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[ChristopherT]

Has anyone done a string of Christmas lights in Anim8or?  I'm looking for one to import into Floorplan3d.  Any suggestions on
how to model my own would be appreciated too.

   Thanks!

         Christopher Tarana

[craksy]

if you are talking about the Led ones, i would sugest making the led first (cant be that hard).
then make a long wire, and use a warp modifier to bend it.
then just give them materials.
i think your biggest problem would be to put the lights on so they look realistic.
but i cant tell... i suck at anim8or

[Olias]

For the wire I'd suggest using an N-gon, then extruding it along a curved path.

[hihosilver]

And for the lights, I'd recommend you lathe half the outline of one light and texture.

[ChristopherT]

Thanks, guys for the suggestions. HiHoSilver, I didn't think of lathing the bulbs which wouldn't be hard at all.  Olias, I was actually thinking of the old glass C-7 bulbs for a project I was working on but LED lights might work.  Crasky, Anim8or isn't as hard to learn as some people might say.  I found it much easier than Blender, Gmax and a lot of others I tried.  Just remember to NEVER throw out your mistakes or other botched projects. 

 Thanks guys!

       Christopher

[craksy]

ChristopherT, i agree that anim8or is easy to learn compared to many other 3D modeling programs, and i got most of the features down.
my problem is just that i have never been good at being artistic creative, and i dont know in wich situations i should use the different  tools.
but thanks anyway xD

good luck on the lights

[ChristopherT]

ChristopherT, i agree that anim8or is easy to learn compared to many other 3D modeling programs, and i got most of the features down.
my problem is just that i have never been good at being artistic creative, and i dont know in wich situations i should use the different  tools.
but thanks anyway xD

good luck on the lights

 The good news was verifying that I could import a .3ds model into Floorplan3d v8 and have it work correctly.  I
imported a lava lamp as a test and it rendered correctly.  So now I can focus on the lights.  I'm going on vacation for a week, so I'll have some time to kick it around.

   Thanks!

       Christopher

[craksy]

does the lava lamp look realistic? :O
and what exactly is floorplan3D?

[ChristopherT]

The point source of the test light is what actually lit up, there are no emissive materials in FP3d so the lava itself didn't glow in the render.  But there was a shadow where part of the lava mesh had blocked the light which was an interesting side effect.   Floorplan3d is a 3d architectural design suite by Imsidesign.  My version is about 5 yrs old, has been superceeded by TurboFloorplan 12 but replaced my FP3D v4.1 recently when I saw it on sale for $10.00 at Office Depot.  I actually got started using Anim8or because it was the only freeware program that would export .3ds objects that were compatible with FP3D.  I use Anim8or to clean up all the .3ds models I download to allow them to work faster in Fp3d.

      Christopher

[craksy]

oh! cool