Ship Bottoms

[Quasar]

I'm a Max user (version 7 to be exact), and I was wondering if extruded/tapered splines were the way to go or editing the hell out of a primitive (box/chamfer box) was the best way on developing the lower end of the ship. Can anyone help here?

[Archetype]

i basicly start with a single polygon and shift extrude the edges around a lineplan

keep an eye out i should have a tutorial up by next sunday

[pete.cook]

I pretty much use the same method as Archetype. A short tut is on the first page of my Type 42 (http://www.military-meshes.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1795) thread. I'm Archetype will go into much greater detail in his tut though.

[Lukem]

I can't wait Arch...:D

[Quasar]

The reason I asked is I have an original scifi series in the works, and the ships are being designed to look more like those of the modern navy with thrusters littered throughout and the like. I've been trying to get the keel of the ship worked out, but with no success. The reason for the look is they're supposed to be able to operate on land, sea, air and space (land is only for medium cruisers and smaller).

[Archetype]

basicly the way i do a keel is by tracing an extra row of polygons below my ship and making sure its the right keelwidth / length

then extrude the keel itself out of those polygons and chamfer around the edges to keep its corner crisp. the only real hard part is intergrating it with the subdivision so it doesnt pull and push your ships hull too much.

can you perhaps post a screenshot of your issue's ?

i could certainly help then

here's some shots of the tutorial, it shows a solid beam keel belnding into a hull shape. and an axis shaft.

in both subdivided and non-subdivided

http://www.navalart.net/images/tut/tut18.jpg
http://www.navalart.net/images/tut/tut19.jpg

in this case concerning the h44 i just chamfered and didnt extrude since it doesnt need to have a visible keelbeam, instead i made a hard surface blend into the plate metal hull


as for the tutorial i posted the first few parts here
http://www.military-meshes.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2220