A personal project to create my first car in 3D. I wanted to create a car, and I'd just finished completely restoring my dream car, a Nissan S13 Silvia. So what better car to model than my own?
A personal project for myself. Since I was a wee little boy, I had a passion for cars. When I was five, my father's friend asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I told him I want to be a scientist or a rally car driver. Naturally following from that childhood, at age 23 I bought my dream car, a Nissan S13 Silvia. It had an automatic transmission, bad paint, rust holes, and a blown engine. I spent nine months rebuilding the engine, welding up rust holes (and a giant hole a previous owner cut in the floor), respraying the engine bay and the exterior, and converting it to a manual transmission. A few months after completion, I wanted a good 3D modelling challenge, and I always wanted to make cars in 3D. So, using my favourite 3D modelling program, Blender, I got started.
Although I naturally picked up many of the techniques used for car modelling, there's no doubt that I learned a lot and spent plenty of time fine-tuning the body to look exactly like my real car (with the addition of a cooler spoiler and better wheels, because I'm a designer, I can't afford everything... yet). Photorealism was the goal, and I got closer than I thought I could, honestly. I've always been highly adaptable to practical challenges, but I was still surprised with myself.
With perfectly matching paint work and near indistinguishable bodywork from my real car, I get to be proud of my work, and furthermore, I can now modify that model to look like anything I can imagine, or put any wheels I want on it. No more guesswork when deciding what wheels to buy, where a sticker could go, or if a certain spoiler will look good. I can just model it and see how it looks! I wish every car enthusiast could have this. And speaking of which, I would love to make your car for you if you wish.
