Making a Clear Safety Goggles by Polygon Tools in Maya

This is kind of a breakdown of my recent work for a VR game named WHMIS 2015 VR. In this blog post, I will describe some of my typical workflows for modeling hard surface objects. As always I am only focusing on effective ways to create photorealistic 3d models by some polygon tools. First, I started by gathering some reference images so that I could have general visual information about the object. I think it is the best way when your access to the real object is limited. You can get reference images and model sheets for your own personal use here.

As a general rule, I always start with the largest surface of a model so, in these protective goggles, lenses should be the first part to model. However, this time, for warming up myself before getting into real work, I began with the smallest part: the webbing buckle. After that I came back to my old habit.

Don’t let the overall look of the model at the beginning disappoint you. You should consider, every incomplete 3d model is just like an “Ugly Duckling” story. A happy ending occurs when you edited the model precisely and added enough details to it. In the following images you can see a comparison between wireframe and ambient occlusion images of this model.

Achieve the best render quality has never been easy even with powerful machines. It is the last and critical step in your 3d application that converts the vector data of the scene into a raster image or images. Although rendering is usually imposing many challenges, I assume you know how important it is. Render results would show all the effort you have put into your model. I used Arnold renderer to light and render the scene: A single Ai SkyDome Light for the lighting and four Ai Standard Surface.

In below video you can see how this model was made in about five hours. Consider that this video is sped up 3 times faster than normal. Finally, if you have any trouble, feel free to ask, you can leave a comment at the bottom I will be happy to answer them.