Start up blender.  Enter front view (‘numpad 1’) and you will see that there is a small cube in the centre of the screen.  With your cursor in the blender window press the ‘spacebar’ and a pop-up will appear.   Go Add > Mesh > Cube.  Another cube will appear on top of the last one with little dots (vertices).  Press ‘tab’ to exit edit mode + switch to object mode.  Press ‘G’ for Grab and move your mouse across to the left.  The cube you have just created will move with it.  Left click to place the cube to the left of the original and now press ‘S’ for Size/Scale.  Move the mouse in towards the cube until it looks a good size for one hand.  Press ‘G’ again to move the hand into an appropriate position.

Make 3 more cubes by selecting the hand ‘right click’ (it should already be selected though) + press ‘shift’ + ‘D’ for duplicate.  The duplicated cube will already be in Grab mode so just move the mouse over to make a right hand (Cuby’s left hand).  Do the same for the feet, but you may want them slightly bigger than the hands.

To colour Cuby select his head (right click) + click the the button in the bottom window with the picture of a sphere (F5).

    A new window will appear.  Next to MA: type ‘cuby body’.  It may not be so important to name everything when making Cuby but it is a good idea to get into a habit as you will certainly need to later.  Move the R G B sliders as in the picture to make a nice orange.

Right click on one of Cuby’s hands and click on the double arrow + click ‘cuby body’.

Cuby’s hand should now also turn orange. Repeat this for the other hand + feet . Cuby should now look something like this...

Now for the eyes.  Press ‘spacebar’ > Add > Mesh > Cylinder and take the vertices down to about 16.  A circle of 16 vertices will now appear on the screen. Enter side view (‘numpad 3’) + press ‘A’ do deselect the vertices.  Now press ‘B’ + click+drag your mouse over one row of vertices. They will now be selected (yellow).  Press ‘X’ > ‘vertices’, which should now disappear.  Press ‘tab’.

    Press ‘G’ to move the circle so that it is just in front of Cuby’s head.  You may want to use the scroll wheel to zoom in and out to see how close it is.  You can also press ‘numpad .’ and it will centre the selected object.  Return to front view (‘numpad 1’) and scale ‘S’ down the circle so that it is a nice size for an eye.  Move (‘G’) the eye to a suitable place.  Press ‘S’ and then ‘Z’ to scale the eye along the Z axis.  This will make the eye longer/shorter.  Left click when you find a good length.  ‘shift’ + ‘D’ to make a second eye and move across to the other side of Cuby’s head.  Do a similar thing to make the mouth.

Colour Cuby’s eyes and mouth black by clicking ‘Add New’ and naming them like we did before and dragging all three sliders back to the very left.

Now to make those scary round holes into cute wee eyes...  Right click on the line that divides the top window (3D view) and the bottom window (buttons window) and click split area.  Place the line that follows the mouse to the right of the centre of the 3D window.  In the new window that appears click the button with the grid on it and select the action editor.  The new 3D window will now change to the Action Editor.

In the 3D window, select one of Cuby’s eyes (right click) and press ‘I’ > ‘Mesh’.  You will notice that the word ‘Sliders’ is now in the Action Editor window, so click on the little arrow next to it.  Back in the 3D window (with the eye still selected) press ‘I’ > ‘Mesh’ again.  A new slider called “key 1” will appear in the Action Editor.  Now, with your cursor in the 3D window, press ‘numpad .’ to centre on the eye and then press ‘tab’ to enter edit mode.  Individually select (right click) different vertices and move (‘G’) them into a shape like the one shown.  Once you’ve finished press ‘tab’ to return to object mode and try out the slider.  It should make your eye change shape.   To make the eye smoother, click the button in the buttons window with the picture of  a square on it and then click on ‘Add Modifier’ > ‘Subsurf’ in the Modifiers panel.

If you want to add more actions for Cuby’s eye, simply (with the same eye still selected) press ‘I’ > ‘Mesh’ again, enter edit mode (’tab’), but this time move (‘G’) the vertices into a different position, like a sad one.  Again, don’t forget to press ‘tab’ to return to object mode when finished.  You can name the sliders by placing your mouse over the slider name and pressing ‘N’ for Name.

Rather than repeating this on the other eye just delete the other eye (I guess there was really no point in putting it there but maybe it gave you a small sense of achievement?) by selecting it (right click) and pressing ‘X’ for eXterminate or something.  Then select the edited eye and duplicate it (‘shift’ + ‘D’)  move the mouse around to place your new eye where it should be.  Yay!  The eyes are complete.

Now for the mouth...  Select it and press ‘I’ > ‘Mesh.  Do that again, but don’t re-select it.  press ‘tab’ and then with all the vertices selected (‘A’) scale (‘S’) it on the ‘Z’ axis.  Alternatively you could scale it on the ‘X’ axis or on no axis at all.  Do what ever suits you, and make as many functions as you wish, by doing the same thing as with the eye. 

Cuby is now complete!

Modelling Cuby

© 2008