A closeup of the tire's treads. One of my goals with this assignment was to streamline the tread process by using believable textures for the fine details.
To create the graphic on the side of the tire, I initially used Adobe Illustrator. The final vector was then imported into Photoshop, where I used the normal filter to give the design some depth.
This is a wireframe view of the tire model before textures and shading were added.
My next assignment in my modeling specialty class was to create a car tire. In a previous semester, one of my professors had showcased the use of deformers for modeling in a demo. I knew immediately that I could utilize this information in this assignment to make the modeling process for the treads easier. The treads themselves consist of two unique rows that tile into each other. I then used some simple math to determine how many repeating rows needed to exist to wrap around the entire tire's radius. Conveniently, the answer was 64 rows. Next, I laid out a long strip of the treads, and used a bend deformer to bring the ends together in a circular curve. From there I added the side walls to the tire, and created a rim model to sit inside of it. Considering that all of this work was done within a week, I am quite satisfied with the results.
