Amy Northcott

February 15, 2006

CPSC 3710 - Computer Graphics

PROJECT - Spring 2006

 


 

Landmark: Clock Tower

Location: Lethbridge, AB

Software: 3D Studio Max

I chose to attempt to recreate the Clock Tower in downtown Lethbridge, AB because I thought there were interesting constructs used to build the tower. I also chose the Clock Tower because I thought there was a lot of history to it. The tower was built in 1913, and is one of the few rare classical architectures found in Western Canada. "It dominated the cityscape back then and even though many higher, more modern buildings have been constructed the post office remains the same, a memory of a distant era, when post offices were meeting places for first dates and a place to see good friends." (McKenna, Melissa. "Withstanding the Test of Time" http://www.lethbridgecollege.ab.ca/expressions/postoffice.html )

The tower ended up being harder to replicate than I initially thought. There is a lot more detail present in the tower when taking a deeper look. If I had more time on my hands, I would have liked to put in more detail instead of just constructing the basic image. However, I have created the basic building blocks to make the tower look similar to the actual tower.

One of the most difficult aspects of this project was to make every sub-object of the tower the correct dimension. Determining the sizes of different elements of the clock tower by eye made the accuracy of my replication very difficult to achieve. Starting the project was especially hard because I was still very new to the software, and I wanted to make sure my initial base objects had the right dimensions. I found it very tough to move to another step in the creation process if the objects I started with were not the right size.

The archway above the clock face was a very difficult element of the tower. It took a lot of work to build the one in my image, however I still could not achieve the archway I was attempting. I tried using half a torus to construct the top of the arch, but could not manage to make the front surface flat enough so that it would blend in. It was also very time consuming to build the bottom frame connected to the top of the arch.

Along with the archway, the background of the face of the clock took a lot of time. This was especially hard because I had to carefully remove edges from individual circles to create the curves. This part of the tower was a lot of careful work that took a lot of re-adjusting.

I spent many rigorous hours to create this image, and I think one advantage I had in choosing the tower was that the 4 sides are all the same. Once I discovered that I could select multiple objects, move, and rotate them all at once, it was simple (however careful work) to recreate another side of the tower.