Good approach to make planks for a barrel?

Question

I'm trying to make the planks in a barrel, without involving sculpting. What is a good method? I thought about an array, but haven't had too much luck. this is what I've got at the moment,

but I'm trying to get something like this second picture.

Can I get some advice?

Thanks you, it's a really a good place to learn the tools and different methods to model things. Also, thanks alot for all the answers, its really nice to see the different aproach i can take. (they helped alot not only in the barrel, but in general) its funny since i tried alot with the array, but its the little things u do between that change the output — Mathwel, Aug 24 '15 at 23:02
Looking at the four answers, they are all good ways to make a barrel, and I'd use any of them in the proper context. What might be of more use to you would be if you would upload a copy of your blend file to Blend exchange or a similar site where you control the persistence of the file so we can give you hints on what you might have done differently with your blend. — brasshat, Aug 25 '15 at 02:36

score 29 · Accepted Answer · edited Mar 14 '17 at 09:14

There undoubtedly lots of ways of doing this. Here's one of them:

Array modifier

Use an array modifier with an object offset to duplicate one board object around radially. This way all the boards can be easily tweaked later on by editing just one; changes will be copied to the other boards.

Create the board object. If you want a certain number of boards (say, 16), then you'll want to be sure the board's width is 1 16th the circumference of the desired circle. The easiest way to do this is add a circle with 16 sides:
1. Add a circle (⇧ ShiftA) and set the sides to 16 in the redo panel.
2. Extrude (E) it into a barrel shape. I used a loop cut (⎈ CtrlR), beveling (⎈ CtrlB), and scaling (S) to quickly make a basic barrel shape.
3. Select one face loop (⎇ Alt RMB) and invert the selection (⎈ CtrlI), then delete faces (⌦ Delete, F)
4. With the remaining face loop selected, extrude (E) and press Esc to cancel the transform. Scale along the normals (⎇ AltS) to give the board some thickness.
Setup the array modifier
1. Add an empty and rotate it 360/16 degrees (R, = 360/16 will do the math in place and rotate the empty 22.5°)
2. with the board selected, add an array modifier, disable Relative Offset, and set the Count to 16.
3. Set the empty as the Object Offset.
Optionally fatten up the board object (⎇ AltS in edit mode) to reduce the size of the cracks between the boards.

Result:

Also, you should consider having a look at the shrinkwrap modifier. — Mörkö, Aug 24 '15 at 09:50
@Gandalf3, here's a workflow question. Except for being a good introduction to some of the capabilities of the Array modifier, why take a perfectly good barrel shape at the end of step 1, and then delete most of it to add a modifier in step 2 to recreate essentially the same shape? — brasshat, Aug 24 '15 at 09:56
@brasshat So all the boards can be edited at once later on. If you create the boards directly with mesh manipulation tools, modifying all of them will be trickier. I find using modifiers gives more flexibility and makes tweaking generally easier. — gandalf3, Aug 24 '15 at 18:41
@gandalf3, OK. I think you should edit that into your answer, and maybe further amend your answer to say at the end of step 1, that if one knows the barrel will need no further manipulation, that one can stop there, but otherwise..... — brasshat, Aug 24 '15 at 18:43

Chebhou · Answer 2 · 2015-08-24T17:10:30.037

14

This way uses just modifiers so the result can be customized at any time.

1- start with one vertical edge away from the object center :

2- then add these modifiers :

Subsurf : for the horizontal resolution. (mode : Simple )
Screw : for creating the panels ( adjust the Steps )
Edge split : to separate the panels ( set angle to ~25 ).
Solidify : to give the barrel some thickness (adjust thickness/offset).
Cast : to give the barrel it's curved shape ( adjust radius/Factor ).
Bevel : to make panels edges rounded.

edited Aug 24 '15 at 17:10

answered Aug 24 '15 at 16:09

Chebhou

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Just a few more modifiers at the beginning, and you would be a default cubist ;) – gandalf3 Aug 24 '15 at 18:47
@gandalf3 that's an awesome art there, congrats on the win . – Chebhou Aug 24 '15 at 20:09
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@gandalf3 outstanding work!!! I think I may ask a question how to create such a fancy shape soon :). – Paul Gonet Aug 24 '15 at 23:14

score 9 · Answer 3 · edited Aug 25 '15 at 02:32

9

Using the Inset tool

Start with a cylinder. Enter edit mode. With all the faces selected activate the Inset tool by pressing I. On the toolshelf enable Individual Faces and move the thickness and depth to your needs.

Add a few loop cuts.

Enable proportional edit(O), select the middle loop cut and scale it to give the barrel its shape.

edited Aug 25 '15 at 02:32

brasshat

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answered Aug 24 '15 at 13:04

Paul Gonet · Answer 4 · 2015-08-24T14:02:36.723

Add a Circle and set the desired vertices number. Extrude a circle upward (E,Z) to make a cylinder. Add the edge loops in the middle of it (Ctrl+R), then scale them to make the cylinder look more like a barrel. Add the edge loops to the cylinder's upper and lower edges.

Enable the edge selection (Ctrl+Tab-->Edge). Select one vertical edge and press Shift+G-->Select Similiar-->Face Angles. Now press Ctrl+B and change the Segments number to 3. Then press Ctrl+- to reduce the selection and delete remained faces.

Add the Solidify (increase the Thickness value) and Subsurf (increase the subdivisions level) modifiers

score 5 · Answer 5 · answered Aug 25 '15 at 22:12

Start out by making one simple board (just a cube scaled down along the X and Y axes, with loop cuts add).
Add a curve circle (BezierCircle or NurbsCircle makes no difference)
Add an Array modifier and a Curve modifier to the board object.
Set the Array's Fit Type to Fit Curve and select the circle added in step two. To put a little space around the boards, set the Relative Offset to something a bit higher then 1.
Set the Curve modifier's Object to the circle added in step two.
Add a Lattice, Increase the divisions along the W (Z) axis. In object mode scale it to fit around the barrel.
Add a Lattice modifier to the board object. Set the Lattice as the Object.
Last go in to the Lattice's edit mode and scale out the middle control points, this will make the barrel larger in the middle.

Here is a gif of the entire process.
animated gif

Good approach to make planks for a barrel?

5 Answers5

Array modifier

Linked