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Description

Some time ago, I wanted a model of a workbee for some illustration purposes. I didn't particularly want to model it from first principles, so I scoured the Intertubes to see if anyone had done most of the hard work for me. I ended up finding an STL model on Thingiverse, which had been uploaded by Hans Ulrich Baumstark . Baumstark had generated his model based on a SketchUp model from TaffGoch ). I no longer have a working version of SketchUp, so I didn't bother to try to start with the original model (which is available on 3D Warehouse).

I'm not gonna lie: importing the STL into Blender didn't give me a terribly clean model. First, there were a bunch of pieces that needed to be lined up and connected. Second, the triangulation of the STL model resulted in some ugly rendering artifacts. And cleaning all of that up was a pretty herculean effort. Part of me can't help but wonder if I would have been better off starting from first base, and modelling it myself.

I tackled the shading myself. I don't think that this is a particularly great render -- the space background is boring and there's some annoying pixelation of the text on the front of the workbee. But I was more interested in having the model, than having a great render.

This fan work is based on elements that appear in Star Trek, which is owned by CBS.

Description

Some time ago, I wanted a model of a workbee for some illustration purposes. I didn't particularly want to model it from first principles, so I scoured the Intertubes to see if anyone had done most of the hard work for me. I ended up finding an STL model on Thingiverse, which had been uploaded by Hans Ulrich Baumstark . Baumstark had generated his model based on a SketchUp model from TaffGoch ). I no longer have a working version of SketchUp, so I didn't bother to try to start with the original model (which is available on 3D Warehouse).

I'm not gonna lie: importing the STL into Blender didn't give me a terribly clean model. First, there were a bunch of pieces that needed to be lined up and connected. Second, the triangulation of the STL model resulted in some ugly rendering artifacts. And cleaning all of that up was a pretty herculean effort. Part of me can't help but wonder if I would have been better off starting from first base, and modelling it myself.

I tackled the shading myself. I don't think that this is a particularly great render -- the space background is boring and there's some annoying pixelation of the text on the front of the workbee. But I was more interested in having the model, than having a great render.

This fan work is based on elements that appear in Star Trek, which is owned by CBS.