Plenty of real life objects out there will challenge your modeling ability. Often times there is a simple solution, while others just require some hard work to knock them out. What about modeling a baseball or basketball? Something that requires holes, stitches and a uniquely meandering boarder across its round surface?

An in-depth tutorial on modeling a baseball using some non-traditional modeling techniques.

well, we have had the opportunity to see various methods for creating the details needed for sports-related balls. Not as unique as Alex Cheparev’s version.

Alex shows how to model a highly detailed baseball using a rather unconventional method. Instead of dealing with modifying a round object to get stitching and holes and borders in there, Alex stars out by modeling a baseball flat. Then it is just a matter of shaping the final result to a baseball-like shape.

This is kind of a long one, but there are some really great bits scattered throughout. If you are like me, you could watch someone model all day long. If you are not like me, you probably have a significant other, a life and friends.

One of the things that I always try to do when challenged with a complex modeling situation, is to break it up into its smaller parts or components. I often tear apart my real-life reference and see how it was built and put together. Then I go about building it more or less the same way. A large amount of the time, this always will provide an answer for me as to how to start or how to execute.

I say “more or less” because, of course, you don’t want to model something that will not be seen by the camera, or used or seen in the final scene / shot.

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