modo basics series: preview

Course Description

This three-part beginner course introduces digital 3D using modo 501, the latest release of Luxology’s fast-growing modeling, sculpting, texturing, rendering, and animation tool.

Students are expected to have basic computer skills: creating and saving documents, surfing the web, etc. By the end of this course, students should feel comfortable with the modo interface and work flow for 3D modeling for design, illustration, or simple animation. Each part will teach a different part of the modo “pipeline” (i.e. the modo work flow) using real-world modeling exercises.

What is “modo”?

Luxology’s modo is a digital 3D modeling, sculpting, texturing, and rendering tool released in 2004 by the same developers who created Lightwave 3D in the early 90′s. To Lightwave users, modo will feel very familiar.

Modo version 501 is the most recent major release of the software, which laid the groundwork for much more advanced rigging and animation tools expected in future versions. Modo is not yet a full-featured character animation tool, but will almost certainly become so in the near future.

The key strengths of modo over its competitors–Lightwave, 3DSMax, XSI/SoftImage, and Maya–are its innovative modeling and UV-ing tools, combined with its fast and flexible physically-based rendering engine. The modo rendering engine was even chosen by Dassault as the real-time rendering solution for its SolidWorks ‘RealView 3D’ product.

Modo is used by 3D modelers and sculptors, illustrators, designers, and photographers. As an industrial designer, I use modo as a rapid-visualization tool for product designs.

Course Outline

Each part we will use real-world modeling challenges to illustrate, learn, and practice modo modeling and rendering techniques. The goal of this course will be to provide a broad overview of modo’s strengths: polygonal modeling, image-based sculpting, rapid visualization, and simple animation.

Each part’s assignment will build on the part before, so it’s very important that you keep your work!

1. Part 01: Introduction

   modo is very powerful, but also easy to learn and fun to use. Our goal today will be to get up and running quickly by getting comfortable with some of the most fundamental interface elements in modo: the Primitive and Transform tools.

   • Demonstration (video):

     Introduction to the modo interface and workflow.

   • Exercise:

     Build a cityscape using modo’s Primitive, Bevel, and Transform tools. Position and adjust a Camera item, making sure to create a strong composition, and leave empty space in the foreground for use in future exercises. Set up Global Illumination, Render resolution, and create a basic “body in white” rendering.

   • Goals:

     • the modo Interface & Navigation
     • setting model units
     • Primitive tools & use of Mesh Items
     • Item & Geometry modes
     • Transformation tools, Snap to Grid
     • geometrey selection (Connected, Expand/Contract, Pattern)
     • Camera items and settings, basic render settings
     • common keyboard shortcuts (source: Luxology.com).

2. Part 02: Sub-D part I

   The modo modeling system is known as “sudivision-surface modeling”, or “Sub-D” for short. You can learn to use the tools in a few hours, but learning to apply them to real-world modeling challenges will take practice.

   • Demonstration (video):

     Introduction to Sub-D and P-Sub modeling: the fountain.

   • Exercise:

     Place a fountain in the city square and then model it in-place by taking advantage of the Local Reference System for the item. Build the base of the fountain by repeatedly beveling the end-face of a Cylinder primitive, and the top of the fountain by Radially Sweeping a profile drawn with the Pen tool. Use Symmetry with the Bevel and Polygon Bridge tools to add detail.

   • Goals:

     • the [tab] and [shift]+[tab] keys
     • acknowledging Subdivision Level
     • the Radial Sweep, Edge Bevel, Polygon Bridge, and Edge Weight tools
     • basic deformation tools (Twist, Bend, Push)
     • advanced geometry selections (Loop, review Expand/Contract and Pattern)
     • setting the Reference System to Local for a given Mesh Item.
     • enabling symmetry

3. Part 03: Precision

   Modo is fantastic for fast-and-loose modeling, but it also has some powerful precision modeling tools. To explore modos Snaps and Precision toolset, we’ll be snapping dimensionally-correct A/C units and rooftop elevators to various buildings, and dropping in pre-made Mesh Presets using the Layout tab.

   • Demonstration (video):

     Scaling, Snapping, Action Centers, and how to say “Planar Rotate Snap Axis” five times fast.

   • Exercise:

     Practice creating 1:1 scal cubes using the numeric inputs in the Cube primitive, and then changing the dimensions of said cubes using the Absolute Scaling tool. Then practice moving the cubes into position using modo’s various Snapping tools. Use Planar Rotate Snap Axis to orient off-axis cubes precisely.

   • Goals:

     • numberic tool controls
     • Absolute Scaling
     • Action Centers (Automatic, Selection, Element, and Local), and Action Axes
     • Geometry Snaps & Drag Snap Rigid
     • Planar Rotate Snap Axis

Full Video Transcript:

Today we’re going to take a look at modo from the very beginning, assuming only that you are generally “computer literate” (whatever that means). No prior 3D experience is necessary.

Now, drumroll please, without further ado, step up to the edge, hold your breath, pinch your nose, and take the plunge into a little thing called modo.

When you open modo for the first time, your screen should look pretty much exactly like mine. If it doesn’t, head up to the menubar > Layout menu > Layouts > 501 Default Layout. That will reset everything to its factory default settings so you’ll be able to follow along.

Modo is a cross-platform environment, and it has a 99% platform-independent UI, meaning it is virtually identical on Mac or Windows, whichever you happen to use. All of the Windows keyboard shortcuts work on the Mac, and most of the Mac shortcuts with the exception of ‘apple key’ shortcuts will work on Windows. I’ll be including a fantastic comprehensive ‘keyboard shortcuts’ chart in the tutorial materials that I very gratefully downloaded from Jason Bartley on the Luxology forum, as well as a condensed “cadjunkie’s modo top-20″ chart with my top-20 favorite shortcuts, but more on that later.

At the top of the screen there’s obviously a standard menubar, and below that are a list of mostly-self-explanatory ‘interface layout tabs.” All modo tools and functionalities are available from all modo tabs, these are just convenient ways of organizing those tools for particular tasks. In the beginning we will spend most of our time in the Model tab.

Most of the tabs are organized in a very similar way: On the top right is the heart and sould of your modo experience, and it’s nearly identical on every single one of the ‘interface layout tabs.’ In it you’ll find sub-tabs for the Items list, the Shader Tree, and all of the Image files referenced in the file. Below the Items list and Shader tree is a group of sub-tabs that will contain the Properties associated with the currently selected items. Between these three lists and their respective Channels below, virtually every part of your modo document can be accessed. On the far left of the modo window you have a set of task-specific tools, organized into sub-tabs on the right. Below that is a tool properties area where we can find the available settings for any active tool, and at the top you have the ‘modo modes’ bar to modify its functionality. For all you soon-to-be power users out there, you’ll be glad to notice a handy command line is also available in the far corner of the screen. Long live the command line!

Last but by no means least, the bulk of the screen is taken up by our 3D viewport, and THIS is where the magic happens. You’ll see an infinite grid extending into a fancy new graduated background, a few important viewport controls at the top-left, navigation hotspots at the top-right, a handy status bar and world axis reference at the bottom left, and some useful viewport statistics at the bottom-right.

To practice navigation, we’ll need some geometry. Hold the [shift] key on the keyboard and the Cube Primitive tool should light up with a yellow plus (+) sign. Left-click it once while holding [shift] to create what’s called a “unit primitive” in modo parlance, i.e. a 1m cube in the dead-center of our modo universe. To navigate in 3D, you could use the three little icons at the top-right of the viewport simply by dragging them in place, for example, to rotate the view, you could click and hold on the rotate icon, and drag the mouse to rotate. But using little icons is far too much work, and really only worthwhile if you have no access to a keyboard. Real modonauts navigate using key combinations: hold the [alt] key while dragging to rotate the view, hold [alt]+[shift] to pan the view, and [alt]+[ctrl] to zoom. If you prefer, you can also use the scroll wheel on your mouse to zoom. Should you accidentally zoom out so far that you lose track of your model (and it happens, believe me!), hit the [A] key on your keyboard to zoom to fit ‘All’ of your model on the screen.

modo uses a rotation method known as ‘trackball rotation’ by default. This is by far my favorite way to work, and I highly recommend getting used to it. Basically it means that when you drag to rotate the viewport, the behavior is based on where you drag. Imagine the viewport is overlayed with a giant trackball. If you click and drag the middle of the trackball, things rotate from the middle. If you drag the edge of the trackball, things pivot sideways, as if you’re turning the trackball from the side, like a steering wheel. Click anywhere in between, and the effect is somewhere in the middle. The beauty of this system is that it works perfectly from any angle: you can flip your model upside-down, and work on it the same as if it were right-side-up. People who are not used to trackball rotation find it difficult to control simply because they’re not used to it: give it time, and you won’t want to go back! That said, if you ABSOLUTELY can’t stand trackball rotation, you can turn it off by clicking the viewport view mode drop down at the top left of the screen, and disabling Trackball Rotation.

Click the cube tool in the modo tools area, and rotate the view so that the white dynamic workplane moves to the ZX position, then drag out a rectangle. To bring the cube into 3D, drag the X in the center of the rectangle. Hit the [space] bar to drop the tool. All modo primitives work the same way. Grab the sphere tool, drag out an ellipse, drag the X in the middle to bring it into 3D, and then [space] to drop the tool. Select the Cylinder tool, drag out an ellipse, and this time take a look at the tool properties on the lower-left of the screen. Type Radius values for X, Y, and Z to define your Cylinder numerically. When you’re done, hit the [space] bar to drop the tool.

The time has come to talk about the cadjunkie top-20: my picks for the first 20 keyboard shortcuts that every modo user needs to know by heart. Memorizing 20 shortcuts might seem daunting, but with a little practice it’s not that bad, and it will make your modo experience much, much more fluid. Before you start into any real-modeling in modo, take a few hours to practice creating and modifying primitives taking advantage of these keyboard shortcuts over and over and over again. Repetition is the key here (pun intended).

So, mouse-over the viewport and hit the [zero] key on the num pad to expand the viewport. I’ve used the extended 10-key on the right of your keyboard, NOT the one at the top-right of the QUERTY keys. If you don’t have an extended keyboard, you won’t have this functionality.

As I’m working, I keep my left hand over the left side of the keyboard. Most of the shortcuts happen right here. With your pinky finger on the ctrl key, slap your thumb on the space bar to pop up a View selection pie menu. Just move the mouse over the view you want, then let go of the space bar. Practice using this to rapidly switch between views. We can use [ctrl]+[2] to quickly change the shading mode of the viewport, to view it in wireframe mode, gooch mode, reflection mode, or advanced openGL.

Since we’ve hidden all of our palettes, we can use [ctrl]+[3] to quickly access them on the fly. When you select the Tools palette for example, it will pop up right under your mouse. Once you’ve chosen a tool, just move your mouse outside the popup and it will disappear.You can access the Items list the same way. If you prefer, you can also use [F2] to pop up a floating tools palette. One shortcut I left off the top 20, but that I find very useful just the same, is the letter [K], which brings up the tool properties for the current tool, in this case the cube tool.

If you ever get lost or confused and can’t seem to find the model in the viewport, just hit [A] for Fit All, and modo will center the view on the model. If you want to zoom in to a specific selection, use [shift]+[A].

Modo has six selection modes, but we’ll only use four of them for now: the numbers 1, 2, 3, and 5 correspond to Vertex, Edge, Polygon, and Item modes respectively. These can also be accessed using the Modo Modes bar at the top of the viewport. When in Items mode, we can select nodes in the modo Items list, like Mesh items, cameras, lights, et cetera. When in geometry selection modes like vertex, edge, and poly mode, we can select the geometry within a Mesh item.

Select geometry elements by clicking, or by dragging the left mouse button. To add to the selection, hold the [shift] key, and to remove from the selection, hold the [ctrl] key. To lasso-select visible geometry, drag the Right mouse button. To lasso-select with X-ray mode, drag the middle-mouse button. If you’re using a Wacom pen, I HIGHLY recommend configuring the lower button on the stylus rocker as Right mouse, and the upper button as middle mouse. You’ll definitely want access to both. If you’re using a mouse with a scroll wheel, just press the scroll wheel for middle-mouse.

Once you’ve made a selection, you can use the transform tools to move them around. We can access them in the modo tools area, but since we use the transform tools constantly, it’s very (very) helpful to learn their shortcuts. They’re not mnemonic, they’re colocated on the keyboard. Use [W] for Move. Drag an axis for single-axis movement, drag a circle for double-axis movement. Use [E] for rotate. Drag the handles to rotate. Holding the [ctrl] key while rotating snaps to fifteen degree increments. Use the [R] key to scale. Drag the boxes to scale single axes, the circles to scale double axes, and the big circle in the middle to scale all three axis at once. Finally, hit the [Y] key for access to all three single-axis transforms at once.As always in modo, hit the [space] bar too drop the tool.

One of the most-used tools in modo modeling is the Bevel tool, so I use [B] for Bevel constantly. We’ll look at this tool in more detail later. For now, select a polygon, hit [B] for bevel, and use the red and blue handles to create a bevel. Hit [space] to drop the tool when you’re done. Note that it also works in Edge mode: select an edge, hit [B] for bevel, and pull out a chamfer. Then hit [space] to drop the tool.

Modo is a Sub-D modeler. If you don’t know what that means, don’t worry. I’ll explain it later. If you are already familiar with Sub-D modeling, you just need to know that the [tab] key toggles traditional SubD’s on and off, and that [shift]+[tab] toggles modo 501′s new Pixar SubD’s on and off.

When making geometry selections, modo has a couple of other tricks up its metaphorical sleeve: select a polygon, then select the next polygon over. Hit the [up] arrow to expand along the implicit loop, or [down] to go back from whence ye came.Now select a polygon, and its neighbor two doors down. Hit [up] to continue the pattern around the loop, or [down] to go back. Very, very cool. Select a polygon, then hit [shift]+[up] arrow to expand the selection in all directions, or [shift]+[down] arrow to contract. Finally, select any two adjacent polygons, and hit [L] for Loop.

That, my friends, is the tip of the modo iceburg. Put on your penguine suit, because to see the rest of what modo has to offer we’re going to have to go for a little swim! And believe you me, despite the icey iceburg analogy, the water is fine.

Lets do ‘dis.

about adam: Adam O'Hern is an industrial design consultant specializing in visual brand languages, and has designed products ranging from laptops to power tools, classroom toys to bathroom fixtures, and robots to lint rollers. He has published with 3DWorld Magazine, CGTuts+, and Luxology, and works with Josh Mings of SolidSmack.com on EngineerVsDesigner.com.