3D-RING: Can you tell us a bit about yourself. How did you get started with 3D? How long have you been working with 3D? What are your sources of inspiration? What do you like about Star Wars? Tell us how Star Wars has influenced and affected your life.

Al Meerow I don't know why, but I always was assured that all space scenes in my favourite movie StarWars were made using computer graphics. And I told myself, hey, if George Lucas could make such great effects in 1977 when there were no computer graphics at all, I can make the same effects (or even better) on my powerful 486DX2-66! Very self-confident, isn't it? So I grabbed a copy of 3D Studio and started building a TIE Fighter. It was very ugly model consisting of a dozen or so triangles and it was out of proportion. But I continued developing. I was running my copy of trilogy on my VCR forward and back, again and again. I sat in front of my TV with a pencil in one hand and a remote control in the other. I paused the VCR and made heaps of sketches of the ship from different points of view. I applied the ruler to the screen to measure the ratios of different parts. I was absolutely insane. It was 1995 and at that time I had no access to the Internet and the black-and-white noisy VHS copies of the trilogy were my only resource. Later I got some additional details from "X-Wing" game. Imagine, how surprised and disappointed when I got a picture where George Lucas stands among models from his trilogy! It's unfair, I said!

3D-RING: What is the 3D scene like in Russia?

Al Meerow People use computer graphics very intensively in games, on TV, in advertising and typography. Also there are a few companies making their own commercial 3D software, for example, well known bCad is made in Russia.

3D-RING: Do you have any formal education in 3D or is it self learned?

Al Meerow Well, in 1994 I graduated from Taganrog State University of Radio Engineering (TSURE) with a degree in Computer Engineering. This couldn't help me with art, but it is very useful to understand 3D programs, algorithms and technology of computer graphics. When I was 16 I finished school of arts (5 years) so I have some skills with pencil, gouache and sculpture. I have no formal education in 3D graphics. I never read any books, manuals or helps. It's almost useless. All those books can teach you HOW to do, but actually you need to know WHAT to do. You can learn how to create a spot light in MAX, but this information is useless if you don't know what spot light is. on the other hand, if you know what spot light is and what's the difference between spot light and omni light, you can easily find appropriate tools in virtually any 3D program. No matter what program you use, all you need is good sense.

3D-RING: I understand you are a member of the Star Wars Modeling Alliance. Can you tell us a bit about this group? What is it all about and what are your activites?

Al Meerow The Star Wars 3D Modeling Alliance (SWMA) is a small group leaded by Jose Gonzalez, members spend their time trying to create a 3D StarWars universe. Main objectives (as I see it) is to collect all 3D models of ships, vehicles, vessels, characters, creatures, droids, landscapes, everything from StarWars universe and give everyone the ability to construct their own StarWars worlds.

3D-RING: What sort of hardware and software do you primarily work on? From your gallery, I can see that you have worked with both Max and Lightwave. Which do you think is the better software?

Al Meerow Yes, I use both LightWave and Max. I can't say what is better. I like the ideology of LightWave's scenes, consisting of objects, stored in separate outer files. It's native lens flares and glow is very easy to tune and makes scenes looks very real. But I guess Max have more tools for modeling than LW and it's volume lights and combustion are just incredible! Right now I use Max more often than LW without any special reason. Again, it doesn't matter what tool you use. I think if your picture depends on some specific program, it's not your picture. That's why I don't use Bryce. It's possible to create wonderful pictures with Bryce, I don't know why, but I don't feel that it is my own picture. My first models were made on a assembled-on-the-knees 486DX2-66 with 8Mb of RAM. Now I have a HP Vectra XU Dual P200 with 98Mb of RAM and a 8Mb Matrox Millennium.

3D-RING: Tell us about your Millenium Falcon model. How long did it take for you to model it? What did you use as reference?

Al Meerow Oh, Falcon! That's my favorite starship. That's why the model is still unfinished. I spent almost a year to create it, I made a dozen versions. As reference I used everything I could get my hands on. My copy of trilogy on VHS and screenshots from games... later I've got several pictures scanned from the "Art of Special Effects" book.

3D-RING: Did you do all the textures yourself? How did you create the textures? How much of it is modelling detail and how much of it is mapping?

Al Meerow Yes, I did all the textures by myself. I take a screenshot of the object from certain projection, then I print it and paint the texture over it. Then I put it in a scanner and made some retouch in Photoshop. I didn't like bump maps. Bump map looks good if you make something like marble or sand, but it looks very ugly if you try to imitate a gadget. So almost all bumped parts of my models are the mesh. I apply textures mainly to diffusion channel.

3D-RING: Did you build the model from scratch? What do you think of Lightwave's modelling tools for a project such as this?

Al Meerow Yes, I build Falcon model from scratch. From heap of scratches. LightWave have the perfect tools for creating such models. But I faced some inconvenience with mapping. LW makes the user enter the coordinates/sizes of the map manually, while MAX have easy to use (and to see) gizmo.