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Other
ClydeSight Productions Bryce 5 Tutorials:
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Learn Bryce 5 modeling by building a robot model based on "Robby, the Robot™"*
See local media coverage of this tutorial!
| This tutorial is intended to teach Bryce 5 users basic modeling techniques by building a robot BASED on the character Robby the Robot™. The Bryce 5 model can be used for educational and personal use ONLY. Commercial use of the model will require a license from Turner Entertainment Co., A Time Warner Company. ClydeSight Productions does not condone or imply any use of this model that would be construed to violate their rights, nor does it use the model in any of its own commercial products. See Disclaimer |
Building
Robby's ArmsNote: This is a highly detailed tutorial. I STRONGLY suggest that you print these pages (there will be a lot of printed pages!) and use the hardcopy as a guide while working. It's much easier than having both Bryce 5 and your browser open and then flipping between applications!
Robby has very classic and unique arms. They seem to be expandable, but in most scenes, they are "retracted" In this section of the tutorial we will make Robby's arms, and in the next section, we'll make and attach his hands.
We'll use the features of Bryce 5 we have become familiar with by now, so it will go quickly and easily. However, to see things properly, we're going to change views from FRONT to TOP.
If you have saved and closed your model of the legs/hip/chest/heart box, open it now and go to the TOP view. Make sure nothing is selected and go into the SOLO mode. You should see a blank workspace. We are working in TOP view because the arms face forward, and would not make any sense from the FRONT view.
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Step 1: Make the Shoulder Choose the Sphere object from the Create Palette. It will come into your workspace, Note that the orientation looks different, that's because we are viewing it from the TOP, so we are looking along the Y axes. The X axis still represents side to side, but now the Z axis is represented by up and down. The axes haven't changed, our relationship to them has. Open the Attributes box and set the following: Position:
X = 19.40, Y = 101.35, Z = -19.40 Click the Check Mark to close the Attributes box. SAVE YOUR WORK! |
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Step 2: Make the
Forearm
The forearm is very short in its retracted position and we make it from a cylinder. Choose the Cylinder object from the Create Palette. It will come into your workspace and if you can see it, it will look like a circle. The reason is that you are looking DOWN onto the top of it. We need to change its orientation. It needs to run along the Z axes, which means we need to rotate it on the X axis (remember that inverse relationship?) Open the Attributes box for the Cylinder object and set the X rotation to 90. Click the check mark to close the attributes box. Open the Attributes box again and Seat As Unity. Click the check mark to close the attributes box. The cylinder will be oriented in the right direction now and aligned to the coordinate system the way all the other objects are. Open the Attributes box and set the following: Position:
X = 19.40, Y = 101.35, Z = -30.35 Click the Check Mark to close the Attributes box. SAVE YOUR WORK! |
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Step 3: Make a Forearm Knock Out Robby's forearms seem to be made of a set of rings that are wrapped around some kind of rubber gasket, so when the arm is stretched, the rings move farther away from each other. Sort of like a vacuum cleaner hose. We won't stretch Robby's arms, but we'll make it look like we can by imitating a set of rings without really making them. To do that, we need our friend, the torus. Choose the torus from the Create Palette. It will come into your workspace in the correct orientation. We need to Edit the inside radius. Click on the E box to enter the Edit Torus dialog and set the radius to 65. Click on the check mark to apply the change Open the Attributes box and set the following: Position:
X = 19.40, Y = 101.35, Z = -30.40 Click the Check Mark to close the Attributes box. SAVE YOUR WORK! |
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Step 4: Make Another the Forearm Knock Out We only need two knockouts to give the illusion of expandable arms. This will make it look like Robby has three rings making up his arms. Select the torus you just made and DUPLICATE it. Open the duplicate's Attributes box and set the following: Position:
X = 19.40, Y = 101.35, Z = -32.30 Click the Check Mark to close the Attributes box. SAVE YOUR WORK! |
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Step 5: Make the Forearm Ring Robby has a ring at the end of his arm. We make it from a torus as well. Select the torus you just made and DUPLICATE it. Edit the Torus as you now know how to do. Set the inside radius to 256, the Bryce default. Open the duplicate's Attributes box and set the following: Position:
X = 19.40, Y = 101.35, Z = -34.75 Click the Check Mark to close the Attributes box. SAVE YOUR WORK! |
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Step 6: Make the Forearm Front We need to cap off Robby's forearm, and that is done with a kind of dome. We'll make it from a sphere. Select the shoulder object and DUPLICATE it. Open the duplicate's Attributes box and set the following: Position:
X = 19.40, Y = 101.35, Z = -34.90 Click the Check Mark to close the Attributes box. SAVE YOUR WORK! |
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Step 7: Make the Hand Ring Robby's arms end in a ring, sort of like the cuffs on a shirt, only round. We make the ring from-- the torus! Select the forearm ring object (a torus). We want to keep its inside radius at 256, so that's why we chose it! We don't have to set it. DUPLICATE the object. Open the duplicate's Attributes box and set the following: Position:
X = 19.40, Y = 101.35, Z = -39.40 Click the Check Mark to close the Attributes box. SAVE YOUR WORK! |
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Step 8: Group the Left Arm We have made an arm. We just need to group the objects. We do this for two reasons. 1) to apply the negative Boolean operation to the forearm rings and 2) so we can manage it as a single unit. In the next section, we'll add the hands. Shift select or drag select ALL the arm objects. (Make sure you don't pick up the camera with them.) You'll see a little G in the icon column. Click it to group the objects. Open the group's Attributes box and check the following: Position:
X = 19.40, Y = 101.35, Z = -24.62 If your numbers match or are close (plus or minus .01) you have done everything correctly and can name the group. Name: left arm group Click the Check Mark to close the Attributes box. Assign the group to the "Robby Paint" family (dark green) SAVE YOUR WORK! |
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Step 9: Make the Right Arm It's very easy to make Robby's right arm from his left one. We just duplicate it. Since the arm is completely concentric on the X axis, we won't even need to flip it! Select the left arm group and DUPLICATE it. Open the duplicate's Attributes box and set the following: Position:
X = -19.40, Y = 101.35, Z
= -24.62 Click the Check Mark to close the Attributes box. The right arm group has inherited all the attributes of the left arm, and is a member of the same family. And all we had to do with the duplicate was change the X position from a positive to a negative number! SAVE YOUR WORK! |
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Step 10: Render the Arm You can check your work now by rendering it. If everything is correct, the two KO torus rings will make indents in the forearm cylinder. If there was a Boolean mistake, there won't be indents, the tori will look like rings. Examine the images careful and compare them to your render. If you click out of SOLO mode, the arms won't look quite right yet. We have to rotate them on the Y axis but we can't do that until we have attached the hands! We'll make the hands next. SAVE YOUR WORK! |
Congratulations! You have made Robby's arms. And, you've learned along the way how to work from a new view in Bryce 5, the TOP view. You got some practice with the different X,Y,Z that orientation you need to keep in mind when you shift views. You also improved your Torus editing skills and learned that an effective negative Boolean group can contain neutral, and therefore unaffected, objects yet will perform subtractions as expected on objects designed to receive that operation.
In the next section, we'll continue building and create Robby's hands and connect them to his arms. We'll also get more practice with Bryce 5 views!
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Tutorial copyright - © ClydeSight Productions - 2004
