jack5321804

[jack5321804]

Week 10 - Completing the Loop

So the stand in cura:

Well, what an adventure in comms it has been. I really enjoyed learning how to draw engineering drawings by hand, and building shapes by using tools rather than measuring. The t-square has proven to be a useful tool which I will treasure fondly but may not ever use again. I also really enjoyed learning how to draw in perspective, that is something I will take with me and can use not only in my studies but in my recreational drawings as well.

I think a big lesson I took away from this course is patience. I am used to picking up new skills quickly, rushing through material to get to the end result. This often involves taking shortcuts. I found that comms classes aren't my favourite as they often focus on conventions and dry skills rather than the artistic and free flowing side of design. I do recognize that no matter how good my designs might be, if I can communicate what it is I am trying to build, then it is basically worthless. So patience with myself and coming into these lessons with a mindset of its about the journey not the destination. If I am to become a good designer, taking my time to really learn the ins and outs of a skill, and apply a strong work ethic will get me much further than cutting corners to get half a job done. Doing this course again I would try manage my time better. I often put things off to the last minute which did in turn lead to more corners being cut. I think over all I achieved some of the learning objectives of this course. I know I am capable of much more and I am a little disappointing I did not apply myself fully to a course. It definitely took me out of my comfort zone and I think I got scared not being good at things straight away. I feel as though I missed out on a lot of learning just because I didn't want to fail enough to gain some valuable lessons. Through out all the ups and downs of a 10 week course, I found out a lot about myself and some good solutions to some problems, and a lot of work arounds that I will need to address in my time at UNSW and beyond. Thanks to all the students who helped me, and thanks to Rob, Sarah and Gonz for an interesting and dynamic term!

[jack5321804]

Week 9 - Prototyping

This lesson I found to be quite difficult. Not being to adept with 3dsmax made some of the adjustments I wanted to make to my stand quite difficult to do. I probably spent a good 10 hours trying a modifier and then undoing it as it didn't do what I was after. That being said, it did teach me a lot within that. The main issue I was having was with the rough and jaggered edges of the scan

I was really at a lose as what to do here and couldn't find a solution.

I made the recess where the perfume bottle would sit nice and flat, as it was quite rough which I didn't like. I did this by selecting the polys on and aligned them to the camera view. I did have to move and rotate the surface around to get it where it suited but I think it looks a lot better than it did before.

I then wanted to make a water tight shape. This took a lot of time to figure out. I tried selected the edge and extruding it, but this was uneven. I then found I could align the edge to the plan which would create a nice flat wall around the sides. I then used cap holes to put a base on the model which I could then use to create a render for my perfume bottle.

The finished product looks like this.

While its still quite rough around the edges (literally) I am quite happy with all that I have learnt over this tedious and informative lesson.

[jack5321804]

Week 8 - Digital Models

Having only used Solid works before, 3dsmax was a bit intimating. New buttons and layouts, with quad view. The two programs are quite different. However I didn't let the intimation stop me. I found the create objects tool to be quite intuitive, but the modifiers list to be a bit hard to handle at first. I managed to get some interesting effects on my primitives using the modifiers but it didn't feel like I quite understood what I was doing quite yet. I did find the exercise fun, as modeling in 3D is always quite enjoyable in my experience.

The second part of the task making a couch looking thing from a block. This was a bit more tricky to do but with a little bit of knowledge and some video tutorials watched I think I made something that could be sat on.

I do feel a lot more confident working in 3dsMax now. However there is still a lot for me to learn, which over time I will pick up. I am sure a lot of these basic skills can translate over to over programs. I look forward to using more programs in the future and being able to create some beautiful renders.

[jack5321804]

Week 7 - Model Making

Having only messed around with the blue foam and foam cutters at DFL for fun, or making rough sketch models, safe to say my blue foam skills were not very good. The shape of my perfume bottle involves a lot of angles, which create problems with accuracy as all the sides are tapered. I found that trying to do this free hand before class was proving to me quite a challenge. The template made things a lot smoother and enabled me to get the angles I want. However the square based pyramid at the top of the bottle was something I could not do. I used some foam cut off on the current angle as a guide to the foam cutter. This helped a bit but still, inaccuracies showed up. I decided to see if I made a large pyramid with the angles of the top first and then cut the tapered sides after would enable better results. I was wrong in this instance but it was still a good idea to explore. Then I thought about cutting the pyramid and the tapered block as two separate pieces which I could glue together after the fact. This seemed to work best so I stuck with that for my sketch models.

The way I wanted the cap to work was quite tricky to cut out from one piece of foam. I tried using a blade to create the effect I was after which was good enough for a sketch model. I also found difficulty in getting smooth flat cuts where I had a recess in my design. I used the dremel for this which has some success but still left me wanting something a bit cleaner and neater. In the end I played around with size for the bottle, and manged to get the cap to work somewhat well on the smaller model. This gave me a good way to experiment with how that cap would look and feel.

I think next time around I use blue foam, I will spend more time sanding and working on the details of it rather than the bigger features of the model. I think my models got really close to something that I would be happy with, and I did learn a lot about tools, how to get straight cuts, and how the foam reacts to differently to other model making materials. I did find foam quite a hard material to work with. I made many mistakes that often resulted in me having to start a whole model from scratch. In all honesty, I do not like blue foam, but see it as a good resource for model making. Perhaps over the course of my degree I will learn to become a better blue foam artist and enjoy the process more.

[jack5321804]

Week 6

I thought I was better at photoshop before I started this. So fair to say I have learnt a lot. Some was familiar and some concepts I found difficult. Clipping masks are something I will need more of play with in future but seem to be very helpful. I ran into some trouble with said clipping masks when I used the wrong layer to draw some things on which then snowballed into a problem down the line which I could not easily resolve. However all I had to do was made a stroke so I found a work around albeit messy solution to it which involved merging layers. Not what I really wanted to do but in a pinch it work. The shading I am not too happy with. Having found this difficult, I expect more research such as looking at photos of bottles would have been a great help here. My concepts feel a little dull and unimaginative to me. It seems that I still think that I can achieve good results without the man hours. This is a weak point I need to get on top of sooner rather than later as I know the more time I put in the greater the output will be. Overall the exercise was fun and informative. I learnt a lot and know if I keep improving I will need to work harder.

[jack5321804]

Week 5: Sketching

Building off from last week and the basics of perspective drawing I felt confident coming into this. The first part of the task to draw thumbnail concepts was quite easy and fun. Creativity can flow and its hard to draw a front on view so badly it can't be recognized. My first sheet wasn't very good at all however which lead to a complete redraw of 12 new thumbnails which I think 2 or 3 could be taken further.

Now onto Part 2. The punishment from not taking the time to learn how to draw curves in perspective catches up with me. I found translating what I thought my bottles should look like into 3D drawings to be quite the challenge. They seemed to always come out looking boxy or just like a regular cylinder. I attempted many times to find a way to make the rounded corners of the bottle look somewhat accurate, getting closer and closer every time. Different methods were implemented, I was determined to take some time to figure it out. Adding some shading here, breaking up the perspective box this way or that way. I found drawing oval shapes in perspective to match up all the lines helped a bit. Still after construction lines where erased the bottle went back to looking like a round cylinder. So then shading was experimented with. I thought if I had the basic shape done then what was missing was some faux shadows. This seemed to help a bit but the complex curves I was trying to draw from an idea built in my brain still proved to fail me. I think I got close to what I was after but to me more still needs to be done.

[jack5321804]

Week 4: Perspective Drawing

This week taught me more than any other week. To learn how to draw in accurate perspectives. The reading for this week proved to be a great help in understanding a previously unfamiliar concept. Translating a 3D object onto the 2D plane while ensuring the distortions that occur stay accurate and legible to the viewers eye was challenging and hard to wrap my head around. After many sheets of paper and mistakes in following the instructions, such as where to put the right and left vanishing points and connecting the wrong lines to said vanishing points, it clicked. The shape came together and looked as it did from my perspective. Once the basis of the concept was grasped things moved along a lot more smoothly. Thanks to help from Rob and my fellow classmates I feel I have a solid foundation to continue doing perspective work.

Part 2 seemed to be a breeze at first. Draw another box and extend the lines out further. But then came the problem. Where do the new boxes end? They do not go on forever and they must have an end point that is still with in relation to the actual dimensions of the box. After some lines drawn here and lines drawn there, I looked on tumblr to see some fellow classmates worked and found out what seemed to be be an accurate place to draw the end lines. However I am not sure if it was in the right place as the boxes do seem a little odd looking. This may have more to do with my vanishing points however.

And then comes Part 3. The circle in perspective. I really found this difficult to do well. Even with a the box square on to make things easier for my self, a few coffees providing a shaky hand and a forgotten ruler lead to some less than desirable circles. I couldn't figure out how to draw the circles to make them seen as if they were in the correct perspective. I think more practice is necessary in this exercise. Perfection comes at the steep price of repetition and hard work, which has always been a weak point for me. I think a calm mind to enable me to find the drawings meditative rather than a task will aid in my future leanings.

[jack5321804]

Week 3

Week 3 went further into orthogonal views. The task to draw a sloped box with some odd dimensions was a slight puzzle. As not all the dimensions have been listed on the reference drawing, it was easy to assume intuitive but incorrect dimensions. Taking my time and planning out the page before hand was a great help to creating a much better drawing than in week 2. I found a steady hand and patience to measure twice and draw once the way to go. However I forgot about the title box until after the 1:1 drawing was complete and was forced to draw a rather poor one in the top right corner. I did find the dimensions a bit difficult to layout in a clean and concise way so in future I plan to think about this part of engineering drawings more. I found the section view rather fun to do as it required me to imagine an object I'd never seen before and then to rotate and cut it in half all in my head. After a few attempts where my brain created some inaccuracies, the imagine become clear and I could put pencil to paper. Overall I found the process quite meditative and hope to continue to hold my patience in future.

[jack5321804]

Week 2

Week 2 I was weak with the flu. I made do with looking over the course materials in my own time and did my best to grasp the material. This week was mainly on the conventions on how to drawn and layout a page and dimensions. This content was more complex and tedious than week 1. I will say that my work was a little rushed in this, and that quality is reflected in my work. I found the short cuts I took this week to not be worth it in the long run. Rulers slipped and felt liners bled creating a messy drawing with a few inaccuracies. Learning to layout the page and the title box before the actual drawing is done is a valuable lesson I will take with me. The workspace I have created at home is also not working for me currently, as using the T-square proves to be difficult. The conventions of labeling the drawing are far more in depth than I previously thought and needs more planing with meticulous attention. I struggled with planning out the title box especially. Overall this week I am not happy with the work I have completed, but have learnt that a calm and quiet mind lends it self to better drawings.

[jack5321804]

Week 1 - Getting Started

This week was all about getting started.

The two engineering drawings done in class seemed to be simple, yet figuring out how to use the equipment in the right way to get perfect dimensions could be challenging. Talking to other classmates and sharing ideas really helped me in this part. In graphite I found I was able to draw the lines quite well. When it came to tracing over with the fine liner, mistakes were made. My hands could have been a bit shaky from lack of sleep on this day. I found the 6 pointed star to be easier to draw than the curves. Overall I think the star turned out quite well and the circle apparatus to be satisfactory for a first attempt. I think more patience would lend it self well in future.

The second activity drawing the geometric shapes was quite enjoyable and I found it easy to pick up. Straight lines are easy to draw. Without a table with a straight edge at home suitable for a t-square I had to use the edge of the cutting board which was a slightly to thin to get the t-square flat. However I like to think I made it work. There were a few mistakes here, mainly using a blunt knife for my first cut and incorrectly using a ruler.

[jack5321804]

First

Hey guys, I am Jack. I do yoga and ride a skateboard.