Unusual uses for the Extrude tool :)

[Rik]

Did this some time ago.
Everything in this lens is 3D Extrude.
In fact, any other method I could think of, would have taken me much longer to get the end result.

[angelize]

There are a lot of uses for the shapepainter/eraser tool combo, in general. The uses with the extrude tool are just part of their usefulness, and they really haven't been thoroughly explored on the forums. I think that it would be good to break off a separate discussion for them.

Rik: that is very well done.

[Gamerprinter]

In fact, any other method I could think of, would have taken me much longer to get the end result.

Nice missile, at least that's what I think it is...

You've probably never used Wings3D or Nendo (I use Nendo) which are subdivisional surface modelers and extremely easy to use. In fact creating natural looking smooth, rounded surfaces on complex geometry is very easy in Nendo and similar applications. Note I only do the object's modeling in Nendo, I then export to .3DS or other 3D format, import to a full 3D program with a rendering engine to create the image. I think Nendo is still available - something like $25 - 50 if I remember right from IZware - it was developed by Nichimen for Squaresoft (I know that the higher end software Mirai by Nichimen was used extensively in the creation of Gollum in the Lord of the Rings movies.)

I made this 'thing' in about 2 minutes using Nendo - another minute to setup the renderer and render the image. No time at all to do.

[Gare]

Nice sculpture, GamePrinter.

Even though we are limited to an Extrude tool in Xara, and all of the creative workarounds and optical illusions we’re gathering here, I feel I ought to point out a couple of realities to 3D modeling that might help explain why “you can’t get there from here” when you have a 3D idea in your head, and an Extrude tool and other drawing tools, but not a true projected 3D workspace on your 2D monitor.

Unless you’re sculpting, as you’d do with ZBrush, Mudbox, and a few other programs, then modeling is usually achieved by beginning with a 2D profile—the profiles you draw in Xara are 2D—and then you project that 2D profile through space using methods I’ll briefly describe here, you figuratively pass it through space, and every point it touches through this other dimension becomes a surface.

Let me do this graphically, because I’m lousy with words:

• Exrude-This is where you take a 2D profile and project it either forwards or backwards and that direction of motion becomes the third dimension of the shape. Bevel edges are usually offered, as they are in Xara, and occasionally with more advanced modelers, you can set a scale for the depth that is not the same as the front size, thus creating a periscope sort of object.



This piece doesn't need a wireframe to visually explain how it's done. You can do this in Xara with your eyes closed. I often do...

• Lathe-This operation spins a 2D profile around a central axis, the axis is usually a straight line, and that straight line is usually exactly at the point where the lathe operation happens or else you get an cup-like object with no bottom, and elegant tube, more or less.Rik, this was a rough attempt at expressing the wonderful lens illustration using 3DS.




• Sweep-A Sweep involves two 2D profiles. One shape is the path that the Sweep operation does, while the other object is the one that is swept. It’s real easy to create a piece of licorice by sweeping a star and then adding a little rotation before the path of the sweep ends. Sweeps have lots of creating possibilities. If you sweep a circle around a helix, the result object is a spring. Here, I've swept a cog shape around two freeform bezier curves in 3D space.




• Loft-Lofting is the hardest to accomplish smoothly because the process consists of lining up profiles and then commanding the program to put a skin on them. You usually should have the same number of control points on each object, but you can add curves, do scaling, and also rotation.



I’m not trying to sell modeling; a lot of us play around with it, and it can potentially be another tool whose product can be brought into Xara as part of a composition. In fact, the monthly video tutorials? You'd be surprised at how much I need to use Xara, not only for the tutorial itself, but for production effects and clean-up and titling.

All I’m saying (and I hate that phrase!) is that the Extrude tool in Xara is one process of several for projecting a 3D surface from one or more 2D objects, so it’s fun in your spare time to try to make a pyramid using the Extrude process, but I’d say the more appropriate procedure would be to model two rectangles, one very small, and then loft the two.

Let’s get back to Xara, though. We haven’t even scratched the surface of novel things we can do to create unusual and photorealistic effects.

My Best,

Gary

(attempt at an SLR and movie cam using illustration+Extrudes)

[handrawn]

a simple cog wheel - the cog part is plastic - the hub is pressed metal with vents...

[quickshapes and extrusion in xdpx]

[Gare]

Nicely done. I particularly like your metal there.

Did you really use Xara Designer Pro X?

You mean IX, or 9 as we non-Romans put it, right?

;)


-g

[csehz]

Thanks for the examples for everyone, a lot of things are in this thread to digest :-)

That hamburger vision, or using the Extrude tool to help positioning of objects in perspective, or that Extrude tool + ShapePainter tool combo, and this is just only in Xara..

Scientists are saying that we use only some 5-10 percents of our brain capacities. My impression is that it is also true in Xara, the program is there with so many tools, vectors, photo editing, extrudes, animations, web pages, presentations etc. Just having a short glance when I registered here, in 2011? So around like an average user and however quite much focusing on the program, but so exactly used only that 5-10% of its capacities yet..

[handrawn]

Did you really use Xara Designer Pro X?

would I lie to you? of course not !! - ver 8 aka X - what are they going to call version ten I wonder










wheels method.xar

[Gare]

Scientists are saying that we use only some 5-10 percents of our brain capacities.

There they go again, just trying to act superior to non-scientists.

Hey, I read somewhere that scientists who make up statistics only use 1% of their brain.

-g

Statistically, 6 out of 7 dwarves are not Happy.

[handrawn]

...who make up statistics....

do you mean that, or do you mean 'compile'

Statistically, 6 out of 7 dwarves are not Happy.

technically that is not a statistic, it is a fact - statistics are not derived from a unitary base
[however it is amusing]