THUNDERTANK
 

Hello All, I'm new here but have just been through all the free tutorials and I must say thank you very much, they have really helped. I would love to buy some more but am soon to be going away travelling for a few months and cash is a little thin on the ground at the moment.

I have also just completed Maya Basics: Foundation over the last couple of months and this is all the experience I have so forgive any horrific newbie mistakes I may make!

Anyway, this thread is about the first project of my own, it may have been done before but I really wanted to create the Thundertank from the masterfull cartoon series I grew up with (but never had the toy, damn you Mum!)

I have to say a big thank you to the animators that originally came up with the concept of the Thundertank and take no credit for original design.

Below is the first part of my model, the arm. I have been trying to get all the dimensions down on paper over the last few days and am just doing a bit of modelling at a time in the evenings.

Please let me know what you think.

Part 2: The underarm!
 

I have a little difficulty tracking down decent source material for the tank, and get confused whether to follow the toy or the cartoon as they are not quite the same.

But anyway, I chose a method of having the gun and front wheel under the arm, a bit of a cross between toy and cartoon.

You may notice there is no wheel on there as of yet, I'm not sure how to do it as I would like to have it as a seperate entity but constrained to the underarm, just a simple point constrain?

I added a couple of quick simple Lamberts to distinguish between parts.

Please let me know what you think.

I think the red swinging arm should look a lot beafier as it seams to weak at the moment.

I never got the tank either, only the figures. :(

Beefing
 

Ok, I have tried to beef up the underarm a bit. You were right that it didn't look strong enough.

There is also a simple Nurbs tyre in there.

Cheers

Stupid me!
 

Well, apparently I cannot make any more changes to the red underarm bit because I have accidentally saved it with all the seperate component polygon shapes combined!

I'm guessing there is no way to ever undo that is there? I mean, with no more 'undos' because of saving.

DOH!!!

Is this the thundertank as in the "thunder cats"? If it is, brilliant choice...always thought cheetahra was was a pretty babe. You do know you are showing your age to us brits? :)

Looking forward to this

Thundercats
 

It certianly is the Thundertank from the Thundercats.

See reference image from cartoon and from toy below.

Pics
 

The Thundertank

Cool pics....glory days. Will keep an eye on your progress :)

Main body
 

I have begun to try and shape the main body now, there is only a very basic cube for the back end but the lower jaw is coming along.

Underbelly
 

I have done a little detailing on the underneath of the tank. Again, little reference material has made this bit difficult so I have just thrown together a few shapes that look somewhat mechanical. Let me know what you think.

SNAAARF SNYYAAAARF SNARF!!

THUNDERCATS, HO!

Looking good, buddy!

Detailing looks fine..

Detailing methods
 

I have just started work on the main body of the tank. There are detailed lines/grooves drawn on the tank in the cartoon and I have been wondering how best to do these. Should I model them or should i use a bump map when it comes to texturing.

So far I have been using extrude face and then scaling them in to create grooves along every edge to create the pattern I want. This of course leaves faces behind the outside ones, no doubt giving me a really high poly count! Might I find this a problem?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

whether you model the detail or use maps is a choice, your choice in this case. If this is a personal project, you could go with what you would not usually do, if only to have the experience to learn from..there is no right or wrong.

Go with the flow mate....just learn :)

Back end, thrusters etc...
 

Well, time for another update. I have now completed the exterior of the back compartment. This includes detailing of the back end and the working doors on the top.

Nothing has been done inside of the tank yet, but there will be seats, gun etc... back there at some point.

I guess I will have to move onto the front now, but have been avoiding doing the top jaw part because I'm not entirely sure how to go about it, but I guess it is all a learning experience.

I had a quick go at putting the thundercats' logo on the top of the main body, it has to split in half, so is essentially two half logos, but I really know nothing about texturing, so any tips or pointers towards good tutorials etc... would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks for your help and comments.

Problem with top jaw
 

I have begun modelling the top jaw of the tank and have run into a problem.

Obviously, being a Thundertank, it has to have the ability to open it's mouth and eat things, like baddies! I have the lower jaw rigged to move up and down already, but when I rotate the top jaw shape it deforms.

The pictures below should show what I mean. Can anyone help? If you have any ideas as to why it is doing this please let me know.

Cheers

Fine
 

Okay like this

Deformed
 

Mis-shapen

do you have any deformers attached to the top jaw? Or did you create it using a curve? If so deleting your history should help.
Cheers,
Penguin

Irritating top jaw
 

It was created using a poly torus. I scaled it to roughly the right shape and cut it in half, then edited from there.

Was this a silly way to do it? I wasn't sure what the best option would be.

I tried deleting the history and this didn't help at all unfortunately.

Thanks for your help though, any more advise would be great.

If it's a seperate piece of geometry you should just parent it to the joints, that way there will be no deformation when you move it around.

Thundercats rule! Unfortunately it was never a huge success in Denmark (or I'm simply not old enough :) ), but the local video rental store had the pilot (first 3 edisodes I think) which a watched something like a million times with some friends :)

I downloaded some of the episodes (shame on me) a while back, and really wanted to make some 3D models of them, but unfortunately I never got started. Oh, and the guy with the whip was the coolest! :D

Thank you for all your help
 

Cheers for all the help and comments people. I feel the tank is coming along quite nicely now.

I ended up re-doing the mouth with curves and lofted surfaces and it is working fine. I have now set up the limit information and set driven keys so that the mouth (both upper and lower jaws) open as I want.

I have added two chairs and the beginnings of a dashboard. There is going to be loads of fine detailing to do.

Below are my latest images. Next, the tracks at the back.

And to all of you that are leaving messages about how wonderful Thundercats was, I salute you. It was Tigra who had a whip by the way blomkaal.

Keep the feedback coming.

More pics
 

Seats, screen and dashboard

Looking forward to seeing this completed

Are you going to make more things from Thundercats?

More Thundercats models
 

I would love to continue to make more Thundercats models after this, there are so many vehicles, buildings and characters to do. But I am going travelling for 4 months in a few weeks so wont be doing anything for a while. I have every intention of carrying on with it when I return though. I just really want to get this tank finished before I leave. Now time to get on with it!

Hi....this is starting to come together :) Nostalgia rocks!

Tank tracks
 

Hello,

My latest issue is how to create the tank tracks. I think I need help here. As you can see in the picture below I have created the wheels the tracks are to go around already.

I have just been following a tutorial to create tracks that run along a motion path. I did this and they run round it fine (i only did one track segment), but only in one direction because they follow the curve in the direction it was drawn! I want tracks that can go in either direction.

I'm also not sure if this is the best way to create and animate the curves, I was thinking of doing them with a set driven key, i.e parent the tracks to the wheels, and use set driven keys to turn the lot as I move the body of the tank. Which is the best way? One of these? None of the above? Any help would be great.

Thanks

Tracks done
 

Well I managed to find another tutorial on tank tracks that made much more sense and allows them to be fully animatable both forwards and in reverse, so I am very happy now.

There isn't much major modelling left to do now, mainly it is just the detailing of the back compartment and dashboard.

Please leave me comments, criticisms etc... any feedback is good.

Till later.

I think its great (having been a big thundercats fan too).
A couple more shots of the front and some wires would be nice to see.

Anyone fancy doing some low poly thundercat characters? ;)

If you can draw some ortho ref images I'm up for it (couldn't draw if my life depended on it) :)

Yeah it'd be nice to see some wires...

More views
 

I'm glad to hear that people like this model, it is a very pleasing one to do because I was so passionate about the Thundercats when I was little (and now!)

It would be fantastic for some people to build some low poly characters to accompany the tank, we could build up quite a collection of Thundercats models in time. Unfortunately, as I have mentioned before I am going away shortly for 4 months so could not do anymore myself.

Anyway, here are some more views. My next challenge with the tank is to fit all the seats and gun (that is supposed, somehow, to sink into the floor) into the back compartment. I'm afraid I dont think I can include even half of the features the tank has in the cartoon series. I was watching some last night and that tank and do ANYTHING!!!

WIreframe
 

Here is a wireframe of the model, there is probably a lot of tidying to be done to it but I am not entirely sure of the how neat it has to be (this is my first project)

Also, how do you usually go about posting images of your wireframe? I just did a printscreen, is there an easier method?

Let me know if you want to see any other views/have suggestions/crits etc...

Now I have to start making some Thundercats! :)

The wireframe is a bit hard to see on the small picture. As far as I know, you don't have to worry about having all quads if you won't be smoothing or deforming a mesh, but I've been wrong before :)

bigger
 

bigger wireframe, bit hard to see as there is so much!

cool, thats great work on the tank, lots of detail as well :)

found a great site for shots from the series (will post it tonight as its on my laptop). I've started accumulating as many all round shots as possible for the costumes and as many side and front shots as possible for each character. Will try and get some ortho drawings done but they might not be done till your back ben ;)

how about the main base next? ;)

More Thundercats
 

Yay! I would love to collaborate on getting som more models together. The cat's lair would be a good one to do, that was my plan initially but decided it wouldn't be much fun when it came to animating! It doesn't really do much.

I am struggling enough trying to incorporate all the features of the tank for now! I need to start modelling the gun on the back but am quite busy for the next few days, will do what I can.

I would like to see this site you found with all the images, I just dug out an old 1990 Thundercats Annual to get a few more references but the characters look quite different in it to those in the cartoon.

Back to it!

sorry about the delay, here's the site with lots of captured reference stuff from the episodes :)

http://www.purrsiathunder.net/coppermine/index.php

some great angle shots etc of the characters and will be useful for drawing some orthographic pics :)

aaah the memories
 

I feel like such a little kid all over again when I view this post, I get all kinds of little butterflies in my stomach just watching this thunder tank come to life. you are doing a great job benpackwood. I remember another show that I use to watch when I was younger, it was Voltron "defenders of the universe" I always thought that was a cool show, I might do something on that when I get good enough, I dont know what my next challenge is going to be, I will have to find one LOL.

keep up the good work benpackwood and thanks for reminding us all of the good old days!!

Leland Webb

Webb Creative Arts

This thing will never be done
 

Hello all, thanks for your encouragment through this project. It makes it all the more fun to do if you know that others appreciate it!

That site had loads of good pics cheers t1ck135, I would love it if we could get a collection of models together, not that I'm complaining about going away for 4 months but I really want to get on and do some others!

I have now added a gun at the back which comes out of a trapdoor in the floor. I have set up a 'set driven key' so that when the doors on the trapdoor open, the gun raises. I had to scale the gun and it's stand to fit in the hole without poking out of the bottom!

I have started on the seats in the back, then comes the dashboard and then I should be almost done.

I am watching lots of Thundercats at the moment to try and grasp all of the tank's features (which seem endless) and deciding which to try and incorporate.

I will keep posting images as I make any changes and I hope you continue to enjoy them