I recently started working on Grant Abbitts Course on gamedev.tv, in order to improve my 3D-modeling skills.
The tool of choice for 3D-modeling is Blender.
The first section of the course it about modeling a mech which can be described as hard surface modeling. Key topics of this section are:
- Modeling via extrude, inset, loopcuts
- Use of mirror-modifier
- Simple use von materials including bloom-effect
- Position & rotation of the camera for video render result
The result can be viewed as video or GIF below.

In addition, here are different views directly in blender.