Lightwave - Naboo Fighter (Mastering 3D Graphics #5)

Overview.The release of the new Starwarsmovie, The Phantom Menace,brings some new craft into theStarwars universe. The new shipsare of a far more radical designthan their predecessors in the firstthree movies. One of these is theNaboo Fighter of the Royal NabooHonor guard, the N-1. This tuto-rial will show you how to digitallyrecreate this classic ship. No spacefighter is complete without its pi-lot, so we will also create a Naboofighter pilot for added realism.

Naboo fighterMastering 3D Graphics ~ issue #5

LightWave~ ~ Rich Maurice

1999 Mastering 3D Graphics


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Throughout the galaxy, peoples often go beyond pureutilitarianism in their Royal spacecraft designs, and ex-press the values of their native culture through their ships a custom which explains the striking look of the NabooRoyal N-1 Starfighter. This handcrafted space fighterembodies the Naboo love of elegant design, and includesall the necessary equipment within a custom designedspace frame, making the ship a work of art.

Created for the purpose of planetary defense sorties, patrolsand formal diplomatic escort missions, the N-1 sports galac-tic standard sub light engine components in a vectored J-type (twin radial) configuration, allowing the lightweight shipto maneuver with quickness and precision. In accordancewith the Naboo philosophy of harmony, the engines weremodified for cleaner operation, which results in fewer at-mospheric emissions during launch and landing cycles.

The N-1 pilot is assisted by a galactic standard astromechunit (R2), loaded through a hatch in the underside of theship. The cockpit is equipped with complete life supportsystems, while a compact hyperdrive provides the space-craft with deep space autonomy, especially useful whenN-1 fighters serve as the Queens Honor Guard on visitsto other planets.

As the galaxy edges into increasing unrest, the symbolicpurpose of noble fighter corps like Naboos N-1 squad-

rons begins to fade before the threats and actions of greatpowers. The dreadful weapons and ships now beingamassed by certain organizations are dedicated to noth-ing but destruction, and there is little that comparativelyfragile artwork spacecraft could do against such savagewar machines.

Naboo fighter technical specifications.The single pilot Naboo Royal N-1 Starfighter was devel-oped by the Theed Palace space vessel engineering corpsfor the volunteer Royal Naboo Security Forces. Sleek andagile, the small N-1 faces its aggressors with twin blastercannons and a dual magazine of proton torpedoes. TheN-1 is only found on the planet Naboo and rarely seeneven there. The N-1 like the Queens Royal Starship usesmany standard galactic internal components in a custombuilt space frame that reflects the Naboo peoples love ofhandcrafted elegant shapes. The Naboo engineers fabri-cate some of their own parts such as fuel tanks and sen-sor antennae, but most of the high technology equipmentis acquired by trade with other more industrialized worlds.The Theed Palace engineers developed a customized en-gine system however, based on a standard Nubian drivebut significantly modified to release fewer emissions intothe atmosphere. The Naboo being a peaceful people, theSpace Fighter Corp is maintained more through traditionas for military defense, and primarily serves as an honorguard for the Queens Royal Starship. Nonetheless, the


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Royal Naboo security Forces train in the N-1s on a regu-lar basis, prepared for the honor of serving the Queen ifnecessary, since service to the Queen symbolizes serviceto the great free people of Naboo themselves.

The center rat tail finial projecting from the rear of theN-1 is a vital component, linking the ship to the palacehanger systems via a plug-in socket found at the rear ofeach ships protective revetment area. The primary pur-pose of this finial is to receive high voltage power chargeenergy delivered from the palace generators to activatethe ships systems. The secondary purpose of the centerfinial is to receive coded information from the palacesbattle computer. The palace battle computer transferscomplete battle coordinates and strategic plans into eachfighter, allowing the pilots to concentrate on operatingtheir ships systems while the flight computer automati-cally directs the ship on a trajectory to the target zone.

The rat tail finials projecting from the engines may looklike design flourishes, but in fact they are part of the cus-tomized engine system developed by the Theed Palaceengineers. The finials are actually heat sinks, which circu-late coolant and help dissipate the excessive heat of theNubian engines. The customized Naboo engine configu-ration burns hotter than normal so as to burn more cleanly,since the Naboo people are very careful not to pollutetheir planets environment.

The on board astromech R2 unit performs in flight systemsmanagement and flight performance optimization as well asoffering limited repair capabilities. To fit into the N-1s smalldroid socket, the on board R unit is loaded into the fighterfrom below. The droids legs then telescope into themselvesslightly and the droids head telescopes upwards from itsbody to appear at the back of the fighter.

The canopy of the N-1 slides forwards to allow boardingby its pilot. The small cockpit has full life support capa-bilities and contains all the instruments for navigation andweapon systems.

The N-1 fighter sports a gleaming chromium finish on itsforward surfaces; purely decorative, as this finish indicatesthe ships royal allegiance. Early Naboo spacecraft requireda chrome like finish for protection from harmful rays in theplanets upper atmosphere. Now the spacecraft and theirpilots are fully shielded from such rays by electromagneticfield technology. The chrome finish is now retained for tra-dition and kept as a royal symbol. Only royal ships maycarry the hand finished chromium treatment.

Ships data.

Design and manufacture: Space frame by Theed Pal-ace Space Vessel Engineering Corps

Configuration: J-type (twin radial sub light engines)


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Length: 11 m (36 ft)Sub light engines: Nubian 221, modified.Hyperdrive: Nubian Monarc C4Crew: 1 pilot assisted by 1 mandatory astromech droid.Armament: Twin laser cannons, proton torpedo maga-

zine with a capacity of 10 proton torpedoes.

Reference Material.

Reference material for the Naboo N-1 was pretty hard toacquire on the Internet. I managed to find some informa-tion and a few small pictures of it however. For a moreaccurate model though the best approach would be tobuy a plastic model kit, as you could use it to get theactual dimensions of the ship.

Creating thebasic body

mesh.Lets start creating theN-1. Open your 3Dapplication and zoomthe side view until youhave an appropriategrid size. Its best tocreate all your modelsto scale for both tex-

turing purposes and integration with other objects in yourscenes. We know the model is 11 meters long, so setyour view so that you see at least 11 squares of 1 meterin your side view port.

Now, depending on what resource material you are work-ing with, load in your background template image. Youcould use a side view image that you got from the Internetor a book, or you might be able to scan a side profilefrom a plastic model kit. If you cant find a suitable im-age, load in the background images included in the re-source file. Scale your background image so that the fight-ers body will span 11 meters.

Go into add points mode and outline your N-1s side pro-file as shown in figure 1. Try to make these points as

Figure: 2.Figure: 1.


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evenly spaced as possible, and add just enough for thebasic outline, as too many points at this stage will makemodeling a lot more difficult later.

Now, starting fromthe front of the model,add points in straightvertical rows. Keepthem in line andagain, dont overdo it;adding rows of 3 willbe enough for thebody sections, and 6for the body/cockpitcanopy area. See fig-ure 2 for the totalpoints added at thisstage. Note how extrapoints are added forthe cockpit detail andthe front area of themodel.

We can now proceedwith creating poly-gons to create the flatmesh. Start at the

front of the model and select points in a clockwise direc-tion. Create Quads wherever possible as these work bet-ter with metanurbs. For the completed flat mesh, see fig-

ure 3. Give the model a surface name andmake it a bright yellow color.

Time to give your model some depth. Selectthe center row of points as shown in figure4. Pull these points out in the top view andmanipulate them with the drag tool to giveyour model the shape as seen in figure 5.Select the next row of points up as seen infigure 6 and pull them out so that they aremidway between the top and center rows ofpoints. Repeat this step for the row just be-

Figure: 3.



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low the center row. You should now have an object thatresembles figure 7.

The cockpit area is stillflat, so we will addsome depth to it bymanipulating thepoints as we did forthe body of the craft.To make this taskeasier the body thathas already beenformed will be hidden.Select the flat poly-gons as shown in fig-ure 8, and hideunselected. Manipu-late the points bydragging them intothe positions shown infigure 9.

The N-1 is now tak-ing shape, but it looksquite rough, unlike thesmooth curvy shapeof the N-1 from the

movie. Lets remedy this by using metaform and smoothshading. Select subdivide and use metaform with the de-fault settings. The mesh is now a lot smoother and has a




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much higher density. Open the change surface panel andcheck the smoothing box. You should now have a nicesmooth model as in figure 10. We now need to create theskirt to complete thebody shape. Select thecenter row of pointsusing the side view.Select the point fromthe front tip, to justpast the cockpit, asshown in figure 11.Rotate these by about10 degrees and pullthem down so that thepoint at the front linesup with the tip. Switchto the top view andpull these points out tothe right slightly, seefigure 12.

Moving on to the tail,straighten up the lastrow of points on thetail section using thedrag tool, then selectthem, as shown in fig-

ure 13. In the side view, pull these points out to length asshown in figure 14. Weld these selected points togetherto create the point at the tail tip, then use the knife tool

Figure: 11Figure: 10.



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to create another row of points about 1 meter in front ofthe tip, see figure 15.

Now it is time to cre-ate the compartmentfor the R-2 unit be-hind the cockpit. Thisis best achieved byusing boolean union.Lightwaves booleanfunctions dont worktoo well on open ge-ometry, so we willhave to temporarilyjoin the two halves ofthe fighter together.Now select all thepolygons and mirrorthe fighter half. Usethe numeric requesterto make sure the mir-ror is dead center.Now invert the poly-gon selection andname the selected sur-face temp. Switchto a new layer and cre-

ate a cylinder that just fits snugly behind the cockpit, asshown in figure 16. Give the cylinder the same surfacename as the Naboo hull. Now do a boolean union to join




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the cylinder to the hull. Use the statistics box to select allof the polygons named temp and delete them to leavejust the original half of the hull. Select the polygons thatmake up the left halfof the R-2 compart-ment, as shown in fig-ure 17 and deletethese as well. Cleanup the join by merg-ing points. You mightalso have to manuallydrag and weld some ofthe points together toget a clean join asshown in figure 18.

Lets create the cock-pit canopy. Select thepolygons shown in fig-ure 19 and give thesea new surface.Change the color todark gray and namethe surface canopy.Cut and paste thecanopy into a newlayer and save this ob-ject, see figure 20.

The wings will be created using smooth shift. First weneed to create the wing profile shape. Use the knife toolto cut the polygons shown in figure 21. Use the drag tool




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on the newly created points to create the shape shown infigure 22. Select these wing polygons and smooth shiftwith a value of zero. Pull these polygons outward andscale them slightly, asshown in figure 23.

Smooth shift, pull out-ward and scale twomore times to formthe final wing shape.Once your wings lookcorrect, subdivide us-ing metaform oncemore. You should nowhave a complete basicbody mesh for thefighter, figure 24.

Adding Detail.We will start addingdetail by creating theengines. Select a newlayer and add sevenpoints, as shown infigure 25, makingsure that both endpoints sit exactly on

the Z-axis. Use the set value of Z=0 for these two pointsand hit the P key to create a polygon, figure 26. ThenLathe around the Z-axis; just 12 segments will be fine for




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this, see figure 27. Subdivide the newly created engineusing metaform. Now position the engine on the end ofthe wing as figure 28 shows. Use boolean union to attachthe engine to thewing.

At this stage its agood idea to createsome surfaces. The N-1 has a chrome underside and front. We willstart with the frontfirst. Open a newlayer and use the boxtool to create a boxthat covers the frontof the fighter asshown in figure 29.Give this box a newsurface, make it darkgray and call itchrome. Useboolean stencil to cre-ate the front surfaceof the N-1. Select theunderside polygons of

the body as shown in figure 30 and give these the chromefinish also.




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Moving on to the cockpit, select the points at the back ofthe cockpit where we removed the canopy, and copy/paste into a new layer. Make a new point at the x,y centerand make a polygon,figure 31. Change itssurface to cockpitback and cut/paste itback to the fighter toform the cockpit back.Save the fighter ob-ject, see figure 32.

Load the previouslysaved canopy intomodeler and meta-form it with the sub-divide function. Cre-ate a new sur facenamed canopy frameand use the same yel-low color as the mainbody. Make this sur-face smooth and dou-ble sided, figure 33. Ina new layer create abox and position itover the canopy leav-

ing the edges uncovered by it, figure 34. Use stencil tocreate a new surface named canopy glass. Again makethis surface double sided and smooth. The canopy object




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should now look like figure 35. Save the canopy and loadthe Naboo hull object into the same layer, figure 36.

Select the front poly-gons of the engines,merge the polygonsthen bevel them usingan inset of about20mm and shift ofzero. Bevel again withan inset = 0 and shift= 20mm. Bevel twomore times using aninset of about 100mmand a shift of 200mm.These values are justguidelines and willvary depending on thesize of your object. Se-lect all the polygons ofthe newly created en-gine cone andmetaform them.Deselect these poly-gons except for thelast two rows wherethe cone meets the

engine. Give these rows the same color as the Nabooyellow surface. The front of the engine should now looklike figure 37.




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Select the rear polygons of the engines, merge the poly-gons then bevel them using an inset of 20mm and shift ofzero. Bevel again with an inset = 0 and shift = -50mm.Copy and paste theselected polygons toan empty layer, thenbevel once more withan inset = 0 and shift= -50mm. Give theselected polygons anew surface called en-gine inner, figure 38.Now change to thelayer where youpasted the selectedpolygons earlier. Bevelwith an inset = 40mmand shift = 0. Selectevery other polygonaround the edge of thedisk and delete themto form a gear shape.Extrude this gearshape by 30mm. Nowselect the inner diskand bevel twice as wedid for the engine

cone, but make the last edge slightly bigger. Smooth shiftwith a value of zero and pull out a few meters to form theengine finial. Select the end points and weld them to-

gether. Metaform the polygons as shown infigure 39 to complete the rear of the en-gines. Make these polygons the same coloryellow as the rest of the fighter, but namethe surface engine rear. Cut and paste therear of the engines back on to the fighter. Itshould now look like figure 40.

No space fighter is complete without itsweapons, so lets create these now. Selectan area of polygons around the upperchrome front of the hull and hide unselected.


Figure: 38.


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Using stencil, cut out an oblong section, select this sec-tion and then smooth shift with the value set at zero. Pullthe selected polygons to scale and rotate slightly to forma channel for the guns, figure 41. Create a small tubethat will fit into thischannel, figure 42.Boolean union thegun into the gun chan-nel as shown in figure43. Un-hide the poly-gons and you shouldhave something thatresembles figure 44.Working on the under-side of the hull now,create a channel forthe torpedo tube. Se-lect about 15 of thecenter polygons,smooth shift and pullin as we did for thegun channel. Deletethe polygons thatform on the centerlinealong the X-axis, fig-ure 45.

Now its time to mirror the hull and merge the points aswe did before. Before you do this however, make sure allof the points along the centerline sit exactly on the X-axis. This is easily achieved by selecting these points and




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using set value X = 0; see figure 46 for the mirroredfighter. Save your object!

Select the top ring ofpoints on the R-2compartment. Copyand paste into anempty layer. Selectthese points in aclockwise directionand create a polygon.Bevel with an inset =20mm and shift = 0.Then again with aninset = 0 and shift = -50mm. Cut and pasteback to the mainmodel, figure 47.

Just the torpedo tubeto add now to com-plete the basic model.Create a tube as wedid for the guns andboolean join into thetorpedo tube channelas shown in figure 48.




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The R-2 Astromech Droid.The Droid is very easy to model, as only the top domewill be seen. The droid will be a separate object so it canbe animated later if re-quired. Start with adefault sphere, figure49 and delete the bot-tom 5 rows of poly-gons. Select the bot-tom row of points andscale them up to thesame diameter as thesphere, moving themup slightly. Now selectthe bottom row ofpolygons as shown infigure 50 and Smoothshift with a value of10mm, see figure 51.Give this a white sur-face. Select the poly-gons shown in figure52 and give them asmooth blue surface.Use the same surfacefor the polygonsshown in figure 53.




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Triple all polygons to remove any non-planar polygons,figure 54.

Now for the cameras.Create a small 80mmsphere in a new layer,using 12 sides and 6segments. Flatten thetop so that it looks likefigure 55. Select thetop points and pull up50mm. Smooth shiftwith a value of zeroand scale downslightly. Smooth shiftagain and pull downby 50mm to form atube. Copy and pastethe selected polygondisk at the bottom ofthe tube into an emptylayer. Return to theprevious layer andsubdivide using meta-form, figure 56. Go tothe layer where thedisk is pasted and ex-

trude it by 10mm. Smooth shift, move up and scale twiceto form the lens shape and give it a new surface name,figure 57. Position the lens about midway up the tube,




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figure 58. Copy and paste the lens into the tube as shownin figure 59. Save this object as R2 lens. Move the lensinto position and load a new lens. Repeat two more timesuntil the lenses are po-sitioned as shown infigure 60. Triple allpolygons thenboolean join thelenses to the R-2head. Load the Naboofighter into a newlayer and move the R-2 into position, asshown in figure 61.You may need to scalethe R-2 a little to getit to fit. Use the reston ground tool with allaxes set to zero, andsave your completedR-2 unit.

Modeling the cockpit interior.The cockpit interior is pretty straight forward, as a lot ofit will not actually be seen. The only details that will be




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seen through the glass canopy are the instruments at thefront of the cockpit, and the detail behind the pilots head-rest.

Lets start by remov-ing the canopy. Selectall of the points shownin figure 62 and copythem into a new layer.Create a polygon andsmooth shift with avalue = 0 and scaledown slightly. Changethe surface of the se-lected polygons, call-ing this new surfacecockpit interior, fig-ure 63. Invert the se-lection and copy/paste back to thefighter layer, figure64. In the top view inthe cockpit interiorlayer, split this poly-gon in two using theknife tool. Do thisabout 10 points back

from the cockpit front. Select the rear polygon and smoothshift, pull the polygon down by about 1 meter, then smoothshift and pull down once more. Form the seat by moving




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the points shown in figure 65 up slightly. Now select thepolygon shown in figure 66, smooth shift and move itforward. The cockpit is beginning to take shape.

Using a new layer cre-ate a cone in the topview; use about 7 seg-ments. Select the endcap and scale it downslightly by about 10%.Change its surface todisplay 1 and move itin a little. Now use thebend tool to shape thecone as shown in fig-ure 67. Copy thiscone into two morelayers. Change theother two display sur-faces to display 2 anddisplay 3. Scale thenew cones and bend,then paste them to-gether as shown in fig-ure 68. Add them tothe cockpit interior,

then paste the cockpit back to the fighter, as shown infigure 69.




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Just one more Item to add to finish the N-1; the pilotsseat. This object is very easy to create. Just add a boxand smooth shift or bevel the details out of it. Usemetaform to create the headrest. See figure 70 for thefinished seat. Add theseat to the fighter andwe are done, figure71. Paste the canopyback onto the fighterand save the com-pleted object.

The Pilot.For added realism, apilot is essential forthe N-1. For averagecamera angles thepilot wont requirea lot of detail, so anadapted Posermodel makes anideal pilot, andsaves a lot of timeand modeling work.Open Poser and se-lect a low detailideal human. Ichose a male, but

you could have a female piloting the Naboo if you wish.Pose your model similar to that shown in figure 72. Onceyou have a good pose, export your Poser object as a 3dsfile.




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Open Modeler and import your Poser model. You mayneed to flip the polygons so they face outward. Scale androtate your pilot so that he fits snugly into the pilots seat.You can also modify your seat to fit around the pilot.Once it looks similarto figure 73, you cansave your pilot object.

Time to add someclothes. You wont beable to see the feet sothese can be safely de-leted, figure 74. Selectthe head and handpolygons then cut andcopy them to otherlayers, figure 75. Cre-ate the flight suit bysmooth shifting with avalue of 5mm. Usingthe head in the back-ground layer, selectthe top row of pointsaround the necklineand form the collar,see figure 76.

Use stencil to create the seat belts, as seen in figure 77.Select the belt polygons and smooth shift with a value of6mm to give them some depth. Give the hands a darksurface (gloves) and paste them onto your pilot. Replace




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the head, giving it a skin surface, figure 78. Select thepolygons around the eyes and smooth shift them to formthe goggles. Create the helmet by selecting the scalp poly-gons and smoothshifting out. Pull outthe front pointsslightly to form thepeak. The head-phones are easilymade using a coupleof discs with spheresboolean joined tothem. For the finish-ing touch, make acouple of joystick ob-jects using tubes withabout ten sectionsthen paste the pilotinto the cockpit, seefigure 79. This con-cludes the modelingfor the fighter. If youdont have access toPoser, or have any dif-ficulty modeling thefighter pilot, dontPanic! Ive included

the pilot object in the resource files. Just scale it to fityour fighter model.

Texturing The NabooFighter.

Creating Templates.Texturing the fighter is reasonably straight-forward. The hull of the ship is smooth com-pared to the more traditional paneled look.The first step is to grab some surfaces of themodel to use as templates. We will start withthe upper hull. Select the upper hull surfaceand hide unselected polygons. In the topview, scale the upper hull polygons to fit the


Figure: 77.


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screen, see figure 80. Use the Print Screen key on yourkeyboard and paste into your paint program. Go back toyour model and repeat for the side view, figure 81. Now,copy and paste the upper hull polygons to a new layer,and select this as abackground layer.Back in the mainlayer, un-hide thepolygons and selectthe lower hull chromesurface. Hide un-se-lected and fit theshown polygons intothe top view as be-fore, see figure 82.

Adding smalldetails.

Small details such aswarning stickers andother decals add real-ism to your models.We will do this by us-ing stencil as it saveson creating extrabrush maps and usesless memory torender. Load your

model into Modeler and select the upper hull surface.Hide unselected and switch to a new layer, using the up-per hull as a background template. Now add some textand scale it to fit on the R2 compartment side, as shown




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in figure 83. I used the Wingdings font for this as it looksa little like what you might expect alien text to look like. Iused the pen tool to create the warning triangle. Give thetriangle and text a redsurface called warn-ing. Select the drilltool using warningfor the surface and xfor the axis; see figure84 for the results. Thewriting around theframe of the cockpitcan be created usingthe same method, us-ing a dark browncolor, figure 85.Create five smalldisks on a new layerand stencil themonto the back of thecockpit, as shown infigure 86.

Creating thebrush maps.

Load your previ-ously saved screen

grab of the upper body into your paint program and cropit so that it fits exactly into the image area, figure 87. Adda new layer using a medium shade of gray for the back-




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ground color and make this layer approximately 60% vis-ible, figure 88. Use the line tool to create the flaps asshown in figure 89. Now make this top layer 100% vis-ible and save your image as top bump. Load in yourchrome surfacescreen grab andcreate a new layeras before, figure90. Now, usingthe line tool again,create a hatch un-der the R2 com-partment asshown in figure91; save as R2hatch bump. Fi-nally load in theside view and cre-ate the seam asshown in figure92; save the im-age as sidebump. All of theabove imagesneed only be 256-color grayscale.

For the chrome and other reflective surfaces of the ship,creating a reflection map is a good idea. You can usetraced reflections, but these will increase rendering timeand you will also need an environment to reflect in the




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surfaces. The fastest way to create a reflection map is torender some clouds using PhotoShop, figure 93. If youdont have PhotoShop, you can create the same mapusing fractal noise in Lightwave, mapped to a flat planeand saved as an image.

The instrument panels for the fighter were created fromgame screen grabs. Corresponding luminosity maps weremade by adding a new layer with a black background andusing a white airbrush over the top, figure 94.

Just one more texture tocreate, the luminositymap for the engineburners. You need agood airbrush for this,so I used PhotoShopto create the imageshown in figure 95,using the settingsshown in the airbrushoptions panel.

Applying thetextures.

Open Layout and loadyour Naboo fighter

object. Lets start with the chrome; select the chrome sur-face and use the settings for this as shown in figure 96.For the reflection options, use your fractal map as a spheri-cal reflection map. Open the bump panel and apply the




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R2 hatch bump, using auto sizing in the Y-axis. Use thesame chrome surface without the bump map for the restof the chrome on the ship.

For the yellow paint surface, use the settings as shown infigure 97. For the bump channel apply the top bump tothe y-axis with auto sizing se-lected. Select add new textureand apply the side bump tothe x-axis with auto sizingagain. Use the same paint tex-ture for the rest of the paintedsurfaces. The engine finialswill have a few more texturesadded to simulate engine glowand discoloration. Open theengine finial surface in the sur-face panel and select fractalnoise for the color texture. Forthe texture size use X = 4cm,Y = 4cm and Z = 40cm. Settexture falloff to 30% in the z-axis. Copy and paste this tex-ture into the luminosity chan-nel and set the texture valueto 100. For the diffuse tex-ture select fractal noise againusing X = 3cm, Y = 3 cm and

Z = 30cm. Set the texture value to 100 and use 20cm fortexture falloff. Copy and paste this texture to the specularchannel and set its value to zero.

For the cockpit canopy, use the settings shown in figure 98.Use the fractal map for the reflection options once more.




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Load the R2 object and parent it to the fighter. Use thevarious views to move it into position. Texture the R2 asshown in figures 99 and 100.

Thrusters.Go back to Modeler andload the fighter as a back-ground layer. Using anengine as a template, cre-ate a disk with 6 sides and1 section. Remove bothend caps, select the rearpolygons and scale up byabout 30%. Metanurband freeze them, then subdivide using metaformtwice. Now triple thethruster polygons to elimi-nate any non-planar poly-gons, see figure 101. Givethe object a thruster surface,then center the object andsave as thruster.

Back in Layout, add the newthruster object to the sceneand parent it to the fighter.

Move it into position behind one of the engines. Nowmake one clone of it and position the clone behind theother engine. Select the engine core surface and use thesettings shown in figure 102, to create the engine inner




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glow. Click the advanced options tab and set the gloweffect to 100%. Use figure 103 for the thruster surfacesettings and for the luminosity map use the thruster lumi-nosity map applied to the x-axis as a planar image map.For advanced options, set edge transparency to transpar-ent and use 50% forthe glow effect. To ani-mate the thrusters, usefractal bumps as a dis-placement map in theobjects panel. Checkthe world coordinatesbox and use 5cm forthe texture size in allthree axes and use0.02 for the textureamplitude.

You should now havea complete Naboofighter object.

Biography

Rich Maurice startedworking with 3D in theearly nineties using Im-agine on the Amiga.

He now works for a virtual reality studio in the U.K. andmainly designs textures and animates low poly charactersand objects for use in VR worlds. He has been doing this forthe past two years. He uses a wide variety of 3D applica-tions at work including Lightwave, 3ds Max and Gamegen.

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Lightwave - Naboo Fighter (Mastering 3D Graphics #5)