, and
material 2 will show. Areas of gray will 2. In the 3D window, switch to
choose 'Project From View'.
be a blend of both materials. Our Alien Texture Paint Mode. In the
is going to be a dark green for most of UV/Image Editor, press the
6. Move the head section to an
his head, back, arms and legs little paintbrush button (fig 5).
empty section of the image
(material 1). His belly, lower face, Make sure your viewport
area
hands, feet, inside his ears, and shading is set to textured, (Alt
antennae will be a lighter green + Z).
7. If your UV sections are too
(material 2).
close to each other, hit the “L

his hands, bottom of his feet

and the lower portion of his
face. (fig 7) Adjust your brush
size smaller if you find you are
painting more of the model
than you want.
3. Now we are ready to start

painting. Your paint tools can
be changed in the Paint Panel 7. When your Mix Map image is
of the Edit Buttons window. the way you want it,
(fig 6) You can paint on either remember to save the image
the model itself, or the image (Image > Save).
map in the UV/Image Editor.
Note: In fact, remember to save any
Note: If you make a mistake while time you go back to adjust this image.
painting, select black and paint out the Any changes will be lost if you forget
mistake. to save the image before you exit
blender.
5. I like nice soft transitions
between colors, so now Time to Set up the Node
change your paint brush from Materials:
“Draw” to “Soften” in the We are finally ready to start setting up
Paint Tools panel. Go over the our Nodes.
edges of the white areas and
soften them up until they look 1. Change the UV/Image Editor
4. I plan on having parts of the blended. I also went back and window to the Node Editor
alien be a lighter color than painted the inside of his ears window. Go to the Material
the rest, i.e. his belly, face, and his antennae white and Buttons window (F5). Select
etc. To do that, we are going softened them up also. “Add New” in the Links and
to paint white on all the areas Pipeline panel. Then click the
that will be the lighter color 6. Continue to paint and blend “Nodes” button. Two floating
(material 2). Set your brush to until you have a pleasing panels (Node) should appear
77 and the opacity to 100%, pattern of where you want in the Nodes Editor window. A
paint the belly, the palms of materials 1 and 2 to be (fig 8). material node and an output

node. With either Material 1 or

Material 2 selected (doesn’t
2. Go ahead and rename the really matter which), add a
Node to something new texture (image type) and
descriptive, like 'Alien skin' then un-check the box next to
(fig 9). it in the material texture panel
(fig 13).
4. Material 2 (light skin): From

the Node Editor window add
3. Material 1 (dark skin): Click another material node (Add >
the “Add New” button to get Input > Material). Now create
your first material. Now at this a lighter color. I used (.515, 6. Next add a Mix Node (Add >
point you name and set up .849, .427), I used the same Color > Mix), connect Material
your material just as you cloud and bump textures so 1 (dark skin) to the Color 1
would normally without Nodes. that the materials would blend socket and Material 2 (Light
I chose a dark green color better (fig 12). skin) to the Color 2 Socket (fig
(.107, .331, .155) and added a 14).
cloud texture and a bump for
texture. (fig 11 & 11a).
5. Now it is time to add our Mix 7. Next add a Texture and a

Map into the Material system. Geometry Node (Add > Input

> Texture) (Add > Input > The nice thing about this method is your model. I hope you had fun and
Geometry). In the Texture the ability to change your materials learned something new and useful!■
node, add our mix map on the fly if you decide that the colors
(Alienskinmixmap). or textures aren’t working for you. The
Mix Map is already made, so changing
8. Connect the Geometry node to the material is as easy as selecting
the Texture Node (Geometry: which material you want to change
UV socket to Texture: Vector and then just doing it (fig 18).
socket), then connect the
Texture node to the Mix Node
(Texture: color socket to Mix:
Fac socket) (fig 16).
You can also layer these Mix Maps to

create a more colorful character.
9. Preview your work so far by 1. Go back to the UV/Image
using Render Preview (Shift +
P). You can see that we have a Editor and create a 2nd new
nice smooth blending between image to paint on
the two materials (fig 17). 2. Paint where you would like a
third material to be (Note:
Remember to save the image)
3. Add a new Material Node, Mix
Node, Texture and Geometry
Nodes. Connect them up like
before (fig 19)
4. The end result (fig 20)
By layering and mixing nodes, you can

create some very complex and
visually rich materials and textures for

3D Workshop – Modeling A Low Poly Space Ship
By holding the (mmb) + (shift) keys going to extrude it two times.

you rotate the 3d window around, now
Modeling A Low Poly hold (ctrl + tab) to select mode,
Space Ship choose faces. Now with the (A) key
de-select all the faces.
by Robert Foster
Level: Beginner to intermediate
Then select two of the faces on each

side as so,
Step 1: Beginning
When we first open blender, there is a

default cube in object mode, pressing
the (tab) key takes you into edit
mode. Step 2: Creating the nose
Next we go to the side view and go to
the end of the nose, press the (B) key
to select the front of the nose and
scale it down by pressing the(S) key.
choosing the individual faces and

press (e) extrude them and press the
(A) key to de-select. Next we select
the front of the cube, then you are

Step 4: Creating the cockpit • Select the bottom of the nose

& refining and move it downward
Next you'll create a cockpit on the

ship following these steps : Step 5: Refining cockpit &
creating the wing
Tip: To verify that you have the

correct number of vertices selected
(which is four vertices: two in the front
& two in the back) check the 'vertices
selected' readout at the bottom of the
selection roll out.
● Move the selected vertices

Step 3: Adjustment to back down along the Z-axis using
of the ship the transform gizmo press the
• 1&2) You’ll go to each side (N) key press (A) to de-select.
and select the vertices and
Now go to the top view and select the move them inward
back vertices, to select them you will
press the (B) key in wire fame (press • Selecting the faces mode,
(Z) key) and select all 4 vertices in
select the faces on top, (select
back of the ship and extrude them
one then hold the (Shift) key
twice
and right click the next one)
and press the (E) to extrude
To fix the cockpit move the front

vertices back a little bit on the Y-axis
and move up on the Z-axis a little bit .
• Adjust the vertices on the Let’s create the Wing:
front of the nose and scale it
inward a little bit ● Go to select mode and choose
faces, right-click and hold the

(shift) key, select six faces on

each side of the ship and
extrude them half way along
the Z-axis as shown in the
illustration.
Pressing the (E) key you are going to

choose individual faces and extrude
● Change to vertex mode, in
them twice as shown in the
vertex mode go to the far side
illustration.
of the object and press the (B)
key, move the vertices slightly
toward the back of the
spaceship using x-axis. Don't
forget go to the side view and
adjust there also.
Step 6: Creating the back

and front vents
Hold (ctrl) +(Tab) choose select mode

> faces. To create the vents, select
Tip: using scale and axis tool select the the two faces on either side of the
four ends and scale and do same as the
center at the back. Extrude them as
other side. Next we use the z-axis, select
the end of both of the wings by pressing shown in the illustration.
● Adding the wings: now we the (B) key and move them downward as
shown in both illustration.
select four faces on each side
as shown in the illustration.

the front of the vents, extrude and >choose faces and select the three
scale and extrude again this time faces on the back of the ship and
along the z-axis and scale it. And for extrude them next
the front vents select faces extrude
and scale it again.
Tip: We go to select two of them on

either side and extrude and scale it in
Step 7: Add more Vents it just right (see images below)and
Next we go to face mode and select make adjustment to the bottom of the
the faces between the two rear vents. ship.
Extrude, press the (N) set the z-axis
height to 5.0 and scale inward and
extrude again change the height of
the z-axis to 23.0.
Go to the side view and press (Z), go
back to vertices select the vertices at Next go to vertex mode, box select a
the back top corners and move them selection region around the vertices at
down. the top front part of the rudder. In
side view , move the vertices back in
the x-axis to form part of the rudder.
Using the axis tool, select scale the
top edge of the rudder along the x-
axis to 30%.
Step 8: Creating the Engines

Choose select mode >faces and select Tip: Hold (ctrl+Tab) and select mode

Final render■
Robert Foster, I was born in

Philadelphia,PA. When I was a little
boy I us ed to draw really well and
dance. When I became a teenager,
my drawing got better and I was
introduced to mus ic. After I
became an adult, I got my firs t
computer and was introduced to
s oftware animation. My firs t 3d
animation s oftware was 3d s tudio
max and now it is blender

3D Workshop – The Making Of 'Project Utopia'
detail, but the style and quality breaks Detailing

The Making Of 'Project down if you happen to zoom in on the In addition to greebles, UV mapped
Utopia' scene. textures were also used to add more
details on the surface. In fact the
texturing was done over the greebled
By Gaurav Nawani surface. The greebled surface was
joined with the main body then UV
Level: Beginner to Intermediate projection was used as the basis for
the textures.
Introduction
The scene 'Project Utopia' was an
experiment to learn about making a
space scene with an emphasis on
lighting and details on the spaceship.
Since the article is mainly about the Fig 1: The handmade greeble.
colony ship, I have used space ship or
UC, (Utopia colony) interchangeably to So most of the body of the ship has
go with the flow of words but in each the greebles added to it by hand
case the Space ship or ship that is modeling, the main advantage of
being referred to is Utopia Colony. adding detail by hand is that it allows
you to follow the design of the ship or
Modeling the surface you are working on. So the Fig 3: UV layout including the greebled
The spaceship is designed as a small whole design gels in with the model surface.
space colony, so what was needed for and the surface detail looks more
the colony is to have some form of natural.
busy details that make it appear to be Textures
supporting some form of life system The textures used were also hand
and mechanics. made for the surface taking note of
the positioning of the greebles as well
To achieve the details, greebling was as design. To add more detail the
used. I personally do not prefer using bump map and the specular maps
automatic greebling, which can be were used in addition to the color
done with the help of few scripts texture.
available for Blender. Although auto
greebling increases detailing of the
ship surface, it does not appear
realistic. Bunches of different shapes
and sized boxes is OK to get some Fig 2: Another view of detail on the ship.

visible surface of the ship. The image planet also affects the UC. Image
shown is the shaded rendering of the below shows the use of reflected
view port and the light value is ambient light on the ship model. The
increased a bit to show the results of light source is actually an array of low
the sun lamp on the model. intensity lamps used to create a
bigger light source and a smooth light
effect.
Effect Light: Now to get an effect of

being in space, a lamp of light blue
color was used to create additional
highlights so as to intensify the space
volume in the scene and since it is a
blue color, it also adds to the coldness
Fig 4: The Texture preview.
of the scene.
Fig 6: The Sun lamp bringing out the main

highlights of the model.
Environment light: The Utopia

Colony is an extension to the planet
supporting human life. The UC is
placed in close proximity to the
planet. So the light reflected from the
Localized Lighting: In addition to

the main lighting of the scene,
additional lighting was also done by
very low powered lamps. These lamps
Fig 5: Texture layers including texture,
specular and bump maps. were placed strategically to provide
the illumination from the lamps in the
space ships. The addition of these
Lighting
lamps was to provide a hint of life on
Main light: The scene consists of three
the ship. See image 9.
light sources, the main light source
being the sun, which creates the main

Star Field
Blender has an built-in feature for
making star fields. In this scene I have
used it for creating a star field
background. In the image below you
can see the settings for the star field.
You can find the stars setting in the
World[F8] buttons window.
Fig 5: Localized lights adds detail.
The Scene
The scene consists of a space ship, a
planet in the background and the star
field. The planet is pretty basic, the
texture used was completely made in
the Gimp using the clouds and the
plasma filter. There is nothing
interesting to write about it, but in this
issue we have brought you the
excellent and very popular article
from none other than Enrico Valenza And Finally the completed scene.
himself about making an realistic
planet. You can follow it to learn how
to make a nice planet in Blender.
Have fun! ■

Meet the Blenderhead – Jean-Sébastien Guillemette
Welcome to the first of many For this installment, we meet one of

interviews with actual Blender users my fellow countrymen, Jean-Sébastien
around the world! Guillemette, otherwise known as Ecks.
Ecks has been a longstanding,
First off, some background about this respected member of the Blender
article. I had brought back this community for many years. He's well
segment when I resurrected the old known for his distinct style and many
Community Journal over at wins in the annual Blender F1 contest,
Blenderartists. The Community as well as hosting the annual Montreal
Journal, as some of you may recall, Blender conference, which I have to
was a Blender e-zine started by actually attend one of these years.
Goofster way back on the old NAN
forums, and continued when we I hope you enjoy this section as much
switched over to elysiun. The e-zine I enjoy bringing it to you ■
featured tutorials, making of articles,
and a gallery section of the best
artwork generated with Blender over Jean-Sébastien
the past month. Guillemette
Well, I missed those CJ’s when we lost
the NAN forums, and I thought, “Hey!
1) How did you discover Blender
Why not bring back the CJ?!” So I did.
and what was your initial reaction
Well, guess what I found out in a real
to it?
hurry? This is a lot of work! So Derek Marsh (BgDM)
I discovered blender a couple years
unfortunately, with my limited free
ago (back in the 2.22 days!) on a
time, I had to abandon the CJ yet
game modding website. There was a
again.
tutorial about how to create your own
spaceship for a game called
The main article that I really liked in
Freespace, using Blender. So I
the CJ’s was the feature “Meet the
downloaded it, tried it, and closed it...
Blenderhead”. I always enjoyed
Quite a frustrating little application at
reading about what other users were
first! But I reopened it just for fun a
doing, how Blender was a part of their
couple months later, and I have never
everyday life and how they saw
stopped since then!
Blender developing and being utilized
down the road.
2) You tend to stay with more
mechanical types of models and
So once again (and I WILL keep a
imagery. Why do you prefer this
single article going) I bring back from
type of modeling?
the dead, “Meet the Blenderhead!”

I think it’s simply because I always should not be organized! Although personally say that mr_bomb is the
had an interest in machinery and that project failed completely, I would star of the conferences. With his
vehicle design. Also, as I mentioned still be up to making such a project... organic modeling tutorial and his
above, my first days with blender just a lot smaller, and with fewer almost limitless knowledge of
were about creating spaceships for a people that I can actually meet. So Blenders modeling tools and
game and it probably influenced me a who knows, maybe someday I’ll start techniques, he impressed all of us
lot to keep doing such things. a new project! more than once. I’d suggest you check
out his DVD if you are interested in
3) How do you see yourself 5) As host/organizer of the organic modeling!
progressing in learning and Montreal Blender Conference,
developing your skills in Blender? which coincides with the yearly 6) You have enjoyed some
I definitely have to start learning Blender Conference, how has that commercial success with some of
organic modeling! But, on a more progressed over the past few your Blender work. Can you
serious note, I think one of the best years and what has been your describe the process in obtaining
ways to get better is by participating personal highlight from those that work and was it worth it?
in challenges. The few I have done in meetings?
the past really helped me out. So If we compare the past two Actually, I was quite lucky. It’s not
maybe I’ll take another go at the 2007 conferences with the first one (was it really a trick or anything. The only
F1 challenge that is running right now. 5 years ago?) we can definitely say thing I did was post my stuff on
I’ll definitely participate (and finish my that the Blender user base has grown several websites to get comments and
entry) in the next CG Society a lot in the past years! We had around it came to the eye of a few employers
challenge. 30 people on both days in the two last who needed some sci-fi stuff done. My
years, with enough presentations and work was at the right spot at the right
4) You started an original movie activities to fill every minute of the moment, and that’s why they
project, composed of artists from day. Although I’d like the conference contacted me. It was definitely worth
around the world. What did you to grow to another level in which we it to work with most of them, but
learn from that experience and could have sponsors, prizes, etc., I some were probably the most
would you do it again? must say that from year to year, it’s annoying people I've ever had contact
I learned that it is almost impossible more and more complicated for me to with. Well, I guess its part of the job!
to accomplish. I was a bit naive, like handle the conference because of my
everyone starting a new hobby such other responsibilities (i.e. school/job). 7) You have spoken many times
as 3d animation, to think I could I’ve had a lot of help already in the about opening a CG studio of your
accomplish a full length movie with past years from people like Jonathan own for commercial work. Can you
people living in different countries, Williamson (mr_bomb) and François describe what your target market
with different mentalities and in Joanette (Le_Mackeux) for the is and how you plan on getting
different time zones that I never met! computer labs, and the guys from there?
It sure was a great experience. We all Linart for the t-shirts. Next year, if
learned a lot about modeling, others think they can help me, be sure I’m currently studying Cinema in
texturing, and animating. We also to drop me an email! As for my college, and when I’m done I’m going
learned a lot about how a project highlight of those meetings, I’d into a 3D animation school

specializing in special effects for

movies. There is an internship at the
end and as far as those students have
told me... most of them ended up
actually working for those companies
once they completed their study.
Since I can’t really claim to know how
a studio works, I really want to work in
one for several years before taking
the risk of starting something of my
own. Let’s say that my dream would
be to work on special effects for
movies.
8) Where do you see Blender

development progressing over
the next few years?
Well, what can I say? At the rate its
going right now, I can only see
Blender getting way more attention in
the industry in the next few years and
slowly bumping the rear of the
“industry” leaders ■




Galleria
Nico [Cartone] - VDE

Galleria
Thomas Kristof - Space Cargo 1

Galleria
Thomas Kristof - Space Cargo 2

Galleria
Zoltan Miklosi - Hyper

Galleria
Luis Amo - Nave Tatuaje

Galleria
Keszán Ákos - Mumu

Galleria
Gaurav Nawani – Utopia Colony

Upcoming...
Issue 10 May 2007
Organic Modeling
Focusing on bugs/plants,reptiles/amphibians (frogs etc.)
Oh and those creepy humans.
Disclaimer
blenderart.org does not takes any responsibility both expressed or implied for
the material and its nature or accuracy of the information which is published in
this PDF magazine. All the materials presented in this PDF magazine have been
produced with the expressed permission of their respective authors/owners.
blenderart.org and the contributors disclaim all warranties, expressed or implied,
including, but not limited to implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a
particular purpose. All images and materials present in this document are
printed/re -printed with expressed permission from the authors/owners.
This PDF magazine is archived and available from the blenderart.org website. Th
e blenderart magazine is made available under Creative Commons 'Attribution-
NoDerivs2.5' license.
The CC license is available at

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BlenderArt Magazine Issue 9 | March 2007

Blender Learning Made Easy

How To Make A Realistic Planet In Blender

Making A Sun-like Star In Blender

Texturing An Alien Using Nodes

Modeling A Low Poly Space Ship

Modeling An Alien Using Subsurf

www.blenderart.org 1 Issue 9 March 2007

Actual star fields and nebulae

In this issue, we have a wide array

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At the time of writing this article, the

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can add our lights and space elements

• Don’t forget, when adding

• While it wasn’t overly obvious

• Also remember that some of

Well with our research completed, we

www.blenderart.org 6 Issue 9 March 2007

of simplicity and speed, this is a static Creating the Particles

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Fig 4:All particle emitters in action

Press Alt+A to see the animation. The

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node to the composite node. Add It would be more effective visually if

Switch to a node type window, and

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ready you can set your media player desired effect.

Things to pay attention to

As I explained earlier, the amount of

A more important thing for the effect In Conclusion

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for rendering but more effective The set

So, let's start adding a big UV-sphere

Introduction Above you can see the effects of the

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But before the textures comes the

Here it is, our completed set. I placed

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At this point, because the texture

The planet surface material 2

And then also for the emit channel

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Of course, all the textures we placed

As for the stencil map, I made a tile-

The first texture channel works as a

www.blenderart.org 14 Issue 9 March 2007

The fresnel disturbing flickering of the pixels on

Two textures for the halo, the first for

At this point, we are finished.

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Making the Sun Green and Blue) values, just be sure

Open up Blender, and if you have the

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another procedural texture for this. sphere, with default settings;

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The new render layer will have all the

Now we have a (very simple)

Now it's time to mix all the three