Mesh Creators! Where do you get your inspiration?

[trancematic]

Hello,

I've been modeling in Maya for the past 2 years at my school. I would like to create objects for my Sims 2 game. I want to start off with something with a low poly count object. I was thinking about kitchen counter. I've tried google but the results weren't something I was looking for. I looking for some really funky designs for household items. I'm hoping that this thread could be helpful on getting ideas for object creation.

Do you know of any websites, magazines, message boards, clubs, or groups where they display really unquie designs for furniture in general?

What websites do you use for object creating inspiration? :)

[porkypine]

Well... I've only played the game for about a year. I got bored with the Maxis stuff. So, I found modthesims2 fansite at the Exchange and came here. I love this site! :0) Then I found the Insimenator.net and lots of other sites and went on a download binge. :rolleyes: My game crashed due to extreme bloatation of the download folder. :lol: Actually, I was moving stuff in and out of my game because I got tired of all the junk that gets packed with uploads and OOPSed it. :rolleyes:

I tried my hand at building - which satified my childhood's unfulfilled architectural desire. and actually published a Featured ite, ! WOW! I wasn't expecting that. :0)

Then I decided to make some painting s that I wanted for my house but couldn't find anywhere. SO I searched for the art and put it on a mesh and uploaded it here.

I still could not find and American Indian stuff anywhere. No one is making the meshes. Some people are recoloring Maxis meshes and trying to put out NDN stuff but traditional NDN women didn't wear mini-skirts. :lol: SO< that lead me to learn how to mesh, which is an involved process. SO, I have lots of ideas that I could not find items for, which inspired me to make my own stuff and share it here and other free sites. :0)

So, I am inspired by what Maxis didn't make and looking around at various sites for kewl stuff. If I can't find something I want, I make it.

[HystericalParoxysm]

Well, I mostly do Body Shop content, and those ideas are mostly from... tv and movie characters, or people I know, or just things we darn well need for the game that don't exist yet.

I find I do get quite a bit of inspiration for objects, though my lack of motivation to create them means they normally don't get fully made... I watch the Antiques Roadshow and HGTV (if you don't get it, it's a home and gardening tv channel). Home makeover and design shows can be great inspiration for unique, interesting designs. I also find just looking through design magazines can be a lot of fun too - there's one, Beautiful Bedrooms, that always draws my eye when walking past the magazines at the grocery store, as they always have something beautiful and opulent, lots of thick rich damasks and heavy wood (which is totally my thing) shot with great lighting.

And then there are the things that I either fall asleep thinking about, or wake up desperate to make... I don't know where those come from, but they're usually some of the most unique (and "wtf?"-inspiring) of my creations.

And if you can identify a style you're into that you know you like, try Google Image Search. Even just a search for "modern furniture" or whatever can yield a lot of great results. And when you do search that way, use "View original page" rather than "view image" as that will let you see what site it's from... and often finding just one great image in GIS can lead you to a whole site of -amazing- pics in a related style.

It can also be helpful to look at the items you're seeing as ingredients... The very nature of this goofy little game lends itself to stranger, more freeform styles... so if you like the leg shape on one thing, and the arm on another, and the cushions on a third thing are really cool, slap 'em all together into a really cool frankenchair. :D

Despite having made phones for some... inexplicable reason, I'm not really much of an object creator so much as hair/clothes/etc., so don't quote me on this part here, but I -think- creating counters for TS2 is a little more complicated than making something like a chair or table. Certainly having 3d modeling experience puts you at an advantage, but it may be worth it to start with something like a dining set, which you can get creative with but keep low-poly. I don't think tables/chairs are gonna be quite as fiddly as counters.

[Lethe_s]

A lot of my inspiration comes from books, movies and games. I'll play Oblivion, or watch Lord of the Rings, and think: hey, that looks nice, I want to make something like that. I have this also with random houses I walk/cycle/drive past. I'll see a really nice object, make a mental picture of it, and sketch it when I get to a desk.
I also get inspiration from working with certain themes (medieval, elven, etc), or from playing the game and noticing that I'm missing this or that for a specific family. Just the other week, I saw a gorgeous lot, built by a very talented sim creator, and decided to start a set of furniture that would fit it. I just wanted items to decorate it, and nothing normal would do.
The thing with objects is, once you find a style or theme you like, you want to do a whole house in them (which takes forever).

For more direct inspiration (while meshing) I find google images to be very handy. To add to sketches, you can just type 'modern mirror' and get oodles of possibilities. Like HP, I usually get several pictures, and take and mutilate bits and pieces from them, to form new shapes.

[khakidoo]

I only just started playing around with meshes.... my inspiration is from things that I've always wanted in my game and never found available...... so far I've made 5 things and from the response other people have always wanted these things too :)