Asset Design:
The first asset I needed to create was the vehicle which the
player will be taking control of in the game. I began by looking through
several car images which I could use to model my assets after and after much
deliberation I decided upon creating a formula one styles car. I searched
online for some blueprints and came upon one which was perfect.
Blueprints:
The first thing I needed to do was to split this image into two using the GIMP2.0 software. The reason for this is because Blender3D allows for the user to have split screens so the user can work on the top view and side view of the model simultaneously.
Mesh Creation:
I don't wish to delve into too much detail when discussing the creation process as it can't get very long, technical and dull to read. Too create my model there were four simple steps which was creating the mesh, creating the UV texture, applying the texture and then exporting and importing the model from Blender to Unity.
Mesh:
The first thing I needed to do to my mesh was to add a plane in the top view, center in the middle of the blueprint, subdivide the surface and then delete half the cube.
The reason for this is because the car chassis is exactly the same on the left as the right so instead of having to create both sides I can add a mirror modifier to the plane which then mirrors the left hand side of the model.
After roughly three weeks and around twelve hours of modelling I was able to create a mesh which looked something like the blueprints above.
As you can see from the image above the car looks very plain and is not yet ready to be exported and used in Unity3D. I now need to add colour to the model. Usually I would just selected a part of the model and apply a material colour however Unity only supports UV texturing on imported models.
UV Texturing:
UV Texturing is simply applying a 1024x1024 png image onto the model in the Blender3D's UV Texturing view. First you need to break up the model in the UV editor view. I did this by selecting faces and unwrapping them in the UV editor.
Above is final UV map of the chassis. Blender3D allows for the easy exportation of UV maps by simply pressing the UV option and then export UV Layout. This image is now saved and I can access it within GIMP2.0 to start texturing it. My model will be relatively plain because I used the mirror modifier on the chassis meaning what ever I texture on one side will be mirrored on the other.
Due to this I am unable to attach unique images to the chassis because they would be mirror on the opposite site which will make text unreadable and images look wrong. I decided to use the colours red and and white.
I created my UV Image, as you can see above, which I added to the materials section of my Blender3D project and then added to the UV Layout. I repeated this for the other parts of my model i.e. Wheels and ended up with a satisfying result.
This model is now importable into Unity3D which I was able to do by exporting as an FBX file and then importing the file in the Unity3D project. FBX are imported at a scale of 0.01 which means the mesh is much smaller than expected. This was rectified by changing the scale factor on the FBX models properties panel and then applying it.
