"Jim Charter" <jrc### [at] msncom> schreef in bericht 
news:46bdd4f2$1@news.povray.org...
>
> Hey Thomas, it has come about that I am trying to model fluted columns.
>  Forgive me if you have talked about it before, but I am wondering how
> you are modeling your columns?

It has been a couple of years since I modelled these, so let me ponder...
(The first version I made in Wings3D, before switching everything over to 
Silo)

I followed the Greek guideline that says that a column, to be appealing to 
the eye, should not be a simple cone shape but bulge a tiny bit out at the 
middle. I acchieved this by using a vertically very elongated sphere, cut at 
the middle (i.e. the base of the column) and at the place where the top 
should be. You have to experiment with the vertical elongation until you 
have both bottom and top diameters correctly. An easy way to do this is to 
first make a proxy model in Moray to get the measurements needed.

Once the shaft of the column is thus obtained, I used (again) vertically 
very elongated toruses so that the curvature matched the curvature of the 
shaft. Again, a proxy in Moray can help but is not strictly necessary. The 
toruses have to be cut to the correct length of the flutes, provided with a 
top end (a sphere) and a bottom end (an inclined section). Then, by boolean 
substraction from the shaft, the flutes are successively modelled into the 
column shaft.

If you want to follow the classical rules, number and form of the flutes are 
fixed, but that is another discussion entirely.

Once you have the shaft modelled to your satisfaction, you can model 
separately the different elements that form the base of the column, and the 
top. The top part is particularly challenging because of the distinctive 
capitals. I have not attempted the Corynthian order!! The Ionian order is 
already difficult enough. I used a background image as a proxy for modelling 
that particular spiral shape.

I won't speak now about corner columns!!! They have their own challenges in 
the way to model the capitals.

The result is shown in this low resolution image when I finished building 
the complete temple.

Any doubts or questions? Just ask  :-)

Thomas

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