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Hi. You may know me as the one who creates these 3D liveries in AE. They are actually renders from 3D aircraft models I create, which I sell online. Here's the full list of my products at turbosquid.com.
I have decided to create a tutorial on how I make these models so you can make your own! I will show you step by step as I create a new model from scratch. I will update until I have finished. You may post questions and I'll try my best to answer them.
So first of all, decide what aircraft you wish to model. In this case I will be modeling the Embraer E-jet series.
Before starting any model, you must research on the aircraft, get as much data as well as photo references as you can.
A useful reference are blueprints. Great quality ones, but often are payware can be fount at the-blueprints.com. If you know where to find, there are free and good quality blueprints as well on other sites.
Sample blueprint:
Some of these blueprints though are inaccurate and they show a limited view. So it is always good to have photo reference of the aircraft to see the entire aircraft at different angles and to see what's underneath the wings, engines, etc. A good place for photo references as you might be all familiar with is airliners.net with a huge database of high-quality photographs.
The program I will use is 3DS max 2014. Other versions of 3DS max may work the same way as well. You can download a free version which you can use for 3 years at autodesk.com/education or you can purchase the full version.
PHASE 1: Creating the 3-view box
Opening a new scene in 3DS max, you will be setting up a 3-view box that will enclose the entire model according to its overall length, width and height.
1. Create a "box". Adjust the length, width and height accordingly
2. Right click on "select and move" tool and enter everything to "0" for perfect alignment.
3. Select the box > right click > convert to "editable mesh". Select "polygon" and delete the top and front polygons as well as one of the sides depending on where the blueprints are facing by clicking it and pressing "delete". Select all the remaining polygons and click "flip". "Detach" each polygon to make each of them into separate objects.
4. Select one of the objects accordingly. This one in particular will be the SIDE. Click on the "material editor" which can be seen on the upper right of the window. In the material editor, drag and drop a "standard" material into the blank space. Looking down towards the Maps, drag and drop the "bitmap" option into the blank space and select the side blueprint image. 3DS max recognizes BMP, JPEG, PNG and many other image file types. (note: I have cropped the SIDE, TOP and FRONT blueprints into separate images). Link the bitmap to the "diffuse color" on the standard material. Click "put material to scene" then "show shaded material in viewport" which can be found at the top of the material editor window. Also, note that older versions of 3DS max has a material editor that works in a very different way. I won't be able to show you how that's done since I don't own an older version of 3DS max.
5. This is what it might look like. Sometimes, the image may become inverted in the scene since it follows no coordinates. Fix this by creating a UVW map. Select the object and on the Modifier List drop-down menu, click on "UVW Map".
6. In the UVW Map, select the "gizmo" and adjust the length and width accordingly. This is dependent on the dimensions of the image. I have cropped the image so that it fits to the dimensions of the aircraft. If you're using a square image, the gizmo must also be square to avoid distortion. Set also the alignment so that it follows the plane of your object. You may also move and rotate the gizmo.
7. Repeat steps 4, 5 and 6 on the other object planes.
You should end up with something like this:
PHASE 2: Coming soon!
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