Any blender / 3D experts

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CheekyC

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I have a whole lot (~300) of icons in use in my app. These are done in Inkscape (SVG) and then exported to .png. I want to see what they look like in 3D and then maybe render them all out to 3D. The 3D version of an icon would simply be an extrusion and slight beveling of edges and then 3D render against a background to 32x32px

Is there someone that is prepared to help me with 1 icon? Then I also need a way to automate the whole lot...
For the life of me I cannot get to grips with blender. Maybe there is an easier tool? Maybe a C# 3D engine that I can use to automate?

Tx
 
CheekyC said:
I have a whole lot (~300) of icons in use in my app. These are done in Inkscape (SVG) and then exported to .png. I want to see what they look like in 3D and then maybe render them all out to 3D. The 3D version of an icon would simply be an extrusion and slight beveling of edges and then 3D render against a background to 32x32px

Is there someone that is prepared to help me with 1 icon? Then I also need a way to automate the whole lot...
For the life of me I cannot get to grips with blender. Maybe there is an easier tool? Maybe a C# 3D engine that I can use to automate?

Tx
Click to expand...

I'm no expert, but ray tracing and 3D modelling entails wire-frames, texture mapping onto them and light sources. What you want seems to be more of a Photoshop job (unless you create the wire-frames from scratch and map your icons as textures)
 
CheekyC said:
Is there someone that is prepared to help me with 1 icon?
Click to expand...
Sure. Post a pic of one of the icons here. I'll see if I get a chance tomorrow. Not sure what the icon looks like - but again - just post one here for people to see what you're talking about? At least it's there for anyone to try if they feel like it.
 
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32x32? That's pretty small:

zas.jpg

You're not gonna see much detail in that. Anyway - post the pic and we can try :).

(If you're gonna post a pic of the icon you want made - please post a large image so the graphic is visible).
 
saor said:
Sure. Post a pic of one of the icons here. I'll see if I get a chance tomorrow. Not sure what the icon looks like - but again - just post one here for people to see what you're talking about? At least it's there for anyone to try if they feel like it.
Click to expand...

Sure, here is a simple + icon

http://www.nucleo.co.za/Downloads/Add.svg

the idea is that the 3d version is just a simple extrude, bevel and lighting from e.g. top left.
 
wow saor that looks awesome? What software did you do it in?
I realise that one could possibly achieve that with AI, but I dont have AI, My older version does not want to register anymore. I tried GIMP and Inkscape but could not get it to work like it would in AI
 
CheekyC said:
wow saor that looks awesome? What software did you do it in?
I realise that one could possibly achieve that with AI, but I dont have AI, My older version does not want to register anymore. I tried GIMP and Inkscape but could not get it to work like it would in AI
Click to expand...
See my previous post for that link for the Inkscape tutorial - it's definitely possible. I created the cross with ProE/CREO & rendered with Vray...it's much overkill for what you want imo. But really you could model and render with any app you wanted to as the geometry is so simple.
 
saor said:
See my previous post for that link for the Inkscape tutorial - it's definitely possible. I created the cross with ProE/CREO & rendered with Vray...it's much overkill for what you want imo. But really you could model and render with any app you wanted to as the geometry is so simple.
Click to expand...

I checked the article. The result does not have bevels tho but looks good nonetheless.

The bigger question is if I should stick to flat icons of all the same colour or introduce some flat colour or even shaded. With Outlook 2013 for example they use very flat colours and very little of it...
 
CheekyC said:
The bigger question is if I should stick to flat icons of all the same colour or introduce some flat colour or even shaded. With Outlook 2013 for example they use very flat colours and very little of it...
Click to expand...
Flat icons are more in line with Material design, though that definitely doesn't mean you need to do it. Flat icons you can easily do yourself. 3d-looking icons you might just need someone to do them for you.
 
45Neil said:
Bump for solution
Click to expand...

All I can think of is to create cubes in a ray-tracing application and specify the icon's image as texture for the cube, then flatten the cube and trace again until you get something that looks cool enough. It will not be the exact bevel effect that you want but it should still look pretty cool.
 
Don't applications like Paint Shop Pro have options to make a 3D bevel for colors?
 
etienne_marais said:
Have a look at http://www.roundmypic.com/
Click to expand...

Nice...!

saor said:
Pay someone to design your icons :).
Click to expand...
Yes I did that. I used one of the most talented gfx designers I have ever come across. Personality tricky to work with but wow, talented. I went for the flat look and she created few 100 icons for my app. Just thought I wanted to bring a 3D effect into the app but I am using Outlook 2013 style and 3D icons looked little bit out of place.
 
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