2D to 3D drawing program?

If what you want is a free 3d program that will let you put images on the 3 axis to use as a template for the 3d model (which is what those above images are showing), Blender is free and works. It's not trivial work, though.

If you want to create a 3d model from picutures, you can try 123d from autodesk, but you would need access to the actual car and enough space around it to take the pictures. I tried it out and it does work but I could not get the proper prespective of my car in my garage as it was a little too close to the car for the software to stitch it together properly. The half of the car that I was further away from when I took the pictures came out ok, but the other half wasn't. I will try it next time the car is out in the driveway and I can take pictures from further away.

 

You'd need more than just profile drawings for 123d. Check out their site, somewhere it tells you the minimum number and angles of pictures you need. You basically need a good 360 degree set of pictures of something and it will make a texture mapped model for you that you can then clean up in your CAD program of choice.

I think you can use the images you have and mirror them to get 6 images. You'd probably need a rear quarter drawing, a top down and top quarter drawing. Mirror those and you have 12 images total so it might be enough to have it roughly stitch it together...

 

Doesn't come off cartoonish - volume and mass well realized in 3D, proportions and shape relationships right on. Sketchy yet accurate style vastly preferable to tightly rendered drawings.

 

You're welcome!

95% of my architectural work was done in the days before digital photography - I have photos but where they're stored I don't know. A few digital photos are lurking somewhere on my computer and I've posted a couple on Fchat in the past - will see what I can come up with.

In college I did nearly enough fine arts courses for a second degree and much was drawing. All evidence unfortunately long lost in the sands of time.

 

I've been working on modeling a Porsche 911 from plans and here is a screen capture of the curves to be used to generate the surfaces. Once the curves are correct, I can loft them to create the surfaces. I can also check the surface for defects that i can edit out if necessary. One thing nice about 3D modeling is I only need half the car since nearly all cars are symmetrical along the long axis.
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This particular model is being done in Rhino 3D. I've also modeled this car in Modo and Lightwave. Rhino allows me to produce accurate curves and surfaces, whereas Modo and Lightwave are polygon based modelers. I use them to render final images.

 

Yet another option is ZBrush Shadow box

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JEZ0VGKg-lg]ZBrush 4 - ShadowBox Basics - YouTube[/ame]

 

that's not how computer aided drafting works... you have to tell the computer what you want, not hope it guesses the correct outcome when given a few 2d lines.

 

I did look, hence my response...

but that is the work you want a program to resolve for you seemingly as I read through this thread and it seems you don't understand the tool, i.e. the computer and computer aided drafting(as computer aided design is more than a bit of a misnomer).

the computer does what it is told, nothing more. it can't design, it can't infer, it can't resolve on its own 2d lines and somehow understand your intent and create 3d forms from what you describe as elevation drawings.

to create surfaces they need to be defined in an xyz coordinate system. the only way the computer can do that is to have the surfaces parameters defined in three dimensions for it by an operator.

the idea that you can provide 4 2d elevation drawings of a design of yours and expect a 3d form be created somehow is not as far as I know a capability of any modeling software I'm aware or.

disclosure, I come from the architecture side of things and have been using acad and similar for 13yrs at this point after spending college and the early part of my career at hand drafting tables.

 

these videos and sketchup might be as close as you get to quick/dirty 3d without a lot of time or accuracy invested.

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aT5D6mIGI_g]Modeling a car in SketchUp - YouTube[/ame]

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ETrZYfooN-o]Modeling a supercar in SketchUp part5/6(tutorial) - YouTube[/ame]


2d information used to create a very rough 3d form one can manipulate for view/perspective
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1gG1inut8o]how to create a car in google sketchup (Tutorial) - YouTube[/ame]

given those this still stands I believe,

the point is inputting 2d information is largely irrelevant to what you are wanting to produce, 3d images(wireframe or not). the only way to get an accurrate 3d wireframe out of any modeling software is to enter 3d parameters(example referenced in post 34) to define the shapes and surfaces.

the only way I can see to use 2d input to start to define with any accuracy a 3d shape/wireframe allowing you to manipulate the view would be to input a series of horizontal and vertical sections cuts at a regular interval not the front/rear and side profiles as you keep referencing. they would then have to be stacked at their interval in 3d space in a drawing file to start to get at the form to be generated

 

The section method described is another way to approach 3D modeling. I once had to model an aircraft carrier for an animation my company was doing. I purchased a plastic model of the ship and sliced the hull into regular spaced cuts. I then traced each slice and scanned the traces into the computer. Once input, I created spline curves for each section and space these curve in the same relation as the original slices. Once you have the cross sections you can join them with curves from top to bottom. From that point you have a grid of crossing curves that can be "patched", creating a portion of the surface. Once finished, you have an accurate surface that you can build on. Once the surface is created, I scale the surface to actual size so I can model in real world measurements, much easier than trying to translate real world dimensions into whatever scale the model was.
I've attached an image of the Porsche 911 that was created using the spline patch method in Lightwave. The windows are blacked out because the model has no interior.
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