Building the Ship's Hull

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In this sequence you will begin building the toy spaceship by adding an Edit Poly modifier to a primitive cylinder to construct the basic shape of the toy spaceship.

Set up the lesson

Start 3ds Max. On the menu bar, choose Customize > Units Setup to display the Units Setup dialog. Choose Generic Units, if necessary, and then click OK to confirm the choice.

Create the base object:

On the Create panel, choose Standard Primitives, and click Cylinder.
In the center of the Left viewport, click and drag to create a cylinder with a radius of about 24 and a height of about 10.
While the cylinder is still selected, click the Modify tab and rename the object Spaceship1.
In the Parameters rollout, set Radius to 24 and set Height to 10. Change Height Segments to 1 and Sides to 6. Turn off the Smooth option.

You now have a flat hexagonal object to use as a base for the Edit Poly modifier.
On the main toolbar, with the object still selected, click the Select And Move tool.
In the Coordinate Display area on the status bar, right-click each of the spinners to the right of the X, Y, and Z numeric fields to reset them to 0.0. This moves the object to the world origin.

Create the hull:

Open the file spaceship02.max from the \tutorials\edit_poly folder or continue from the previous section.
On the Command Panel > Modify tab, choose the Edit Poly modifier from the Modifier List.
On the Selection Rollout, set the sub-object level to Polygon.
Click the Zoom Extents All button to get a better look at what you are doing.
In the Perspective viewport, select the front-facing polygon.

The selected polygon turns red.
On the main toolbar, right-click the Select And Uniform Scale tool to open the Scale Transform Type-In dialog. In the Offset:World group, type 75 in the % box and press Enter.

The hexagonal face scales to 75 percent of its original size.

Close the Scale Transform Type-In dialog.
On the Modify tab > Edit Poly modifier > Edit Polygons rollout, click the Bevel Settings button to open the Bevel Polygons dialog.
On the Bevel Polygons dialog, set Bevel Type to Local Normal. Set Height to 5.0, and Outline Amount to -5.0.

Click Apply to accept the edits.
On the Bevel Polygons dialog, set Height to 2.5, and Outline Amount to -3.0. Click Apply to accept the edits.
On the Bevel Polygons dialog, set Height to 1.0, and Outline Amount to 0.0. Click Apply to accept the edits.
On the Bevel Polygons dialog, set Height to 2.0, and Outline Amount to 3.0. Click Apply to accept the edits.
On the Bevel Polygons dialog, set Height to 5.0, and Outline Amount to 5.0. Click Apply to accept the edits.
On the Bevel Polygons dialog, set Height to 18.0, and Outline Amount to 5.0. Click Apply to accept the edits.
On the Bevel Polygons dialog, set Height to 17.0, and Outline Amount to 0.0. Click Apply to accept the edits.
Click the Zoom Extents button.
On the Bevel Polygons dialog, set Height to 18.0, and Outline Amount to -4.5. Click Apply to accept the edits.
On the Bevel Polygons dialog, set Height to 10.0, and Outline Amount to -3.5. Click Apply to accept the edits.
On the Bevel Polygons dialog, set Height to 10.0, and Outline Amount to -4.0. Click Apply to accept the edits.
On the Bevel Polygons dialog, set Height to 11.0, and Outline Amount to -3.5. Click Apply to accept the edits.
On the Bevel Polygons dialog, set Height to 12.0, and Outline Amount to -4.5. Click OK to accept the edits and close the Bevel Polygons dialog.
Click Zoom Extents All to view the entire model in all four viewports.

The basic shape of the toy’s hull has been defined using the Edit Poly Modifier. Next you will add a cockpit to the hull.

Create the cockpit:

Open spaceship03.max from the \tutorials\edit_poly folder or continue from the previous sequence.

If you are starting with spaceship03.max, select the Spaceship1 object and click the Modify tab. On the Selection Rollout, set the sub-object level to Polygon.
Select the two polygons on the top of the hull just ahead of the flat section.
On the Edit Polygons rollout, click the Bevel Settings button.
On the Bevel Polygons dialog, set Height to 5.0, and Outline Amount to -5.0. Click OK to accept the edits and close the dialog.
Click the Polygon sub-object button to return to the Edit Poly level.

Now that you have created the hull and added the cockpit, it is time to add the lower trailing thrusters.

Modeling the Tail and Thrusters