Improve your Blender skills | beginner exercises | Level 3 | Hard surface

hello in this video we're looking at practice exercises again in this particular episode we're looking at hard surface techniques these exercises are all part of a much bigger course on gabot co uk where all the courses are free from beginner right through to advanced levels as per usual I'll show you the shape then you have a go at making it and then I will show you how I would go about making it okay so this is the first shape the tip is subdivision surface have a go at that ok so how would I go about making this I'll make sure my cursor is at center shift a insert a plane add a subdivision surface modifier and we get this so I think I put it up to about three maybe four then into edit mode with tab on the keyboard or you come to edit mode down here and then ctrl R will give you the loop cut tools and then when you move over your shape it will give you options of where to put it I'm going to put it here left click to set you can move it around but right click will keep it in the same place and then I can just move this up and I have created this sort of curve shape like this back into object mode and I can set my shading to smooth as well and that will give it a nice smooth look okay let's look at the next one I'm going to select it and put it on smooth shading in fact there we go have a go at making that shape after seeing the last one this should be easier okay let's have a go let's choose a new layer make sure my cursors in the center shift a mesh plane let's add our subdivision surface modifier and up the amount so let's go into edit mode with tab I'm in edge mode so I've selected my edge here I'm going to get to side view which is three on my numpad and then five on my numbered to go to orthographic and I should then be able to press e to extrude and create some sort of interesting shape that goes around a curve now when I go back with my middle mouse button and go to a perspective mode with five on my numpad I can see the model I'm creating I don't have to go to side view but it's just easier and you know that it's going to be in line I could just extrude and pull them out as I see fit and this is a great way of creating panels so with that in mind back to object mode let's look at the next one your hint for this one is the solidify modifier also bear in mind that these are separate objects have a go at that okay so I'll move these across at the side and shift a mesh plane so let's add our subdivision surface modifier like the last times put that up a few go into edit mode and let's pull that one out I can't decide for you and see where we're going control our creates a loop cut down there let's bring it all up so I'm back into object mode with tab or we can change it down here move it up I'm only gonna roughly do the same shape tap back into edit mode let's move this back slightly extrude and pull it down now you can see I've gone off on the corner because I wasn't in side view so let's undo that and pull it down with the z-axis extrude and then press Z to constrain it does that access this time extrude and then Y to constrain it to the y axis and let's extrude once more now I've done a couple of extrusions if you want your lines sharper you will need to add more edge loops around that edge that you need so here if I bring these in close it creates quite a sharp edge whereas here is a very rounded edge and they're quite far apart if I put another one in here with ctrl R it sharpens it up slightly and I can move that out and into position ok so we've got a similar shape now you'll notice my curve comes around here a lot so there's a lot of space between the edge here and to smarten that up I can press ctrl R and pull it across and put another on the other side and you can see I've sharpened this up slightly I could also go this way as well and that supports these edges in subdivision surface it's looking slightly different from this but I'm explaining things I go so hopefully you get the idea now how do I make it a solid shape well there's an easy way I could of course go in to face mode with control tab faces and select all my faces and extrude them by the z-axis and then sort of pull them out this way as well to make them solid and that does work but that's not the most efficient way let's deselect all those and undo what I did and you'll notice actually that I've pulled these out in the wrong direction so I probably forgot to constrain it to the z-axis then I'll just quickly tidy that up that's quite close now if I go back to object mode and I go and use my solidify modifier so in the modifier panel under the spanner add modifier solidify and you can see already it's added a tiny bit of solidity so let's put the thickness up so the thickness option here and that's quite similar now let's click smooth shading now you'll see immediately these go soft as it were so we need to come over to our object data and click on Auto smooth so that we use that 30 degree angle to set things whether they're sharp or not okay the last thing to do then is to click and add our cylinders shift a mesh cylinder let's scale that down scaling the said move it up into position maybe a bit bigger and mine obviously have a subdivision surface modifier on so I can go to my spanner again add modifier subdivision surface now remember n guns at the end are not liked by the subdivision surface modifier so we'll need to go in to edit mode ctrl R and smarten this all up quite a lot and this top face here with ctrl tab select that top face eat extrude and scale it in and now we have a much better looking rivet or whatever it might be and we can also set that to smooth there we go and lastly if I press full stop on my numpad to zero in on that I can move it to the side shift D to duplicate and then move it across to the other side and we have two of the things so although it's not exactly the same you hopefully get the idea of how you can create these sort of straps or panels with rivets in okay the last shape I want you to look at this this one here now this looks quite complicated but you'll probably get the idea when you either have a go or when you see me do it it's less complicated than you think but there are a few things you need to know about it the tip for this one is think about your loop cuts for the sharpness of your curves okay have a go at that so we're going to edit mode quickly and show you the topology and you can see it there I've actually added a mirror modifier as well although it doesn't make a lot of difference it just means that I only really need to think about one half you can see that I've got edge loops supporting this little divot here so let's look at how I would create that move that over to one side cursor roughly in the center and let's go shift a mesh plane just scale that up touch and I'll scale it in the x-axis as well I'll do the same thing I did over here I'll create a mirror so into edit mode with tab control R you can of course use the auto mirror but I'll do it the long way control R left click left click again to set the position control tab to select face delete and then faces add modifier mirror and there's our other side okay so I need to divide this up a bit so let's control R I'll have a cup of loop cuts this time and in order to do that I need to use my wheel and I'll do the same this way ctrl R use my wheel and then I'll go into face mode with ctrl tab select these two faces and drag them upwards okay so I've got that rough shape let's put the subdivision surface modifier on and see what that looks like to add modifier subdivision surface and turn that up just a touch to about the hair we find now I want a loop cut coming around here okay so if I press ctrl R I can't do it and that's because my topology isn't set up in the correct way so I right click and come out of that when you're creating these sort of areas like this you need if I click on this one edge is to follow those kind of divots so back to my shape into edit mode how can I do that well well I can press the inset button to create an inset press I on your keyboard I can also uncheck this boundary section and that means the mirror where there's a boundary it won't create an inset in it it's probably a good idea to turn clipping on as well in the mirror and now I can select this loop of faces and I can actually just extrude these down and suddenly it creates this sort of divot area and now I can modify this in a special way however I see fit and I can all sorts of interesting shapes of this so maybe I'll select this face lip here and scale that out in the Y and you can see that it's coming bit closer to what we've got over here so you can get the idea of how we can create these sort of divots also I can go to smooth shading and it's a bit closer and if I ever want to sharpen those up we're going to edit mode again I can do another loop cut and sharpen some edges up like this also if I press a full stuff on my numpad I can zoom in there and get round to this side as well with my loop cut and pull that down as well and now because I've got the right to apology I can then create these loop cuts all in this area and now we've got a very sharp edge so if I add another plane over here just to reiterate that point shift a mesh plane and I subdivide it this time I just press the subdivide button a couple of times here full-stop to zoom in and then ctrl tab to select the faces select these four in the middle here and pull them upwards put my subdivision surface modifier on and I'll just quickly explain that again you can see this middle bit it's being pushed up but as soon as I press ctrl R it's not following a flow around those faces so I can't create a loop cut the only way I can do that is by creating an inset with I and now I can go in and create a loop cut in this area then I can create my divot but those subdivisions surface up before that seems complicated but the more you model the more that will make sense and this is a basic introduction of how topology works your edge flow needs to follow the edges of your model so you can add loop cuts around it and sharpen edges up if you need to within a subdivision surface modifier okay bit more complicated there there'll be more episodes like this in the future so do go on together taco dot uk' if you want more of those thanks for your support I appreciate all the comments so do comment and let me know of any issues you can also go to my discord server and ask questions lots of helpful people on there and I'm also on there regularly and if you want to support me there is a patreon link my website thanks for watching

Channel: Grant Abbitt

Views: 70,930

Rating: 4.9708028 out of 5

Keywords: learn, blender, tutorials, 3d, art, graphics, texture, paint, exercise, practice, tools

Id: bNFn8_fISiY

Length: 11min 35sec (695 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 05 2018