Reference Planes

In order to start the group project, I took the architect's plans of the Guildhall and imported them into Adobe Photoshop CS4. Once there, I pasted all four elevation images into one document and aligned them so that the image could be used to make reference planes. I achieved this using the ruler tool, in a similar way to when I created the reference planes for my head model. This technique was easier for the Guildhall as, being a structure rather than an organic object, the features are quite linear. I also imported the architect's images of the floor plans into Photoshop in order to create reference planes for the building layout.

Once I had completed the Photoshop work, I created a plane in 3D Studio Max. I then went into the materials section and added a bitmap setting to the material diffuse property. The bitmap image was of the aligned Guildhall plans from Photoshop. Once setting the self-illuminate option to 100 and ensuring that the viewport settings were correct for showing the bitmap in full quality, I applied the material to the plane. I then applied the UVW-mapping modifier to the plane.

The UVW-mapping modifier allowed me to move the gizmo (the image) around without moving the planes. Once I had the left elevation shown on the plane and had reduced the plane to the right size, I then cloned the plane and repeated the process for all four elevations. I then created a new reference plane for the ground floor layout. Here I have five reference planes set up from which to create the model of the Guildhall.