This time in our epic quest to take a sneak peek into the workings of landmark modelling we travel all the way into the distant future of the year 2003.
30 St Mary Axe, or informally known as the Gherkin, is without a doubt one of London's most recognized modern landmarks along the London Eye. It serves as a business center in the heart of London and sports a rather unique look compared to its surroundings.
Gherkin's bullet-like shape presented some challenges that I needed to tackle before I started modelling. I had to find clear and high resolution references so that I could get a full view of the building. Especially the outer support structure with the glass ”walls” was something that needed extra thought to it. I did some pen and paper sketches of the diamond shape structures and calculated how the uv-mapping would work on the building. Due to its circular and twisting nature I had to be careful to get the textures running smoothly from top to bottom.
Base of the building also proved to be a bit of tricky to model with the outer supports continuing all the way down to the ground floor. I had to switch between modelling and uv-mapping/texturing to see how the building turned out to be. This also led to many corrections along the way as the texture evolved as I added more detail and shifted the uv-map layout to better accommodate the large wall spaces.
I also noticed after the initial shape was down in the model that the glass was framed with metal ”railing” giving extra support on the outside. Luckily it was relatively easy to use the basic shape and modify it so that I could get the thin metal railings modelled quickly. I extruded one half of the railing and then cloned and flipped it over to create the intersecting ”net”.
I also modelled a lobby for the building even though it is most of the time unseen because the camera pulls back when next to the building. But I thought it was necessary to have a view into the lobby since the real life counterpart also has a big, glass-walled lobby.
One of the special parts of the design is the see-through glass outer shell of the building. I needed to use ”true alpha” technique for that so that I could achieve the half-visible glass effect on the building. True alpha differs from 1-bit alpha in that it can use the grey tones too where 1-bit alpha uses only black and white to determine what is see-through and what is not.
Gherkin is certainly one of the more unique buildings I have modelled so far. It has some technical and visual features that I have not encountered before and it proved an interesting chance to try out new ideas what it comes to modelling.
Here are some shots of the building that I took during modelling. Enjoy!
This is where I have gotten the shape of the building down and come up with the layout of the windows on the outer ”shell”. You can see a box that represents a CIM person next to the model.
Here is a shot where I have modelled the metal railings that forms the ”net” on top of the glass shell.
Rendering the model with skylight to see how the railing net goes on top of the shell and how the ambient occlusion falls in place.
Preliminary textures for the first time. This is to see how well I have managed to uv-map the glass shell. It seems that the pattern flows pretty well. In the end product the pattern is less visible due to the alpha material and tweaking the color saturation and brightness.
Here is the finished building. You can see the partially visible insides of the building as well as the white support structure that I have painted on the glass, mimicking as if it was behind the darker support structure and glass.
30 St Mary Axe, or informally known as the Gherkin, is without a doubt one of London's most recognized modern landmarks along the London Eye. It serves as a business center in the heart of London and sports a rather unique look compared to its surroundings.
Gherkin's bullet-like shape presented some challenges that I needed to tackle before I started modelling. I had to find clear and high resolution references so that I could get a full view of the building. Especially the outer support structure with the glass ”walls” was something that needed extra thought to it. I did some pen and paper sketches of the diamond shape structures and calculated how the uv-mapping would work on the building. Due to its circular and twisting nature I had to be careful to get the textures running smoothly from top to bottom.
Base of the building also proved to be a bit of tricky to model with the outer supports continuing all the way down to the ground floor. I had to switch between modelling and uv-mapping/texturing to see how the building turned out to be. This also led to many corrections along the way as the texture evolved as I added more detail and shifted the uv-map layout to better accommodate the large wall spaces.
I also noticed after the initial shape was down in the model that the glass was framed with metal ”railing” giving extra support on the outside. Luckily it was relatively easy to use the basic shape and modify it so that I could get the thin metal railings modelled quickly. I extruded one half of the railing and then cloned and flipped it over to create the intersecting ”net”.
I also modelled a lobby for the building even though it is most of the time unseen because the camera pulls back when next to the building. But I thought it was necessary to have a view into the lobby since the real life counterpart also has a big, glass-walled lobby.
One of the special parts of the design is the see-through glass outer shell of the building. I needed to use ”true alpha” technique for that so that I could achieve the half-visible glass effect on the building. True alpha differs from 1-bit alpha in that it can use the grey tones too where 1-bit alpha uses only black and white to determine what is see-through and what is not.
Gherkin is certainly one of the more unique buildings I have modelled so far. It has some technical and visual features that I have not encountered before and it proved an interesting chance to try out new ideas what it comes to modelling.
Here are some shots of the building that I took during modelling. Enjoy!
This is where I have gotten the shape of the building down and come up with the layout of the windows on the outer ”shell”. You can see a box that represents a CIM person next to the model.
Here is a shot where I have modelled the metal railings that forms the ”net” on top of the glass shell.
Rendering the model with skylight to see how the railing net goes on top of the shell and how the ambient occlusion falls in place.
Preliminary textures for the first time. This is to see how well I have managed to uv-map the glass shell. It seems that the pattern flows pretty well. In the end product the pattern is less visible due to the alpha material and tweaking the color saturation and brightness.
Here is the finished building. You can see the partially visible insides of the building as well as the white support structure that I have painted on the glass, mimicking as if it was behind the darker support structure and glass.
Fantastic and unique building! Wonder if your researchers had the same feeling I did when looking up from the floor, depending on how the clouds move it generates an optical illusion that the building is falling towards you!