Talk:Blender 3D: Noob to Pro/Penguins from spheres

Possibly moving the module
Hi!

While this is a really neat tutorial on creating a cute little penguin, this module doesn't introduce any new functions or tools of blender. Translation, rotation, scaling, extrusion, merging etc. are all tools from previous modules. Maybe this tutorial could be moved to the 'Miscellaneous Tutorials' section?

( I actually get this feeling from a lot of this books modules - that it's just a collection of miscellaneous tutorials. When learning about a new program shouldn't the main focus be on explaining the tools? Of course a little bit of repetition never hurt anyone, and to learn new tools, old tools will have to be used in the process of explaining what the new ones do. Sure now we know how to make a hat, a person and a penguin, but what about a toaster, a parrot, a moon, or the greek god Zeus when he's in a bad mood - are there going to be tutorials about these things too? )

Oh, and another thing! The term "noob notes" seems a bit weird here. Why not just "Observe" or "Hint" or something like that. I mean, aren't we all noobs reading this?

Coloring
I colored the rest of this little guy using the Multiple Mesh technique. Here's what he looks like: http://img324.imageshack.us/img324/291/penguin1wn.png I'll probably add a section on how to do so, if nobody minds.
 * Sorry for making all of you guys wait, other things have come up. I've got to register with Wikipedia to upload the pics, which will slow down any work I'm going to do. If I can't do it for some reason I'll let you guys know.

-- Hi, My Name is Craig, i havnt got a clue how to colour my penguin, i have made him to how the tut says to, but im a bit puzzeled about how to colour him, could somone please add something onto this tut about colouring.

Thanks

'''EDIT:

i have now coloured him and i dont need any help but it still may be a good idea to post how to colour it for other people.

i used the same technique from the dice tut.'''

Fixed the Limit selection to visible picture
It was pointing to the wrong button before, so I replaced it with a picture of my own. -Cleobod

Step 1
to put cursor in middle from the box it says, selection-cursor, but it is cursor-selection instead

Step 3 – the head
Shouldn't limit selection to visable be turned on here?

Step 4 - The Wings
At the end of this step, you have to select the two backmost vertices, but I couldn't find the ones so it is the same as on the picture

Step 5
Says: Now select the bottom most vertices in the same fashion, and press SHIFT + FKEY to Fill the hollow bottom of the poor bottomless penguin.

Shouldnt it just be FKEY for new face?


 * Nope, it would work if there were only 3 or 4 vertices, but FKEY for new face can't cope with so many at once. It makes at most a single new face, and blender's faces cannot have more than 4 vertices. Shift-FKEY tries to work out a way to connect all the vertices using as many faces as it needs. -- Darloth is terrible at explanations, but hopefully that helped.

Making the Neck
Could someone explain this in a little more detail I'm having trouble forming the neck?

Me too. I get up to the part that says " repeat (selection, etc.)" but what part do i repeat do I unselect and do the same thing over or continue on with the top 3 already selected. Instead of repeating I ended up extruding the middle then rotating it a little:

I did this by:

From the picture directly right of Rotating the neck:

1. Extrude the top 3 rings up (just less than double the size) 2. Rotate them 45 Counter-Clockwise 3. Extrude the top 2 rings (double their size) 4. Rotate the extruded part 50 Counter-CLockwise

I ended up with this: http://img103.imageshack.us/img103/8686/penguinfv0.jpg (sorry can't upload images to wiki for 4 days)

Start:  http://img232.imageshack.us/img232/7466/penguin1kp7.jpg Stage 1: http://img232.imageshack.us/img232/1289/penguin2dh6.jpg Stage 2: http://img403.imageshack.us/img403/3517/penguin3zf2.jpg Stage 3: http://img103.imageshack.us/img103/8977/penguin4vy2.jpg

In the final step where you move neck to the left, if you follow the Noob Note, there is a keypress missing and the neck skews along the X-axis. You need to press G, Y, -0.4. The "Y" constrains the movement along the Y-axis and you end up with what is in the picture. --Blonewolfs (discuss • contribs) 15:36, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

neck pointing in oppisite direction to the photos
when I made the neck from the side view in 2.49b up .3 on the Z hittig the blue arrow worked fine, but rotating by typing 30, made my neck point in the oppisite direction to the pictures.. lol Pearts (talk) 22:06, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

Instead of typing "30", you need to type "-30" to rotate counter-clockwise. --Blonewolfs (discuss • contribs) 15:23, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

evidently the even though I made it in side view, i had to AKEY twice, then NUM7, then Space -> Transform -> Rotate -180 to get mine to look like the photos Pearts (talk) 22:17, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

but now I've learned I could have pressed ctrl + num 3 and saw it from the other side! Pearts (talk) 15:23, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

Extruding the wings
User comment: I really need to do this by hand? Is there no way to tell Blender to do the same on the other side?

reply:You can select CTRL+SPACE->scale and while in front view, use the red square. Just make sure the cursor is between the wings. After you select the faces to extrude, just SHIFT+SKEY->Cursor->Selection.

User reply: Modifiers-> Add Modifier -> Mirror. Use the X-axis. Click "apply" when done with the symetrical stuff.

User response: adding a mirror modifier resulted in the surface of the penguin looking corrupt (response to self - because the penguin body was being mirrored on top of itself, but even when half of the penguin vertices are removed an unsightly seem is left).

Final user response: You can fix the 'corruption' by pressing Ctrl+W and choosing "Remove Doubles" after mirroring.

Appendix to Final user response: "Remove Doubles" will only get rid of the distortion if you select half of the faces in Front view (NUM1), hit (XKEY) and select "Faces" in the delete menu on the side to be mirrored, then the mirror modifier won't leave a seam, or distortion due to overlap.

Another User reply: Or you can select the bottom faces on both sides, and only then extrude.

Last User comment: Switch to Edit Mode. Select all penguin vertex by pressing AKEY twice. In "Mesh tools" tab click in "Rem Doubl" button.

Another Last User Comment: If you select both faces and hit EKEY>Individual Faces and then use "1.4" it works just fine.

Creating the beak
I prefer to set the MMB to pan the view instead of rotate it, but until just recently I didn't know how to center the camera again, and I'm posting this to help other Blender newbies who prefer this. I found that if you press "C" you can easily move the view to the center of the scene.

[For those who use versions earlier than 2.49b {the version I use as well as the only one I've ever used}, I don't know if this will work; still, try it and see if it works]. This made things immensely easier for me, since I now have better control over the camera. [In case this wasn't covered earlier, you don't need the MMB to rotate. With NUM lock on, NUM pad 4 rotates {the scene, not the view} left, NUM pad 2 rotates down, NUM pad 6 rotates right, and NUM pad 8 rotates up. These keys rotate the view right, up, left, and down, respectively.]

Smoothing the wings
(User comment on grid snapping: If you hold CTRL+SHIFT while doing a manipulation, it allows you to use smaller fractions as grid snap than with CTRL. With translation this is 1 for just CTRL, and 0.1 for CTRL+SHIFT)

(User comment on using the arrows: I mentioned earlier that the grid snap seemed inconsistent. It now seems that when I’ve got the 3d manipulators enabled (the arrows), the grid size is 1.0 units. When I have them turned off, the grid size is 0.1 unit. I don’t know why, and I haven’t found where to change this. The previous picture shows where to turn the 3D manipulators on/off, and which arrow to drag (using LMB) to achieve Z-axis movement.)

(User comment: if you spin the view it becomes 1.0 snapping, go back by pressing NUM1 and you should get 0.1 if not make sure View &rarr; Orthographic is checked and not Perspective this can also be done with NUM5)

(User comment: I've had trouble with the three axis arrows. When I click on the 'hand' icon, the three lines come up but with little blocks instead of arrows at the ends, which I believe means that they will scale instead of move. So, I have had to use GKEY for 'grab' and then ZKEY or YKEY or whatever to move along an axis.)

(Note from another user: Next to the hand click the triangle to go to Moving Mode).

(Reply to previous comment: You can change the size of the 3d manipulator arrows in the preferences area so that they are easier to click.)

Culling the underside
Note 1: Instead of using SHIFT+FKEY to make a zigzag surface, you could extrude the circle of edges (EKEY), constrain the extrusion to the Z-axis (ZKEY) and enter 0 (0KEY + ENTER) as the distance. This effectively duplicates the circle. Then do a merge (ALT+MKEY &rarr; At Center) to create a nice surface.

Note 2: Press CONTROL+NUM7 to view the penguin from the bottom. Now, without deleting anything, select four vertices, top, bottom, left, and right in the second ring out from the center vertex. Then snap your cursor to the selection. SHIFT+SKEY &rarr; Cursor -> Selection This places the cursor at the center of those vertices. Finally, select the center vertex, expand the selection to include the first ring (CONTROL+NUM+) then merge as above (ALT+MKEY) but at cursor rather than at center. This achieves the same result but without having to delete or extrude anything.

Alternative Method - Extrude & Scale:'' From a side view. Box select (BKEY) the bottom vertex & the 2 bottom most rings, then delete (DELETEKEY or XKEY &rarr; Vertices). Now box select (BKEY) the remaining bottom most ring. Initiate an Extrude (EKEY &rarr; Region) command, and escape terminate (ESCAPEKEY) said command. It will appear as if nothing has happened, but you have created a new (overlapping) bottom ring and is currently selected. Change the view to Orbit Down (NUM2KEY). Now Scale (SKEY) the selection, press the number 0 to close, then press the Enter key to commit. The bottom should have closed with a number of triangles, all pointing to a common center vertex. As a good practice, you should now remove doubles' (WKEY &rarr; Remove Doubles).

Extruding a tail

 * Note 1: I found it easier to select the center most, lowest vertex, and move it along the Y axis only. This creates a crude but very effective tail (that doesn't look all that bad when subsurfed).
 * Note 2: to do this correctly (if I've properly understood the previous user) you can also select the two faces in the bottom row (CTRL+TAB→Faces), which are connected to the three middle vertices and their projection on the bottom line, then split them into triangles (SPACE→Edit→Faces→Convert To Triangles or using CTRL+TKEY), then select the right two of them (it was the right quad face before) and flip the triangles' orientation (SPACE→Edit→Faces→Flip Triangles Edges or using CTRL+FKEY). So, there will be the five edges connected to the middle point in the second row from the bottom and only three to the vertex, mentioned by previous user. Then just move this lowest, center most, vertex by Y on 0.4
 * ''Note 3: don't do that extruding of the tail with only the edges or you will get an so called 'non-manifold mesh', cause you will have an edge with outgoing three faces, so blender can't recalculate the surface and you can't use the decimate modifier. this can be very nasty if you're modeling more complex things later. better select the whole two faces at the back end and extrude that and then shrink it along the z-axis.

Adding the feet
User note: I merged the three vertices at the bottom one,and at the folding point I merged the middle and top vertices at the middle one, and then I used the red arrow to translate the newly merged vertex about 0.04 BU's toward the inner part of the penguin, and the green arrow to translate it about 0.1 backwards.

Normals not pointing the right way
Even after recalculating them, a patch of mesh along all the back of the penguin gets the normals wrong, on the opposite side of the rest of the mesh.

I had to flip them manually so that all of them would point in the same direction, but if I recalculate them again they go the wrong way again. I'm not sure what am I doing wrong or why this is happening. http://i.imgur.com/kY8tUSs.png 186.125.95.40 (discuss) 06:28, 9 August 2013 (UTC)