3DVIA Shape 3.0: Tip #4 - How To Revolve Geometry

The following techniques for 3DVIA Shape 2.0 are still quite valuable to help improve your 3D modeling skills:

Dhiraj Patil is well known to 3DVIA visitors as DPV1. His models have been in Top 10 – 005, – 007 and – 008 with a second model as an Honorable Mention in – 008.

Dhiraj also knows his way around 3DVIA Shape like few other modelers. The Honorable Mention model happened to be of a volleyball and I included an image of his wire frame because so many 3DVIA Shape users had been asking how to make a sphere using Shape.

Dhiraj has even kindly sent us the following illustrated tutorial that will easily step you through the process to create various spherical objects using 3DVIA Shape 2.0.

These are his own words and images with just minor edits. You did a great job Dhiraj!

“This tutorial is aimed at letting users of 3DVIa shape 2.0 create spherical objects which cannot be created using a direct command. The example taken is that of a volleyball which eventually can be applied to any other object spherical in nature.

1 – Create a rectangle using the rectangle tool.

2 – Extrude it to create a block by using the push-n-pull tool.

3 – Create a circular surface on one of the vertical faces.

4 – As we need only half the surface, delete the unwanted part.

5 – On the top surface, create a triangle by drawing lines exactly from the center to the two opposite vertices.

6 – Remove all the surfaces except the triangle on top and the semi-circular surface on the side.

7 – Using the push-n-pull command, extrude the two surfaces so that they intersect totally.

8 – Now remove all the unnecessary surfaces to keep only the semi-circular wedge created after the intersection. The faces of the wedge also should be deleted.

9 – Provide a Texture or color. Doing this at this step will save adding it to the individual circular faces later as there would be a larger number of them (depending on how many wedge segments you use).

10 – Select the object and click on the manipulate command.

11 – Drag the vertex of the manipulator axis to the corner of the wedge. This shall be the point of rotation.

12 – Now we need to rotate the wedge around this point, simultaneously making a copy. Click on the CTRL button and drag the horizontal rotation arc of the manipulator axis.

13 – The wedge gets copied with a rotation around the selected point. Repeat this step until the whole spherical object is formed.

Your completed sphere will look something like this.

14 - Since (after rotation) the left edge will not snap exactly on the right edge, there might be intersection between them. To remove the intersected elements, join the edges of the intersecting surfaces by drawing a line to connect them. This will create distinct intersection surfaces.

15 – Now delete the unwanted surfaces.

The object that is created is very much spherical in nature. The number of discrete wedge elements determine the smoothness and the smaller the angle of the wedge the smoother the object will be. However, with more discrete elements there would be more triangles and the file size would eventually be greater.

I have followed a similar method to create flowers and plants in 3DVIA Shape 2.0.”

Thank you Dhiraj for sharing your techniques with us! I’m always amazed that each user will find a way around a problem that so many others have not thought of. We can all apply this set of tools and the inspiration of your example to make sure we bring our imagination to our own modeling.

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 3D Model of the Duxford Control Tower

View Model on 3DVIA 

Thank you for the quick turn around on the very cool 3D model.  I put the same assignment out to anyone else – make a 3D model using 3DVIA Shape and drop a comment here.  I’ll post the best versions when you upload them to the site.

While we are on the subject of buildings…you should check out Marc’s new group for House and Building 3D modelers.  After you join the group, you can add your 3D models to the group directly from the model page.

siege103 from Earthware recently posted some interesting 3D models to 3DVIA that were built using Google SketchUp. The best 2 models he uploaded were the Housing Terrace and Shopping Center models.

My assignment for Chris this week…try creating some of your models using 3DVIA Shape?

 Siege103’s 3D Shopping Center

You may remember his great (and honest) review from the Earthware Blog covering the Microsoft Virtual Earth – 3DVIA release and the video he produced on “Creating your first building in Virtual Earth 6“.

To upload your 3D models to our free 3D model hosting service, create a 3DVIA account and enjoy.

Cheers!