USS Tecumseh - Canonicus Class ACW Monitor

[tea monster]

A render test of my riverbank. It's coming along, but not quite there yet. For some reason, the bank itself is looking very lack-lustre (even for mud!). A few problems with the trees, but it's coming together.

I tried it out in Cycles, but it still had some very strange problems around the tree alpha. There is still hope for a jump to cycles, but right for now, Yafaray is playing nicely with the transparency, so I'm staying put.

Owen

[Devin]

Sweet! Are you going to leave it "full strength" like that (I'm sure there's a better term) or mute it in order to show atmospherics, distance, etc.

[tea monster]

I'm going to get the distance effect going on the next pass. You can do a very faint volumetric material on the sky to simulate haze, or I can just play with the depth-of-field. I can also adjust the brightness of different objects to achieve depth, so I'll get that all sorted later on.

I've got to get some variation on the trees and sort out the river bank first. I'm 'cheating' a lot and using image planes with transparency to make my forest rather than model or particle trees (render times) and I'm trying to get it looking as real as possible. That involves a LOT of tweaking, photoshopping, playing with position and all that malarky.

Owen

[Roscoe]

That is looking really good, I especially like the trees. It seems the mud bank would be a little tough to do, I mean how do you make a texture for mud, it's not like sand where it's grainy, but kind of a mish-mash, if that's a word.

Cheers,
Dean

[tea monster]

Thanks!

How I've done it is to set the whole thing up like a stage play. There is a background with a 'glow' on it so it stands out. The trees are planes with alpha cut-outs and the river bank is a very simple mesh (sub-surf will smooth it out).

First I UV Mapped the ground and output the map to Photoshop. I got a few soil and grass textures from CGTextures and set them across the uv map of the ground. It was quite easy in PS to blend from one to the other by using layers and the clone brush. I even put a dark stripe on the 'shoreline' and used overlay on the level to get a 'wet stripe' on the shore. Just for test, I've used the diffuse as the bump, but I'll have to make a dedicated bump map when I've finalised the shoreline image.

Again, the water is just a cloud texture set to bump on a plane.

I'll have to add some more detail and put a few rocks and stuff on there to give it a bit more oomph.

Owen

[Roscoe]

Very cool...
I enjoy your mini tut's, seeing the work-flow and thought that goes into making something like this, definitely helpful for a Blender wannabee like me.

Dean

[tea monster]

Thanks!

Glad I helped Dean! If there is anything else you or anyone else is curious about, please ask.

Owen

[Roscoe]

Bump....

Just checking in to see what's up. Any progress on your river scene?

Cheers,
Dean

[tea monster]

Yes there is. Not so much on the river scene. That is pretty much ready to go. I've just got to drop the Tecumseh in there.

I've been working on the crew at the moment. Steve (my Son) and myself have got the Officers pretty much done. I've got two heads and the body for them.

I've also been working on the sailor characters as well. I've just sent the body off to my Son for a 'second opinion' before going ahead and sculpting and texturing him.

There has also been a lot of stuff going on behind the scenes as well. I've been playing with the ocean modifier and got some decent results. I've also pretty much got my head around how to get decent results out of Cycles. I've also been playing with sculpting a lot and got myself where I feel I can comfortably get something that looks like a human being created digitally.

New Captain Head (this one is actually by Steve, from a basemesh that I created):

and Cycles test with an old cannon I just had 'sitting around'

I'll start posting stuff when Steve gets back to me with the body and we can start creating an invincible digital navy!

Owen (not Dr. Evil, honest)

[Roscoe]

Very cool... sculpting people is tough, I played around with Sculptris when it first came out and I can see it will take awhile before I can do anything even close to what you did... very nice work!
And a great looking render with the cannon, sweet! Definitely looks like your getting the feel of Cycles, and can't wait to see what you do with the ocean modifier.

Also just installed the latest Blender and started to go through some video tutorials to get familiar with the UI and work-flow, so I'm on my way, but it's going to be a long road.

Cheers,
Dean

[Roscoe]

Owen,

Quick Blender question about modifiers and workflow, I understand about using mirror when making symmetrical objects(for example a rowboat). But what about the Subdivision Surface modifier, do you use it, and when? Do you add it after you have the basic shape, or from the start with Mirror? And what other modifiers do you use? I'm just trying to get the feel of a proper workflow so I don't get too far offtrack.

I should have said multiple questions.

Cheers,
Dean

[tea monster]

The Sub-surf is vital for what we do. Sub-Surf is a smoothing modifier. It takes two poiints and creates a nice, smooth transition between them. Imagine a 'real' ship with the ribs as the vertices and the subsurf as planks on the frame.

Without nurbs and curves, you can imagine how many vertices you'd need to maintain a smooth curve to the hull - and more importantly, what it would be like to have to alter that mesh and keep it all smooth!

To control how the smoothing works there are control loops, which are just edge loops which act to 'tighten' curves. You can also use edge sharpening, which kind of does a similar thing.

A good modifier to use is the Edge-Split modifier. That will split edges to 'break' the smoothing. You can do this on edges marked as 'sharp' or on the basis of the degree of slope. Very handy for transoms and holes in decking.

You can see on the pic that the top one with the subsurf has a much leaner mesh with fewer polys. Much easier to work with and generally more manageable.

Owen

[Roscoe]

Cool, thanks for the tips... funny you mentioned adding control loops (edge loops, whichever ) for tightening things up, because that's exactly what I've been doing on a rowboat I'm making. Baby steps.

I'll tell you though, it's a totally different mindset modeling with Blender than what I'm used too, a lot more open than history based parametric modeling. But I can already see this is going to be a fun journey.

Cheers,
Dean

[tea monster]

Yes, it's nothing like that at all. It's 'Modelling by the seat of your pants'

It has it's ups and downs.

If you need anything else, then just ask.

Owen

[Devin]

Owen,

I've been looking at my "hulls" I cut for a 1/200 scale Tecumseh last year. Now that I have the 3D printed turrets that Dean designed, doing a waterline Tecumseh would be pretty short work. I'm still, though, mulling over the anchor arrangement. I see the plates as you have them in the 1960's drawings of the Tecumseh wreck, but I don't see them on any plans or any photos. The main thing is that to me it doesn't make any sense. Why put those covers up there if chain doesn't feed out over the deck? And if it doesn't feed out over the deck, then how do they get the anchors up on deck? A separate chain to hoist it up? That would mean that there would always have to be two chains on each anchor, one going into the hull below the waterline, and the one to the anchor davits on deck.

Just trying to figure this out. Hopefully my questions make some sense.

-Devin

[tea monster]

Hey,
I've been a bit busy with a game model commission so I've been away a bit.

The way I saw it, the anchor chains came up out of the hull, under those armoured covers to clear the lip of the hull, and then down over the side, but under the overhang of the hull.
I've put the anchors on deck with some chain as that is how I've seen them on numerous photos. I'm assuming that the anchors and chain on deck is for 'handling'.

EDIT: 06/03/20 fixed dead links.

[DrPR]

Owen,

Actually the rig you have depicted isn't very different from how anchors were handled on square riggers, except there are no catsheads to hoist the anchors. It was standard practice to hoist the anchor out of the water with block and tackle. In this case they must have used a "portable" davit (one that is erected and stowed as needed).

Phil

[Devin]

I guess my big question is why they would do this. The Monitor herself and the entire Passaic had an anchor well that was completely below the waterline and run from inside, so that the ships could anchor while under fire without exposing crew on the deck. Why would they completely discard this system for the Canonicus class? There is a great color profile drawing of Tecumseh from Warship back in the 1970's, and it shows the same type of anchor well as the Passaics , but who knows what sources they used for that drawing. The Tecumseh wreck survey drawings shows it as Owen has depicted, but that drawing doesn't convince me, as that part of the ship is under silt and it's all artists' conjecture. I can't seem to find any other sources that mention this one way or the other. Canney doesn't mention it at all, which is odd considering how he does talk about Passaic's anchor setup.

Just going by what I know of the Passaic class from my research on Weehawken, what I personally believe is that they had the anchor well setup during the war as-built. Then later they were refitted with an on-deck anchor system with anchor runs and handling cranes, mostly post-war when setting anchor under fire was no longer a concern. There are tons of photos of Passaic class boats going through this evolution.

Now the problem is, of course, proving any of this. Finding the drawings of the right era (wartime, not post war), or even a mention in logs or letters, could prove difficult.

THIS type of stuff is why it takes me so @##$*@!! long to build a model! Good thing I love the hunt!

[tea monster]

As I read it, the Canonicus class has a thinner, more streamlined bow, so they had to chuck the anchors over the side, as there was no room for a more conventional anchor well. The thing is, I can't remember where I read it!

Old Steam navy mentions that they used to ship water in the old system (as accounts of the original Monitor's sea journeys confirm). So maybe that was another reason for changing it.

Owen

[DrPR]

Another problem I can see with the enclosed anchor well and retrieval system is the muck that is pulled up when you hoist the chain. Today it is common practice to hose down the chain and anchor as they come out of the water.

With the enclosed anchor system all the muck would end up in the chain locker and clog any dewatering system. Then some poor schmucks would have to climb down into the locker and haul out the mess in buckets.

I suspect the Navy was going through a learning curve about anchor handling, just as it was having to reinvent nearly everything else in steam powered ironclads. This is what makes this period so interesting to me.

Phil