Blender Tutorial: Caliper Accuracy 3D Model

in this blender video I'm going to demonstrate how to make this 3d model of a stereo plug adapter this is modeled after an actual plug adapter that I have one challenge to modeling based on a real physical object is being able to accurately measure the dimensions of the object in this video I'll show you how I use a digital caliper to measure the various dimensions of the object and I'll also demonstrate how to use these measurements to create this 3d model a digital caliper is a versatile measurement tool with good accuracy it can be used to measure the thickness or width of something it can measure an inside diameter or a distance between two edges it can measure depth it can also make step measurements after doing my research I ended up buying the eye gauging ez Cal digital caliper and I'm very pleased with it it's got a nice large display and it measures in millimeters inches and inches with a fraction if you follow the link that I placed in the video description then you can see the current price and learn more about this digital caliper but I need to make the disclosure that as an amazon associate I earn from qualifying purchases the blender version that I'm using is 2.8 beta since this is a beta version of blender you should be aware that some of the things that I'll be showing might change also version 2.8 is a major update to blender so if you are using an earlier version than many of the things I'll be showing will be different we're going to start with a new project so from the file menu select new and then general the first thing that we're going to do is set up the units that blender uses so that it will match the units that the caliper uses so open the same panel and then open the units section the caliper can measure either millimeters or inches I typically take measurements in inches but for a change I'm going to set the caliper to measure in millimeters in the unit system drop down menu if you're going to use inches then set this value to imperial and set the length value to inches since I'm going to use millimeters I'll set the unit system to metric and the length value to millimeters now blender matches the caliper we don't need the cube so select it and then press X to delete it now press shift a and add a mesh circle then open the last operation panel here is where you can make changes to an object right after adding it if you don't see this panel then from the View menu add a check mark next to adjust last operation currently the radius of the circle is 1000 millimeters I'm going to use the caliper now to take a measurement from the plug adapter before taking any measurements I'm going to close the caliper and then push the zero button to zero it out now I'll measure the diameter at this point it's six point three four millimeters so I'll enter this value into the radius entry box but before I press the Enter key I need to take into account the fact that what I measured was the diameter and this entry box is asking for the radius to convert a diameter value into a radius value all I need to do is divide by two in blender this is easy just type a forward slash which means divide and then type two now when I press the Enter key blender divides the diameter value by two and displays the radius now the circle is a lot smaller so I'm going to zoom in you'll notice that if i zoom in too far then the circle disappears to fix this from the view menu add a check mark next to sidebar then select the View tab and change the clip start value to one now you can go to the View menu and remove the check mark from next to sidebar now I can zoom in even farther and it will look fine next tap into edit mode and then press a to select all next we're going to extrude this circle on the z axis so press E then Z then pull it up this value shows how far we extruded it on the z axis now I'll measure the overall length of the chapter it measures 45 point zero three millimeters and so I'll enter this value here for the Z value even though this displays 45 millimeters if you click it you can see that it's actually forty five point zero three next I'm going to place a loop cut at the position of this edge so press ctrl R to add a loop cut left click to place it here then slide it all the way to the top and left click again to confirm the operation I moved it all the way to the top so that we can now move it a specific distance from the top now move it on the z axis by pressing G then Z then move it down here this displays how far we moved it now I'll use the depth measuring rod at the end of the caliper to measure the distance from the end of the adapter to the black plastic ring it measures 30 points 8 2 millimeters when I enter in the value I need to enter it as a negative value since the displayed value is negative so all enter minus 30 point 8 2 next I'm going to place a loop cut at the position of this edge so press ctrl R to add a loop cut left click to place it here then slide it all the way to the bottom and left click again to confirm the operation now move it on the z axis by pressing G then Z then move it up here now I'll take a step measurement from the black plastic ring to the end of the adapter it measures one point zero two millimeters and so I'll enter that value here to set the distance next we're going to extrude the plastic piece to give it some thickness so switch to face select mode then hold down the Alt key and left-click one of these faces to select the whole ring of faces when we extrude these faces we're going to extrude them along the normals so from the face menu select extrude faces along normals then extrude outwards the offset value shows how far it's extruded now I'll take a step measurement to find the thickness of the plastic ring at this point it measures one point five two millimeters and so I'll enter that value here to set the thickness next I'm going to place a loop cut at the position of this edge so press ctrl R to add a loop cut put it here and slide it all the way to the bottom and left-click then move it on the z axis by pressing G then Z then move it up here now I'll measure this distance it measures eight point two six millimeters and so I'll enter that value here next we're going to extrude the bottom part of the plastic ring to make a thicker so switch to face select mode then hold down the Alt key and left-click one of these faces to select the ring of faces now from the face menu select extrude faces along normals then extrude outwards now I'll take a step measurement to determine how far to increase the thickness it measures zero point four nine millimeters and so I'll enter that value here to set the thickness next we'll work on the socket part of the adapter that accepts a small stereo plug so press shift a and add a circle now I'll measure the outside diameter of the socket it measures five point nine six millimeters and so I'll enter that value here and divide by two since this is a radius value and what I measured was a diameter now we'll add a circle for the inside of the socket so press shift a and add a circle now I'll measure the inside diameter of the socket it measures three point five four millimeters and so I'll enter that value here and again I'll divide by two next we're going to connect these two circles together so switch to edge select mode then with the inside circle still selected hold down both the Shift key and the Alt key and left-click the outside ring to add it to the selection then from the edge menu select bridge edge loops now we'll delete some of the geometry that we don't need so hold down the Alt key and click this ring of edges to select them then hold down both the shift and alt keys and click this ring and this ring to add them to the selection then press X to delete and select vertices now hold down the Alt key and click this ring of edges to select them we're going to extrude this ring up to the level of this ring to do this open the snapping drop down menu and select edge this will allow us to snap to an edge now press e to extrude then Z to restrict the extrusion to the z axis then hold down the control key to enable snapping and place the cursor over this edge a circle should appear over the edge to indicate that we will be snapping to this edge then left click to confirm the operation now with this edge still selected hold down both the shift key and the Alt key and click this ring of edges to add them to the selection next we're going to use bridge edge loops again to connect this ring of edges to this ring of edges but if I do it right now you'll see that something strange happens to show this I'll go to the edge menu and select bridge edge loops you can see that it didn't connect the edges the way that we would expect there are edges crossing each other I'll press ctrl Z to undo this and then I'll show you how to make it work as expected what we need to do is to recalculate the normals before doing the bridge edge loops so press a to select all then from the mesh menu select normals and then recalculate outside now hold down the Alt key and select this ring of edges then hold down the shift key and the Alt key and click this ring of edges to add them to the selection now from the edge menu select bridge edge loops now it looks good now let's finish the hole in the middle so hold down the Alt key and click this inside edge to select it then press F to add a face now press e to extrude and drag it up this is a good time to save what I have so far I'm going to name it adapter dot blend now we're going to add loop cuts here here here here here here and here I'll be making all of the measurements from this point so press ctrl R to add a loop cut and left click here then slide it all the way to the bottom and left click again to confirm the operation now move it up on the z-axis by pressing G then Z then drag it up here this is how far I moved it this distance measures twenty seven point four six millimeters and so I'll enter that value here now we'll do it again press ctrl R to add a loop cut and slide it to the bottom then press G then Z then drag it up here this distance measures 24 points eight millimeters and so I'll enter that value in the interest of time I'll do the next five loop cuts more quickly so I'll add a loop cut and then move it up the measured value is twenty three point two eight millimeters I'll add another loop cut and drag it up the measured value is twenty two point three two millimeters I'll add another loop cut and drag it up the measured value is twenty-one point zero three millimeters all out Loup cut and drag it up the measured value is fifteen point nine millimeters I'll add the last loop cut and drag it up the measured value is fourteen point nine one millimeters now let's work on the tip of the adapter and so I'll zoom in on it I'll select this top ring of edges by holding down the Alt key why I click on one of the edges to set the size of this ring it might seem like all that I need to do is to press s in order to scale this down in size while this does change the size the values that we can set our percentage values so for example if I set both the x and y values to 0.5 then the size of the circle will be 50% of its original size well we could do some math to determine what percentage values to use I'll show you a different method so start by moving the 3d cursor to the center of this ring by pressing shift S and then select cursor to selected now press shift a and add a circle I'll measure the diameter at the tip it measures one point nine eight millimeters and so I'll enter that value here and divide by two since this is a radius value now press F to add a face to the circle next hold down both the shift key and the Alt key and click one of these edges to add the whole ring to the selection then from the edge menu select Bridge edge loops next add a check mark next to merge to merge these two rings together then you can use the merge factor setting to control whether you merge to the outside ring the inside ring or something in between I'm going to merge to the inside ring since that's the measured circle that I just added next hold down the Alt key and select this ring of edges then press s to scale and scale it down in size it doesn't matter how small you make it because we're going to adjust its size later next we're going to adjust the radius of some of the different sections of the adapter that's because the radius of this section is not the same as this section or this section or this section and the radius of this insulating ring is different than this one in fact none of these sections are the same but the caliper has a zero function that can help us to adjust things the very first ring that we made when we started modeling was the radius of this section so we're going to adjust the various sections based on the size of this section to do that I'll first measure the size of this section now I'll press the zero button so that the caliper will read zero at this point now when I measure the other sections of the adapter the caliper will show us how much larger or smaller it is compared with this section let's start by adjusting the size of the insulating rings so switch to face select mode then hold down the Alt key and left-click to select this ring of faces then from the face menu select extrude faces along normals then extrude inward now I'll measure this ring it's zero one four millimeters smaller we're going to enter that number here but first notice whether the offset is positive or negative since it's positive we're going to enter our measured value as a positive value so all enter 0.14 also our measured value is a diameter value and the offset is based on radius and so all divided by two now hold down the Alt key and left-click to select the other insulating ring then from the face menu select extrude faces along normals then extrude inward now I'll measure this ring it's 0.38 millimeters smaller and so I'll enter that value and divide by 2 now hold down the Alt key and select this ring of faces we change the size of the two insulating rings by extruding them because that added more geometry to them at the edges we're going to be pushing these faces in a little but we don't need any extra geometry so from the mesh menu select transform then shrink fatten then push the faces inward we're using shrink fatten instead of scaling it because shrink fatten allows us to enter an offset value if you recall when you scale something it uses percentage values now I'll measure this ring it's 0.18 millimeters smaller and so I'll enter that value and divide by 2 now hold down the Alt key and select this ring of faces then from the mesh menu select transform and then shrink fatten then push the faces inward now I'll measure this ring it's 0.36 millimeters smaller and so I'll enter that value and divide by 2 now let's add a subdivision surface modifier and then we'll adjust the radius here and here so tab into object mode then switch to the modifiers panel and add a subdivision surface modifier set the render and viewport values to 3 then right-click the adapter and select shade smooth now tab back into edit mode when you use a subdivision surface modifier the radius of the new smooth surface doesn't always match the original geometry very well especially in areas like this and this so I'll show you a method that you can use in these areas we'll start by adding a couple of circles that we'll use as a reference so switch the edge select mode then hold down the Alt key and select this ring of edges then move the 3d cursor to the center of this ring by pressing shift S and then select cursor to selected now press shift a and add a circle I'll measure the diameter at this point since I changed the zero point of the caliper earlier I need to close it and rezero at first the diameter measures five point eight nine millimeters and so I'll enter that value and divide by two now let's add another circle here that we'll use as a reference so that we can see through the smooth surface click the show whole screen transparent button now hold down the Alt key and select this ring of edges then move the 3d cursor to the center of this ring by pressing shift S and then select cursor to selected now press shift a and add a circle I'll measure the diameter at this point it measures three point eight millimeters and so I'll enter that value and divide by 2 now click the show whole screen transparent button again next we're going to add a loop cut so press control R and put a loop cut here then switch to face select mode hold down the Alt key and select this ring of faces now I'll zoom in next press s to scale and scale it until the smooth surface is even with the reference circle now let's adjust this section so click the show whole screen transparent button then switch to edge select mode then hold down the Alt key and select this ring of edges now click the show whole screen transparent button again if you don't see the reference circle then press s to scale and scale it down now press 1 on the number pad for front view then move it on the z-axis by pressing G then Z then move it until the minimum width of the smooth surface is centered with the reference circle now rotate the view down a little now press s to scale and scale it until the smooth surface is even with the reference circle we're done with the two reference circles so let's remove them to do that make sure that edge mode select is selected then from the Select menu choose select all by trait and then loose geometry then press X to delete and select vertices next let's flatten the top so switch to face select mode and select the top face now press I for in sets and inset it slightly if you look closely you can see some ripples around the edge so press I and inset it again now it looks better now we're going to some materials and we're also going to add some loop cuts to sharpen some of the edges so press Z and select look dev so that we can get an idea of what this will look like before we set up the lighting now switch to the material panel and click the new button we'll keep the principal shader set the metallic value to 1 to make this a metal material we're going to add a small amount of roughness so set the roughness value to 0.05 then change the base color to a hex value of b2 9 f9 6 now we'll add another material for the insulating rings so hold down the Alt key and select this ring of phases then click this plus button to add a new material and then click the new button now click the assign button to assign this material to the selected faces now set the base color to black keep the metallic value set to zero because if this is not a metallic material we want the material to be glossy so set the roughness value to zero you'll notice that the new material doesn't extend all the way to the top and bottom of the selected faces so we're going to add some loop cuts to fix this so press ctrl R add a loop cut here and slide it all the way up then press ctrl R to add another loop cut and slide it all the way to the bottom now let's add a few more loop cuts to sharpen some edges so add a loop cut here and slide it up a little then add another one here and slide it down a little then add another one and slide it here next let's work on the other insulating ring so switch to face select mode then hold down the Alt key and select this ring of faces then click the assign button to assign the material to the selected faces then add a loop cut here and slide it all the way up then add an Loup cut and slide it all the way down now add a loop cut above the ring and slide it here then add another loop cut below the ring and slide it here next we'll work on the black plastic ring so switch to face select mode hold down the Alt key and select this ring of faces we're selecting these faces because they are at the center of the plastic ring now hold down the control key and press the plus key on the number pad two times to select more connected faces if you don't have a number pad then from the Select menu go to select more or less and choose more you'll need to do this twice now click this plus button to add another material and then click the new button then click the assign button to assign this material to the selected faces now set the base color to black then set the roughness to 0.4 this material is extending up here to high so press ctrl R to add a loop cut and slide it all the way down then add another loop cut here and slide it all the way in we'll do this at the bottom also so add a loop cut here and slide it all the way up then add another loop cut here and slide it all the way in now sharpen this bottom edge by adding a loop cut here and slide it outward until it's close to the outside then sharpen this top edge by adding a loop cut here and slide it outward until it's close to the outside now add a loop cut here and slide it near the top to sharpen this edge now add a loop cut here and slide it near the bottom to sharpen this next add a loop cut here and slide it outward until it's close to the outside now let's sharpen the edges at the bottom of the metal socket so add a loop cut on the bottom and slide it outward until it's close to the outside then add another loop cut to the bottom and slide it inward but don't slide it too far because the inside edge is not as sharp then add a loop cut to the inside and slide it down to about here this is a good time to save what I have so far the black plastic ring has a texture on the surface and so we'll add that now so switch to the shading workspace I'm going to zoom in on the adapter and a quick way to do that is to press the period key on the number pad if you don't have a number pad then from the View menu select frame selected if i zoom in further it will disappear but I can bring it back by clicking this button to switch to orthographic view to add a texture press shift a and select texture and the noise texture then press shift a again and select a vector here you'll find vector displacement and displacement select displacement then connect the displacement output to the displacement input then connect the factor output to the heights input now change the noise texture scale value to 200 to make the texture smaller the texture that we're trying to achieve is not very strong and so I'm going to enter a very small value for the displacement scale value I'm going to use point zero zero zero zero five even though this displays zero if you click it you can see that it accepted the small value that I entered part of the black plastic ring has a grid pattern on it we're going to add this by using a grid texture to do this switch to face select mode hold down the Alt key and select this ring of faces we're going to add a new material to these faces so switch to the material panel then click this plus button to add a new material and then click the new button now click the assign button to assign this material to the selected faces this new material will be similar to the previous material that we just made so let's copy the previous material so select the previous material then click this button and select copy material now select the new material that we just added then click this button and select paste material we don't need the noise texture for this material so select it and press X to delete it now press shift a and selects texture and then image texture connect the color output to the heights input I'm going to be using this image of a grid that I created using Inkscape you can find a link to it in the video description now click the Open button and select the adapter grid image next we need to unwrap these faces so switch to edge select mode then rotate the view to the back and select one of these edges then from the edge menu select mark seam now I'll rotate the view back to the front next switch to face select mode hold down the Alt key and select this ring of faces then press u to unwrap and select unwrap now change the scale value to point zero zero one next we need to scale the unwrapped faces so that they will fit the image that we're using so switch to the UV editing workspace now press a to select all then rotate it by pressing R then 90 then enter we're going to adjust the size of the selected faces to match the size of the image so move it on the x axis by pressing G then X then drag it to the center to make this easier from the UV menu add a check mark next to constrain to image bounds this will prevent the selected faces from moving outside of the image now press s to scale and scale it up in size until it won't get any bigger then press G to move and center it then press s to scale and scale it up in size again until it won't get any bigger next switch to the layout workspace then press tab for edit mode now we'll add a couple of loop cuts to adjust the position of the top and bottom of the grid so add a loop cut here and slide it up a short distance until the grid is near the top and there is a border between the grid and the top edge then add another loop cut and do the same thing for the bottom edge we're done making the adapter so tab back into object mode I'm going to position this so that it's lying on a flat surface so press 1 on the number pad for front view then press R to rotate if you set the angle to 94 degrees then it should work well now we'll add a surface for it to sit on so press shift a and add a mesh plane then press G to move and drag it down to the bottom of the adapter for the material click the new button and set the base color to a hex value of a for a for a for then scale it up in size by pressing s then 100 then enter next we'll set up the camera view so press 0 on the number pad for camera view this is the view looking through the camera I'll zoom in a little now I'm going to lock the camera to the view to do that press n to open the sidebar select the View tab and put a check mark next to lock camera to view then press in again to close the sidebar now I can zoom pan and rotate while looking through the camera since this is going to be a close-up view of a small object let's change the camera focal length so find the camera in the outliner and select it then switch to the object data panel if it's not already selected and changed the focal length to 200 now I'm going to pause the video while I set up the view that I'd like to use I'm finished setting up the view next let's set up the lighting some of the lighting settings are different for different render engines so we'll select the render engine now so selected by switching to the render panel and then select cycles now find the light in the outliner and select it then switch to the object data panel make sure the point lamp is selected and set the size to 3000 millimeters then set the power to 3000 now switch to the object panel so that you can position the lamp at the same location that I use I'm going to enter the location here so set the location x value to 1000 the Y value to 150 and the Z value to 5,800 to see what this looks like press Z and then rendered reflective surfaces like the metal in this adaptor generally look better when they have something to reflect so we're going to add an image to the background to do that switch to the world panel then click this small button next to color and select environment texture then click the Open button and select an image I'm going to use this image it's common to use a 360 degree image for an environment texture but since I'm only using it to give the adaptor something to reflect an image like this will work just fine you can find a link to it in the video description this image is named outdoors dot jpg now the reflections look better everything looks good so we're ready to set this up for the final render so switch to the output panel this is where you can set the resolution of the rendered image and the file format I'm going to keep all of the default values now switch to the render panel the sample in section is where you set the number of render samples the larger this value is the better the final image will look but the longer it will take to render I'm going to set it to 300 now I'm going to save the project it's a good idea to do this before rendering in case something goes wrong during the rendering process now we'll render the image so from the render menu select render image this is going to take several minutes to render and so all pause the video until it's done rendering is finished and this is the final image to save the image go to the image menu and select save as I'm going to name this image adapter dot PNG well that concludes this video thanks for watching and please subscribe and leave a comment

Channel: tutor4u

Views: 110,913

Rating: 4.948771 out of 5

Keywords: blender, caliper, digital caliper, blender version 2.8 Beta, 3D Model, how to, tutorial, tutorials, tips, tricks, beginner, intermediate, Blender (Software)

Id: RUPhlB_KkU8

Length: 38min 22sec (2302 seconds)

Published: Mon Jul 15 2019