The future of war

drewswift

Hey just wanted to drop a robot design on you guys. I'm still debating weather to paint over the model or not. Any tips folks?

Combat robot .jpg

Mike Amos

Are you trying for a robo cop alike soldier robot? From a practical point of view 'bots are likely to come in two varieties, flying and tracked/wheeled. For a humanoid type yours has more credibility than many around but the non textured image seems to suit more render types. Urban and many rural scenarios are better covered by a single drab colour as far as military practise goes. To be really up to date your 'bot would not hold a weapon system like a human, the hydraulic system would be easily capable stability wise and binocular vision over a wider field would enable range data to be more accurate anyway. Likely to be radar or ladar based rather than optical.

drewswift

@mike amos said:

Are you trying for a robo cop alike soldier robot? From a practical point of view 'bots are likely to come in two varieties, flying and tracked/wheeled. For a humanoid type yours has more credibility than many around but the non textured image seems to suit more render types. Urban and many rural scenarios are better covered by a single drab colour as far as military practise goes. To be really up to date your 'bot would not hold a weapon system like a human, the hydraulic system would be easily capable stability wise and binocular vision over a wider field would enable range data to be more accurate anyway. Likely to be radar or ladar based rather than optical.

Ah thank you for the input. I actually gave a lot of thought to using a humanoid form for this type of robot. Really military applications are just one use for them. there is a level of shock and awe with human form on the battlefield. I know you can't see it in this version of the model but there are two additional sensor modules in the torso for radar and ultrasound.the optic systems are really just for show and to confuse attackers. The head it's self contains only sensors the main computer is housed deep in the chassis. another thing I was thinking with the humanoid form was to lower the arm joins and ad an extra segment to give the limbs a range of movement far beyond that of any human. the limbs can move independently upwards to a 360 degree angle giving the platform a lot more versatility over harsh terrain that a wheeled or tracked type robot. I personally would want to see these sorts of robots in peaceful civilian application but with any new tech the military is always the biggest buyer. But thanks again you have just given me the idea to make an whole presentation about it if it was an actual product. btw you have any good tutorials for texturing in sketchup?

Bryan K

Looks good to me, but military markings would look good as well.

Mike Amos

Have a look around there are some really experienced robot designers on the board and they are the guys to ask about texturing robots. As an aside, did you see how the x-box conroller, (the 3d movement thing) has been used to make disaster scene robots sheaper and more effective? I reckon the cost to be something like one hundredth of the cost of purpose designed kit. Robots with human form have been considered as more frightening for an enemy but have a thought to how the tripods in war of the worlds worked with sound. Shock tactics achieve as much or more than weapons in a conflict sitaution, the enemy cannot do too much if they are searching for some nice soft paper and a whole. The appearance and noise of the first tanks in ww1 was enough to send whole trenches of troops running. Back to war of the worlds, can you imagine the sound or would you have to watch the film again, I can conjure it from memory and that would work for security purposes like riots too.

liam887

I like this robot!

I think this model would look really good painted over in a 3rd party piece of software. You wont really achieve great results texturing in SU unless you export to render software. I use photoshop myself, if you dont have it you can download a 30 day trial. Alternativley you can use some free software to achieve similar results.

I did a tutorial a few years ago, (its not very good) but shows the basics of how you go about it: http://liam887.wordpress.com/tutorials/

I have perfected the method since then here are some examples. The result depends on how much time you put in. The examples below took quite a few days to get the right look:

Cheers

Liam

okomta

wow,,,did you do that with plugin? may i know about it?
thanks,,:D

srx

Very good. What if you import painted picture back in SU as Photomatch, adjust it and click Project photos. It would create 3D textures