Roll out the mechs, 3D week 3

Hello again, last week's blogpost I said that I would make a vehicle from one of four concepts. Since it's too badass to resist I chose the mech. I felt like it was the logical thing to do because it seemed like an interesting challenge. When I finally decided I immediately went in to pre-production.

The mech I decided for

Besides the concept we were also to choose a game in which this model we are to make would fit in. At first I started thinking that this mech would fit in the Metal Gear universe or ARMA. Those games were good matches for the mech but it wasn't perfect and then I suddenly started remembering a game I played a lot a couple of years ago, Battlefield 2142. This mech is perfect for Battlefield 2142, if you've played it you would know what I mean. The game is basically battlefield with big mechs like the one in the picture.

The first step was to find good reference pictures that matched what I was going for. I found a lot of good references by searching for tanks and robots. Since I was going for a desert feel I included the M1 Abrams tank in my references, it also looks totally badass. The M1 Abrams also has a very nice deserty plate armor which I'll try to include in the mesh and textures later on. This here below is my gathered references, it's not all of them but it's the ones I found most important.

I also researched a lot about hydraulics, I really wanted to know how this machine works and moves. Understanding how it works is an important step to get good results. I went to Youtube to find moving reference material of quadroped robots. It was really cool but sometimes creepy to see how they work. Here are some of the videos I found useful.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQicXbj5Ivs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u0KMDNtEpvc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3-KF1Prj5ZI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1czBcnX1Ww

After researching a bit I created a prototype in 3DS MAX to see how it moves. I created a fast rig and started animating but I found it incredibly hard to do. The other robots I've been checking material on has mostly been robots with spider legs. The legs of this mech wasn't as flexible and efficient as the spider legs, this one had more of a turtle's legs.

I struggled with the animating part so I can't really show what I did because it didn't turned out very well. I at least have a general idea of how to do it now. All this research will help me when I get into modelling and designing the mech.

Oh yeah almost forgot, last tuesday the entire class went to a museum about almost everything from the stone age to the 19th century. We were to take pictures of some of the objects in the museum for reference. It was really interesting and I got a lot of good reference photos. I'll end the post with a few photos I think turned out well, these are times I wish I had a better camera. Thanks for reading, I will probably post an update during the week of my progress on the mech.