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Boolean Modeling and Point Lights

For use with Shade 8 and all versions of Shade 7

In this tutorial we will model a pumpkin, create surface textures for it, then cut a face out of it using Shade's Boolean functions. Finally, we'll light it from inside with a "candle".In this tutorial we will model a pumpkin, create surface textures for it, then cut a face out of it using Shade's Boolean functions. Finally, we'll light it from inside with a "candle".

First, we model the pumpkin- create a closed line shaped roughly like this-

-then make it solid by revolving (choose Solid>Revolve from the Tool menu or palette.) Convert it to a curved surface; this allows us to add control points around the circumference- select the upper, outer circumference, choose Modify Control Points from the tool palette and command-control-click-and-drag (X-Z-click-and-drag on Windows) through the selected circumference to add a control point. Make two additional control points per section, for a total of twelve; they don't have to be perfectly evenly spaced. Now we'll use those control points to make the ridges on the pumpkin shape. We'll leave the center circumference alone, but option-click-and-drag (Z-click-and-drag on Windows) the control handles for each control point on the upper and lower circumferences to create the ridged shape. Here's a neat trick- those handles can be manipulated in more than one plane, so you can drag them diagonally "down" as well as "out". Your pumpkin shape should look like this-

When it comes time to apply a surface to this pumpkin, it will become apparent that we'll actually need another pumpkin object inside the first one, as the surface attributes of the rind of the pumpkin are very different from those of the skin. This is easily done; set the view to Front, zoom in a good bit, select the pumpkin in the Browser and choose Copy>Scale from the tool palette. Now scale the copy down just a bit, to fit inside the "skin" shape. Remember to scale it in all three dimensions, so none of the "rind" shows through the "skin". We can rename the two objects "Pumpkin Skin" (the bigger one) and "Pumpkin Rind" (the smaller.) If one wanted to be very sure that the final effect would come out properly, one could edit the section profiles (the twelve closed lines that were created from the original outline that we revolved, when the shape became a curved surface) to make them thinner, making the "skin" object more "skin-like".

Now we can apply surfaces to the skin and rind. For the skin, a simple diffuse and specular color with a bit of roughness (0.20) should do well; for the rind, a lighter color, a very slightly glossy specularity (set value to 0.35 and size to 0.65) and, in the bump channel, a procedural spotted texture, scaled down to 0.15 along the M and R axes, with the value set at 0.20, gives a reasonable approximation of pumpkin rind. Do a test render and see how the skin looks.

Now we have our hollow pumpkin; the next step is to use Shade's Boolean operators to cut a face in it. We'll create a part for the pumpkin (call it "Pumpkin"), then another for the items to be cut out of the pumpkin (call this one "Face".) To create the items that will compose the face, use the Closed Line tool to draw a smile (I made this one toothy as shown.) Use the Closed Line tool to create a pair of eyes and a nose as well, then extrude each closed line to form a 3D object. Put all these into the "Face" part. We'll apply the Pumpkin Rind surface that we created to each of these new objects. Now, in preparation for applying the Boolean operation, ensure that the Face part is listed directly under the Pumpkin part, and then rename Face "*Face" (put an asterisk in front of the word "Face".) If we use a minus sign ("-Face") then when the face gets cut out of the pumpkin, it won't have surface data for the cut surfaces. Even when we specify that we want surface data (by naming the part *Face), if we do a test render, it will have some artifacts around the mouth in particular; Shade's Boolean renderings run into trouble where there are complex and back-facing surfaces. Notice though that the cut surfaces on the eyes and nose have inherited the surface data from the objects in the *Face part.

We should fix this artifact situation; if the shape of the pumpkin and the face are acceptable, we can select both of the parts and, from the Tools menu, select Create>Boolean Modeling... to generate a polygon mesh object that has the appropriate textures on it. Be sure to set the surface subdivision to Fine (if you want to export a fairly large, detailed pumpkin) and check the "Allow more than 4 vertices per polygon" box. Once the polygon mesh has been created, delete the original objects, leaving only the mesh object, and do another test render to see how it looks now-

OK, our pumpkin shell has been modeled and shaded; now we can build a stem (sweep a closed line along a path, then shrink the end a bit) and a candle (an extruded disk- or we could get fancy and revolve an open line in any odd shape we want.) Apply appropriate surfaces to them. The final step is to create a light that will illuminate the inside of the pumpkin- this won't do much as far as export, but if we want to use the pumpkin in a Shade scene it'll be a nice touch. Make a separate revolved open line for a flame- this will be our light source.

Now, to turn the flame object into a light source, we first set its surface attributes; we'll make it somewhat transparent (about 30%), and apply a gradient color to its Diffuse and Specular 1 attributes. To apply the gradient, open the Mapping disclosure triangle in the Surface palette, and check the 1 checkbox, then select Gradation from the mapping type menu. Click the More button to edit the specific colors to be used in the gradient- I used four, ranging from orange through bright yellow to light blue, and set it to apply along the Y axis. Set this part of the gradient to apply to the Diffuse color. Now, select the second channel (2) and set up another gradation to apply to the Specular 1 channel- for this gradation I used just two colors, orange and yellow. A third gradient, black to light grey, applied to the Transparency channel, completes the shading for the flame. Now, let's add a point light source inside the flame to light things up a bit. From the Tool menu, select Create>Point Light, then click and drag in any of the view windows to create the light source. Move>Translate it into position in the candle flame, then crank the intensity up to 5000 (leave the Lumens box unchecked) and the Attenuation to Linear. Notice how as you increase the intensity, the indicator lines grow; you want to make sure that they extend outside the pumpkin shell or you won't see the light through the holes very well. Another test render gives us this-

And there we have it, a jack-o-lantern, ready to export or use in a Shade scene. Happy Halloween!