Skywalker FPV EPO Foam

[robmohr]

Jeff,

Regarding servos and animation, I would only do that if you feel that it will have value as part of the tutorial. As you say, it isn't visible while flying.

That being said, the McFoamy is a work of art, and I have sat in the editor and played with the servos, marveling over the detail you guys put into that one. So, the work has not gone unnoticed.

Again, really up to you based on your thoughts on learning value.

[jeffpn]

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.zip file attached. Download and remove .rfx extension to view.

[jeffpn]

Servos really aren't anything difficult to learn, once you have basic modeling down. Servos are more about hierarchy (which part belongs to which part, ankle bone is connected to the leg bone sort of thing) than anything else. That is outside of the scope of this tutorial, because Wings 3D cannot do hierarchy. Of course, running the wires can be difficult to do. flexible did an outstanding job on that. That could be demonstrated in a stand-alone tutorial. It's all about the lift command. At least that's how I'd do it.

[robmohr]

How will the hierarchy get done for this model? Is there a freeware application that can do it, or is this a step that must be done in 3DStudio?

[jeffpn]

Blender is free and can do hierarchy. Somebody needs to work up a tute for doing that!

My whole point of giving detailed pics on how to create models in Wings 3D is that there's not that much that needs to be done in a second program, if you've done everything you can do in Wings. I daresay there are several people who will take it the rest of the way for you. I would, if the model is simple enough. A basic model like this, or the McFoamy, or the Extra I did is no big deal to assign pivots and hierarchy. More complex planes with landing gear and movable pods can be much more difficult to set up in Max.

[jeffpn]

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.zip file next post

5th picture edited!!

[jeffpn]

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.zip file include. Download and remove .rfx extenstion to view.
.zip file edited!!

[jeffpn]

New command this section.
.zip file included. Download and remove .rfx to view

[jeffpn]

.zip file attached. Remove .rfx to view.

[jeffpn]

Current progress.

7,826 triangles (20,000 allowed)

[jeffpn]

Note to self: I'm not sure I scaled the wheels to the plane. I'll have to remember to look into that later.

[robmohr]

Jeff,

It's looking very nice. I have a lot of catching up to do.

P.S. I'm headed out on business again. Two week trip this time. I will have net access in the evenings and will keep abreast of things here. If you can think of anything you might need that requires access to the plane, you will need to let me know before I leave the morning of the 5th.

[robmohr]

Originally Posted by jeffpn

Note to self: I'm not sure I scaled the wheels to the plane. I'll have to remember to look into that later.

I haven't seen anything so far in Wings that would be what I would consider a measuring tool to set an actual scale... If it's at all helpful, the main gear wheels have an outside diameter of 1.5"

[jeffpn]

Originally Posted by robmohr

I haven't seen anything so far in Wings that would be what I would consider a measuring tool to set an actual scale...

Uh oh, that's your instructor's fault. If you click any 2 vertices, you'll see the distance between those vertices displayed in the upper left corner. In Wings, the units really aren't inches, but it turns out when the model hits RF, there is a 1:1 correspondance between Wings units and RF inches.

[jeffpn]

Extra credit lesson