[OpenGL] Totally Stuck -- Need Models but none available - What to do?

Question

So I've got this class where I have to make a simple game in OpenGL. I want to make space invanders (basically).

So how in the world should I make anything appear on my screen that looks decent at all? :( I found some code, finally, that let me import a 3DS object. It was sweet I thought and went and put it in a class to make it a little more modular and usable (http://www.spacesimulator.net/tut4_3dsloader.html).

However, either the program I use (Cheetah3d) is exporting the uv map incorrectly and/or the code for reading in a .bmp that ISN'T the one that came with the demo. The image is all weird. Very hard to explain.

So I arrive at my question. What solution should I use to draw objects? Should I honestly expect to spend hours guessing at vertices to make a space invader ship? Then also try to map a decent texture to this object as well? The code I am using draws the untextured object just fine but I can't begin to go mapping the texture to it because I don't know what vertices correspond to what polygons etc.

Thanks SO for any suggestions on what I should do. :D

Answer 1

You could draw textured quads, provided you have a texture loader.

I really wouldn't worry too much about your "uv map" - if you can get your vertices right then you can generally cludge something anyway. That's what I'd do.