Wings 3D/User Manual/A Quick Start Guide/Your First Real Model: a Dog House

If you still have your finger exercise up, do a File New. Don't bother to save the tooth, unless you really want it. Now let's build a dog house.

Start with a primitive cube. Select the lower and upper edge on one of the sides. Then Connect them (remember to right click to bring up the Edge menu). Hit the Space Bar to deselect the new edge. Repeat the operation on the opposite side of the cube. You should have something similar to that shown in Figure 10.a.

Select the three vertical edges on one of the sides. Connect. Hit the Space Bar to deselect the new edge. Repeat on the other side. You should have something similar to that shown in Figure 10.b.

Move the horizontal mid-edges up in the Y direction on both sides by 0.50 units. Then Move the vertical mid-edges forward in the Z direction on both sides by 0.50 units. You can see the units change in the Status Bar at the bottom of the Wings window, below the Icon Bar. Simply stop dragging when the value reads 0.50 and left click the mouse. You should have something similar to that shown in Figure 10.c.

Figure 10. Roughing in the basic form. The top and bottom edges have been Connected in (a). The new edge and the two side edges were then Connected in (b). Do this on both sides of the model. In c the edges have been Moved. Do both sides of the model at the same time to ensure symmetry. In (d) the sides have been Extruded. The vertices on the front face have been Connected in (e). In (f) the new edge and the bottom edge were Cut by 3 and the resulting vertices then Connected.

Select the two large faces, one on each side, and Extrude Normal by 1.0. You should have something similar to that shown in Figure 10.d. Then Select the two vertices on the front face and Connect them as shown in Figure 10.e. Select the two long edges on the front face and Cut by 3. Connect the resulting vertices. You should have something similar to that shown in Figure 10.f. Select the front faces of the side sections and Inset some windows as seen in Figure 11.a Move the front three edges that run horizontally across the front of the main cube down in Y by 0.50 to square up the door as shown in 11.b. Then select the two windows and Scale them down in Y by 0.50 units to square them up as well. You should have something similar to that shown in Figure 11.c. Select the door, windows, and the three floor faces as shown in 11.e. Now Intrude to hollow out the shell of the dog house. Figure 11.f shows the results of the Intrude operation. The thickness of the walls is determined by how much you move the mouse while Intruding. Figure 11. More basic construction. New faces have been Inset in (a). The three edges on the front face were then Moved down in Y (b) to resize the door face. The windows are then resized in c. Select all the faces that will be used for the Intrude command in (e) and Intrude. The results of the Intrude are shown in (f).

Select the two edges that go from the side sections to the main roof and Dissolve them (Figure 12.a). Switch to Vertex Mode. Select the two left over vertices on the roof lines and Collapse them (Figure 12.b). Then select the top face and Inset by 75% (Figure 12.c). Now Move the inset roof face up in the Y direction for 0.50 units (Figure 12.d). Now Inset the top face outward by 30% then Extrude it up in Y by 0.25 units (Figure 12.e) and then Scale it down Uniform by 90% to form a little roof cap. The house should resemble that shown in Figure 12.f.

Figure 12. Building the main roof. Dissolve the edges (a) and Collapse the vertices (b) that disrupt the roof face. Then Inset the roof c. Move the center face up in Y (d) then Inset outward and Extrude Y to form the roof cap(e). Then Scale the top of the cap (f).

Select the top faces of the side sections and Inset outward by 40% (Figure 13.a). Then Extrude Normal up by 0.10 units (Figure 13.b). Switch to Edge Mode. Deselect the front and back edges with the mouse. This will leave the inside and outside edges still selected as in Figure 13.c. (I just rotated the house so you can see the back side and see that four edges remain selected.) Connect the side edges (Figure 13.d). Move the new edges up in Y 0.53 units to form gables. Hit the Space Bar to deselect everything and switch to Vertex Mode. Then select the vertices on the outside of the two gables and Scale X by -25% to bring them in as seen in Figure 13.e. Then Connect the vertices on the top outside edges on the sides of the gables.

Figure 13.The side roofs. Select the two side roofs and Inset outward (a) and then Extrude Normal up (b). Select the four edges (two on each roof) and Connect (c). Move the new edges up (e). Switch to Vertex Mode and Scale the two outer most vertices in X to form the gables (f).

Connect the front side top edges (Figure 14.a). Then select the two lower edges of the front top and Connect them (Figure 14.b). Switch to Vertex Mode (Figure 14.c) and Scale the vertices down in Y to bring the two lines close together and then Move them down in Y to bring them closer to the door (Figure 14.d). Select the two edges we just positioned (Figure 14.e) and Cut them by 3, then do a Connect on the resultant vertices (Figure 14.f). Scale them apart in X by

Figure 14. The porch overhang. Connect the side edges of the top front face (a) and then Connect the lower set again (b). Select the vertices and scale them down in Y to bring the edges closer together c. Then Move them all down closer to the door (d). Cut the edges by 3 (e) and Connect the resulting vertices (f) and scale them apart (g) to form a face that will become the porch roof (h). Then Extrude that face (i). 40% (Figure 14.g). Select the new face (Figure 14.h) and Extrude it Normal by 0.5 (Figure 14.i). Select the top back edge of the porch roof (Figure 15.a) and Cut it by 2. Connect the resulting vertex with the two front top corner vertices as show in Figure 15.b. Move the back center vertex up in Y by 0.5 (Figure 15.c). Now dolly the camera so that you can see the underside of the porch (as in Figure 15.d). Connect the bottom side edges of the porch roof (15.e). Move it forward in Z by 0.15 units (15.f). Select the front and back bottom edges of the porch roof too. Cut all three edges by 3 (15.g). Connect the vertices (15.h). Scale them apart in X 130% to form small square shaped faces at the front bottom corners of the porch roof (15.i). Now select the two intersecting vertices and Bevel to 0.07 units (15.j).

Select the resulting edges and Cut by 2 (15.k). Scale the resulting vertices from one side Uniform by 40% to form a roundish face (15.l). Now select the four vertices on the other side and do an Edit | Repeat Drag to form an exact copy of the rounded face on the other side of the porch. Select the two round faces and Extrude Y by -1.10 units which will make them even with the bottom of the house.

Figure 15. Under the porch. Cut the back edge of the porch roof by 2 (a) and connect that vertex up with the two at the top front corners (b). Then Move the center vertex up in Y (c). Now roll the house over so that you can see the underside of the porch (d). Connect the two side edges (e) and Move the new edge towards the front. Select the three long edges (g) and Cut by 3 and then Connect the resulting vertices (h). Bevel the intersecting vertices (i). Then select the edges of the new boxes and Cut by 2. One one side only, Scale the new vertices Uniform to form a circle (j). Then use Repeat Drag (k) to create another circle (l) on the other side of the porch.

Switch to Body Mode and select the house by clicking on it. Then switch to Edge Mode and all the edges will be selected. Right click to bring up the Edge Operations menu and set Hardness to Hard. Pick faces and set materials to your liking. Select all the roof top faces. Right click for the Face Operations menu and choose Set Material. You will be prompted for a material name. Call it Roof. The Material Editor will come up. Change the settings until you get a roof color you like on the preview globe on the left. Then click OK.

Figure 16. Completing the project. Select the two circles (a) and position your model so that you can see it from the front with all the bottom edges lined up (b). Then Extrude Y to create the columns. After assigning materials your model should resemble the one depicted in c. Remember to hit the Tab key to see the colors in Smooth Shaded mode.

While you can see the materials on the shaded wireframe in Workmode you can get a better idea of how things will look in Smooth Shaded Mode.To see the results deselect the roof faces and hit the Tab key for a shaded preview. You should see the new roof color. Now repeat material assignments as you did for the roof until your dog is happy (Figure 16.c). Save the model. Optionally, Export the model into one of the formats your renderer can accept and render the dog house to see how it turned out. Here is mine (Figure 17)

Figure 17. The dog house, rendered in Vue d'Esprit®.