Hi, I am wanting to make a custom mp bee head, but I don't really know where to turn, I have managed to make a rough outline on tinkercad, but any ideas on how to make those white designs like this?


Here's the outline anyways:

 

I believe that is a Shapeways render in the Frosted Ultra Detail print.

 

I know, but what program would they use to create it?

 

The design or the render?

 

It's not really about the shader material in that Shapeways pic.

What you want is to learn any decent 3D modeling program at novice level, meaning ; starting with low polygon modeling.
Just some examples:

- Autodesk Maya
- 3Ds Max
- Sketchup
- Cinema4D
- Blender
- Lightwave

You can find some decent tutorials on youtube for any of these programs.

 

Render

Thanks

 

The render is automatically done when you upload it to shapeways.

 

Also, could you tell me the design too?

 

When you say design, do you mean print type?

 

No, I just mean how you make the shape, the form, just everything.

 

Seems like your best bet is to YouTube it

 

Basically this. Try using TinkerCAD. It was recommended to me by @SteamShield and is fairly easy to use. There are plenty of YouTube video tutorials to help you get started.

 

TinkerCAD is your three-wheeler, once you're comfortable with it try something more advanced such as 123D Design. TinkerCAD is not so powerful to design 3-D printed models unless you are ok with something solid.

 

123d design is going to be merged into tinkercad and discontinued IIRC.

Onshape is a good alternative if you want super advance stuff.
Open Source & Public Projects | Onshape

 

blender is free and is what i use but can be a bit over whelming at times (I learned Maya when i was in college). if you follow the tutorials on youtube they will help tremendously. also start with basic shapes like cubes and spheres they are what i mostly use but you may prefer planes or a torus (as examples). and you can always input images into your back ground for a template to build over. once you finished your project(s) you will have to export them to an stl file before sending to shapeways. i do suggest testing what you can and cant do in shape ways before finishing your design. ive made that mistake a couple of times and its cost me hours if not days of work. my work tends to be semi complex though

 

Yep. and Netfabb basic will suffice for checking common errors like loose vertices, holes and non manifold polygons.

 

I found 123d design pretty easy to learn on my own. There are video tutorials on the site and more on youtube. 123D Design How To | Autodesk 123D
The shapeways website also has some other tutorials and their forum often has helpful info. 3D Printing & Design Tutorials - Shapeways

 

Sorry to resurrect a dormant thread, but I happened to find this while browsing.

@SteamShield, I’ve noticed many of your projects on Shapeways, and I see that you’ve recommended a number of CAD options to the original poster. Is that what you use specifically when working on heads and faces? Or do you use 3d modeling programs like Blender for those projects?

 

I still use 123d for faces. The tool is good for creating complex geometric shapes by adding and combining basic shapes, however it is not easy to create organic objects such as a face. I tried   so I am trying to find time to use a better sculpting tool.

 

Yeah, the CAD style tools seem less effective generally for complex and more curved shapes like faces. But yours are generally my favorite of the replacement heads for transformers, despite the challenges. I’d love to see you make some sort of tutorial on producing those faces in CAD.