Skip to main content

Rope Coiler

B

elow are screenshots of my next mechanical model, a rope coiler, I'm working on for the deck of the F/V Scully.

This an automatic rope coiling device that draws in a line of rope to a crab pot being hauled in.

Similar to other models I've created before, I only had photographic references to go by making this coiler from scratch. When it comes down to working from a handful of images, it requires me to get creative. This is because certain areas are not as well documented.

A big part of the job is filling in the gaps to make it as believable as a real-world object. However, this isn't always straightforward! In this build, it proved quite tricky with many parts pivoting on one arm and the other being fixed inside to the top of the coil can.

Eventually, with enough trial and error, I found a balance and soon had the low poly model complete.


Jason Bartlett ©
 
Jason Bartlett ©


Jason Bartlett ©


Thanks for reading :)

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Timeless Terror: Jaws @ IMAX (50th Anniversary Re-Issue) Review/Analysis

T he 50 th Anniversary Re-Issue IMAX screening of Steven Spielberg's  Jaws  (1975) was not just a revisit to a classic, but a thoughtful re-education and celebration of cinematic history. From the moment the MCA Universal logo and the iconic JAWS title card graced the colossal IMAX screen, the experience justified every penny. The stunning clarity plunged the audience into Amity Island’s perilous summer like never before. The enhanced resolution revealed details previously lost to small screens and the compression/conversions to old VHS and DVDs. A prime example of this is immediately apparent in the opening sequence. The day-for-night shots where Tom is running after Chrissie on the beach, is remarkably clearer. This allows for a much richer appreciation throughout. As someone with deep admiration for analogue artifacts, particularly works shot on ARRIFLEX or Panavision cameras with anamorphic lenses, this IMAX presentation elevate...

Arnold Render Tests

A fter months and months of modelling, UV unwrapping and exporting assets, it has been very refreshing to now open up Maya 2026 and experiment with all the new features. The first thing I just had to do was to try out the latest version of the  built-in ray tracing renderer, Arnold 7.4. Excitedly, I opened up the wheelhouse interior scene, dropped in a HDRI map on a skydome light, and experimented with all the settings. I increased the brightness of the lights in the attribute editor (as it is an interior space it will be inherently darker), and played around with the number of samples to improve the overall image quality (more iterations for rays to bounce and do their thing). I'm incredibly pleased with how these greyscale renders of the wheelhouse below turned out. They not only bring the space to life visually, but also motivate me to get back into the creative flow. Jason Bartlett © Jason Bartlett © Jason Bartlett © Jason Bartlett © Next time, I'll show some development of...

Crab Pot

For the next step of the modelling process of the crab pot, I was challenged with another huge hurdle ( to say the least). This stage was where all the painstaking problems crawled in again.  The rope. I thought making some bendy cords would be simple enough, but believe me, it was anything but. There aren't many tutorials, covering the whole modelling process to the end 'game ready' product, for rope. So, like previous obstacles I faced in the modelling stage, I used multiple methods and trial and error to find the best path.  Actually, creating a tube following a manually placed path, was the easiest part for me. I had picked this step up while at University. However, I had to manually place and move each Bezier path to form the guide lines, for yards of rope, in a natural and realistic way. Hundreds of them. I spent more hours than I would have liked, setting up the paths to guide the rope along. I kept asking myself that there must be an easier way to tie...