Working on Textures

I created a lambert texture and added the checker file from the video tutorials and applied it to all my buildings so I could make sure things wouldn't stretch.

I went into the UV editor and cut pieces apart and rotated them etc until all the surfaces had relatively perfect squares.

I created a material and added a picture of corrugated steel and added the material to parts of the buildings. In the UV Editor I used the scale tool to scale the building pieces outwards so that the ribs of the steel looked more realistic. In the screen shot I have adjusted the UV's of the middle and back buildings and have not adjusted the other two buildings.

Applied the checkerboard material to the two roofs and adjusted the UVs so there was no distortion.

Added a slightly darker gray colored material to the remaining metal items and a wood texture to the two building platforms.

Starting to Model the Vehicle

I decided to start with the hood of the truck. I created a box with multiple segments and sized it to the approximate side of the hood. I deleted the bottom, back and rear right faces and then in vertex mode began adjusting the vertices based on the reference pictures.

I repeated the same process to get the front half of the bumper.

Working on the Buildings

I used the edge loop tool to insert edges to block out the shape of the vents on the front of the building. I extracted the faces where the vents would go, deleted one of the extracted faces and kept the other to make the vents. I used the insert edge look to add edges to make the frame of the vents and deleted the middle face.

I created a cube and flattened it out into the shape of a vent slat and then with it inside the frame I used the duplicate special and told it to make 10 copies I then combined the slat pieces with the frame and made a duplicate of them  to make the other vent.

I used the edge loop tool to block out the doorway and the door frame and then extracted the frame forward. To make the frame thicker I selected the back faces of the frame and extruded them back. I created a plane and moved it into the frame to make the sliding door on the building.

I created a cube and flattened it out for the roof and then rotated it to fit the slant of the roof. I created another cube for the supports of the roof and then duplicated it.

I repeated the same process that I used on the vents for the first building to create the vent for the tall back building.

I duplicated the vent of the first building. sized it down and moved it to the left most building. Using the insert loop tool I again blocked out the shape of the door and its frame. I extruded the frame outward and the face of the door backwards.

When trying to create the triangle roofs of the buildings I discovered some issues with buildings I made. I ended up creating cubes, scaled them to the size of the original buildings and then deleted the original buildings. I had to do this to my two buildings on the left. On the largest building I only had to use the insert edge tool around where the two vents were so that I could cut out the faces behind the vents. On the far left building I left the vent where it was but had to remake the door.

To make the roofs I inserted an edge loop in the middle of the buildings and then selected the edge on top of the buildings and moved it until I was happy with the degrees that the roofs slanted.

I duplicated the vents from the main building once again, this time scaling it down and outward. I created the door in the same way I did for the door on the other building.  I then duplicated the scaled down vent. I used the insert edge tool to cut around the vent, deleted the face created and then tilted the vent.

To make the roofs I made a cube and sized it to one half of the main building and adjusted the left and right vertical angles so they were straight. I then duplicated the roof and rotated it around to make the other side and then lined it up with the other half of the roof. I think combined the two sides and duplicated them and moved it to the taller building I resized it again and adjusted the angle of the roof so that it fit the top of the building.