[Bendezium]

When my teacher didnt show up for class we were just sitting around messing with Lightwave and I started modeling a building.



I was using the knife tool to send divisions all the way around the two layers so they can be connected together.

Is that the right way to model? I mean I know there are a million ways but are there any ground rules?

Should my two levels be seperate on their own?

Even though if I finish this it probably wont be subpatched, when I do subpath It looks like a sloppy mess and thats why I'm think mabye its not right.



Thanks everyone

[Fallenswordsman]

I wouldn't bother with subpatching if you're going to be modelling a building. There is no need unless you want some nice bevelled edges. From my motion tracker thread:
http://forum.simplylightwave.com/sho...&threadid=2217
you can see that I have actually subpatched the model, but because I have knife lines very close to the edges, the patches give me the curves that I want rather than having a model that looks like a big box.
Personally if I were doing this, I would start by deciding on the building I wanted to model and then work with the extrude tool to get the detail you wanted. As the building you're doing is fairly simple, you shouldn't need much more than extrusions.
It might also be worth looking at the wireframes for this months competition in the competitions section - lots of buildings going up there and you can probably figure out how people are making them too. For example, fluted columns can be made by drawing out the basic stencil shape as a flat object in the top view and then extruding the shape upward to get the 3D vertical column. You don't have to have all your components joining either. I would suggest making a number of layers - you know something like columns in one layer main building in the other - stuff like that but don't feel that at the end of the day, you can have an object that just sits in one layer where all the points are joined and where you're going to just have three and four point polygons.
Also I would suggest getting to know the boolean tool for knocking out windows.
If you don't own a copy already, have a look at Dan Ablan's Inside Lightwave book - I believe he makes a building in that somewhere (been a while since I looked at that book).

[Mark]

He does indeed make a building in the book. Here's a sample of what it looks like when finished (its a beast of a model and a good learning experience)...



... and another one ...

[kumar]

Ah,,, the Inside Lightwave... One,,,, a classic,,, but careful... if your system is a under power,,,, hehe..