Cladey Island's monastery. The largest of all the buildings on the island this beautifully stylized building is the latest version of the Caldey monastery that has existed -in one form or another- on the island since the 6th century.

As you can see from the photograph this is a very large building with multiple parts to it's overall composition. A very advanced building for any 3D artist with the added problem of an elevated position not represented on Google Earth's terrain feature.

In addition to the buildings complexity we have the added difficulty of limited access for the photographic reference, due party to surrounding terrain and vegetation and partly the fact that this is a working monastery and has very limited access.

Here we have the row of attractive cottages that can be found at the far end of the islands central green. These cottages form what you might call the residential center of the island.

This model uses many different techniques to get almost 95% of the building rendered with photo-texturing from the original on-site photographs.

There were many challenges with this building to make sure that the dimensions of the building matched the slightly off center satellite imagery. In addition this building has many unusual characteristics especially the different roofing materials at the front, curved walls and door arches.

This small building is know to visitors as the Video Hall, indicated by the blue sign near the entrance, however by the look of this building you can see it seems to have a double life as a small chapel.

With this model the main building features that offer character are the arched windows and door opening. Every effort has been made to create a sense of depth to the entrance with the use of window ledges, door extrusions and recesses. Rather than leaving the door closed I decided to offer a more authentic representation to the original reference photographs by leaving the door slightly open.

This little blue cabin can be found in a wooded area near to the video hall. The blue is a great colour contrast with the surrounding greenery giving this building a magical quality that really catches your eye.

With this model one of the main problems with obtaining reference photographs was the surrounding vegetation. As you can see in this photograph which covers half of the building a tree is covering the side and the roof. Because earthHD is all about creating authentic photo-texturing especially with areas such as roofing materials these images needed photo-shop work to create usable textures.

The post office and museum sits at the head of the central green and is the first building that visitors to the island face as they make their way across the open space. As you can see quite an unusual building with it's large double tiered roof, arched entrance, beam supports and bright red phone box.

With a building like this there are multiple points of interest that need to be incorporated to make the most of the final model. One of the first things undertaken was getting a good match with the roof line that could be seen from the satellite photograph, with a roof like this angles need to be perfect to get everything to fit correctly on top and underneath.

The perfume shop and shrine are the second buildings that you will see on your right as you enter the central green. This shop sells every type of lotion and perfume on offer from the Caldey Island range. All items on sale are derived from plants such as the yellow gorse that grows wild on the island.

This building has a rather strange wide entrance with no windows to the left or right just benches and a wide overhang, ideal for getting out of the sun. Most of the detail in this model can be found around the central entrance, the farm building to the left and the shrine to the right.

As you first enter the central green you will find the main gift shop on your right. Here you can find an array of Caldey branded gifts, from chocolate made 400 yards away at the chocolate factory, to elaborate religious ornaments that you can just make out in the front window.

This building is the simplest in structure out of the Caldey collection and lends much of its interest to little details around the front of the building.

Walk towards the 'Video Hall' and the 'Blue Cabin' and you will find this and another house along a steep section of road. Following the same paint scheme that many of the buildings on the island do with dark, or sky blue window frames and a white-washed roughcast.

This model was made more difficult to build by the fact that only a few photographic angles are available from the public footpath. The sides of the building have been created with what little photographic material could be gathered, referred to as 'building blind' because we hazard a guess to how building elements -we can't see- will look.

Walk past House 7 and you naturally find House 8. Although the two houses are joined they are totally different buildings in their design and geometric complexity. As with house 7 we had problems getting anything but forward facing photo reference due to surround buildings, trees and public access.

With House 8 we stumbled across a classic example of the building style linked to this little island. Every type of shape has been incorporated into this structure from a normal looking entrance to fort like flat roof to a large round tower, in addition every window and door is total different apart from the sky blue paint.

Satellite imagery from this location is very difficult to use as model positioning reference due to distortions created by the steep slope. A lot of fine tuning was needed to make House 7 and House 8 join while leaving enough room for the video hall to the immediate right.