Using Blender to bring some of my crazy ideas to life….

[Matthew Fricker]

So my Wife is very much into crafting with resin at the moment , and she has learned a lot about the art of it and the processes involved. I wanted to have a go at it too, so with her help on the resin side ,  I have decided to combine my Blender skills and job as an Engineer to try and create a few unique objects in real life and maybe even sell a few along the way.

My first project I have named “Sunk” . The idea was to create some sort of lamp  , that mimics looking through the porthole of a sunken ship , and seeing something swim past.  My first version will feature a mechanical style fish which will be cast in resin. A strip of hidden LED lights  will illuminate the fish (hopefully)  

So , I threw together a fairly quick visualisation of my idea in Blender and this is what I came up with :  

[spikeyxxx]

That looks great!

Would definitely be something you could sell, if it turns out like this.

[Matthew Fricker]

Thanks Spikey , yeah I hope they turn out similar to the model. Construction started today  so I’ll post updates over the weekend. 

[Ingmar Franz]

Awesome 👍!

[Matthew Fricker]

Construction began today. I used a laser profiler to accurately cut 6mm plates for the main body of the porthole. Then I cut a small length of tubing and also rolled and welded a 2mm strip for the surround that will encase the resin. All the pieces were chamfered and tidied up before welding them together. Next stage is to make the fish and source some old wood for the base…..

[Mark Smith]

is way cool!!

[Shawn Blanch]

Holy crap. You’re actually building it!

I can’t wait to see it @frikkr

How did you get the wood texture so well on the 3D model?

[Matthew Fricker]

Thanks @duerer and @me1958424 ! 

[Matthew Fricker]

Haha yeah @blanchsb , I have so many crazy ideas for things I would like to build floating around in my head that I decided it was time to visualise them In Blender and if they looked cool then bring them to life. I am hoping to get this one completed over the Christmas holidays as I am off work for two weeks. 

As for the wood, that was cheating slightly – it is a high poly Megascans asset. The rest I modelled myself and the rusty metal was textured in Substance Painter. 

[William Crespo]

This is so dope! I can’t wait to see the final thing!!

[Matthew Fricker]

Finally managed to get some progress on this over the holidays. The fish is now finished and ready for the resin pour. 

Here are the progress pics : 

First up I made the spine by bending some M4 bolts and welding them to the body : 

Next I bent some 1.6mm welding rods to form the ribs and welded them to the M4 nuts on the spine : 

Then I cut a face and jaw (not pictured) out of 0.5mm thick stainless steel and welded it to the body along with some m6 Nyloc nuts for eyes : 

Finally , I made a tail , lamp/antenna thingy and sharpened/shaped some welding rods into teeth : 

With everything assembled , the fish was complete :

At this point , I decided to deviate from the concept art a little as I felt that the perfect stainless steel finish did not work well with the rusty porthole so I sprayed the fish black and then rubbed it down so it left the black in the crevices a bit like a cavity map : 

This thing was a seriously fiddly project. The photos make it look bigger than it is. The overall length of it is only approx 50mm and the wire for the teeth and ribs is 1.6mm thick and the lamp/antenna thing is 1mm welding rod so it was a bit of a mission to weld it all together! 

The next stage is to make the mold and set the fish into resin so that it can be set into the porthole. The LED kit has also arrived which will illuminate the fish. 

[Ingmar Franz]

That’s awesome 😀👍!

[Mark Smith]

WOW!!

[Kaj Suominen]

Awesome work! 🙂

[Matthew Fricker]

@duerer , @me1958424 , @louhikarme Thanks guys! Hopefully have some resin progress over the coming days 🙂 

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