Looking at Using Primitive Shapes to Start

After some more practice with 3ds Max, I have created a maritime steering wheel, 'free hand' (as opposed to using schematics to create over.  Using these would make it much more accurate.

Here is the wheel that I created.  For this all I used were tubes, and cuboids.  The inner rings were created firsts, and then I copied and scaled it up to create the outer ring.  To make the straight posts, I put the different primitives and the grouped them, so that it becomes one object. Lining it up in the centre and then, when clicking on the object, holding shift and then dragging, it causes the object to be copied, or referenced, which was the use I needed as I could specify the amount necessary and they are all spaced equally.

(bp-setup-01, n.d.)

If I were to use a schematics when making the steering wheel, such as the car to the right,  I would have been able to create the shapes, by dragging the edges, vertices, or polygons to match the picture(s)

Once I had an idea of using primitive to make 3d objects.  I decided to look up a Tie-Interceptor and then draw over primitive shapes to give a rough idea how I could make the Tie-Interceptor using the primitive shapes, to keep the object simple, and to try and keep the polygon count down.

(Tie-Interceptor, n.d.)

This is the original schematic of the Tie-Interceptor, showing the front and the left hand side.

Using this image, it is easier to see which primitive shapes can be used to create each part of the ship.  For example, the cock pit would be a sphere, and the arms could made from tubes (as highlighted in the picture below).

Doing this prior to making the object makes things much quicker when going into 3ds Max, as I can have a print out on hand to reference.

(Tie-Interceptor, n.d.)

References:

[bp-setup-01] n.d. [online] Available at: <http://www.the-blueprints.com/modules/tutorials/images/tut-3dmax/bp-setup-01.GIF> [Accessed on 09 October 2015]

[TIEint_schem] n.d. [online] Available at:  <http://vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net/starwars/images/7/7a/TIEint_schem.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20081030151146> [Accessed on 09 October 2015]