This started as a render to see how the navigation lights were looking.  but turned into a showroom beauty model.    I’m going to have to redo it, since this is a solid model.  The engines are fixed, but gives an idea of what it will look like.

There’s also a TON of detail on the engine intakes.  The blades are angled and there are actually two sets of rotors in each engine.   But in this render, it just looks like solid grey.  Maybe I’ll stick a light inside the engine.

Here are a couple of renders of my latest model in a scene. The mountain one is a straight render using a preset scene in Carrara.  The other has a little bit of postwork. I don’t know who remembers Blue Thunder, but there is a shot of it coming towards the camera with the setting sun behind it.   I’m playing around with getting a heat haze, but nothing is quite right yet.  I’ve seen tutorials that use ocean ripple filters, but it’s not quite right.   I’ll keep trying.   Can you do me a favour?   If you like the pictures can you click on the like button on my blog so I can see if that’s working? Thanks.

I stripped the chopper right back and remade the wings and made a lot of cosmetic changes to the engines, especially around the intakes.   Here’s a grayscale model that shows off the detail without colours getting in the way.

It occurred to me yesterday that this is going to be a purely personal project.   Since I already sold a model that this is based on, I can’t resell it.   And for the same reason I can give it away.  So it’s just for my use.

Here’s an updated render of my altered chopper model.   The good thing about back lighting is that it hides a multitude of sins.

An updated render:

It’s a dull and rainy day, I’ve read the entire Internet and so powered up Wings and played around with my old chopper model. I like the idea of this, but it does feel like I’ve bolted and tweaked the original model. I think I’ll need to start from scratch.

But it wasted a few hours.