Raptor 3D Project - Edits 15

modo ROCKS!

I'm just starting to become comfortable now with modo, and really, am just scratching at the surface of it's capabilities. Still, using some of it's very powerful tools, I've been able to clean up the mesh as exported from Carrara, and improve it considerably. Very few errors remain on the exterior, and those can all be fixed fairly soon.

The model still has no "paint" (texture maps) of any kind, aside from basic gray colors on the exterior, and and some green glass in the cockpit, for the HUD and MFD's. (Multi-Function Displays) Every panel line, door, vent, etc., is all actual geometry.

The bottom view here shows the kind of small errors remaining on the exterior. See the slight "crease" in the left-hand side missile bay door? I'm fixing details like this now, and will be adding the bulge in the side where the main landing gear doors are. After that, I'll be moving on to the next stage in the geometry... adding more detail, both inside and out.

Cleaning up the geometry...

Most of the errors above have been repaired, and at this point, virtually the entire plane has been rebuilt, simplifying the mesh and cleaning up the issues that arose when I transferred the model from Carrara. Modo makes this task a LOT easier, with it's advanced modeling tools, and I'm seriously impressed with it. Ultimately, I'll remodel the landing gear details too, but for now, am still using the (excellent) landing gear included by the original author, along with his parts in the thrust vectoring area of the plane, and his ejection seat. Everything else is new.

I've separated all the landing gear doors and weapons bay doors, so they can be animated later. The cockpit detail is coming along slowly. To add some realism, I took a "full male figure" from the modo content, bent it around enough to fit it in the cockpit, and added a simple sub-d'd helmet. You don't want to see that up close, just yet... The figure was simply colored a "flight suit green" color, but has no clothes. I'm new to character modeling, so I'll come back to that later.

A few more simple textures have been added, such as the "screen" effect on some of the vents, and some chrome on the landing gear oleo struts. For those of you who are familiar with the aircraft, you might notice that I've started to model some of the exterior bumps and depressions, like those around the gun door.

Prepping for the close-ups.

Every time a door or other opening is added to the model, there's always a little cleanup of the mesh required. So that's ongoing. But now, I'm doing more and more close-up test renders, using harsh, low-angle light, to point out any exterior flaws in the surface. To keep my interest, I alternate between these tedious jobs, and adding something new, which is fun.

Here are a couple of renderings showing the landing gear bays and weapons bays, with their doors removed. These are all built into the fuselage directly, not modeled a separate parts. All these bays had to be closed up on the inside, before I start detailing them.

The interior:

I've got some of the major components installed, including the complete system of intake ducts, engines, and the thrust-vectoring assemblies at the rear. The landing gear is adequate, but needs more scale detailing for close-ups. The cockpit now has a pilot with helmet (but still no clothes... He's just colored green, to disguise that.) The cockpit detail itself is ongoing. I've modeled enough of the main panel and HUD to be visible in most renders, but for close-ups, I'll be adding the interior side panels, control stick and throttles, etc.. Haven't really decided how far to go with the interior work yet. I just work on it when the mood strikes, but spend most of my time on making the exterior as accurate as possible.

There will a pause here.

There are tools within modo that will enable me to do the next step of detailing in a very precise way. At this time though, I'm new enough to modo that I'd prefer to pause here, while I look at some of those methods, and develop some macros to help in the process. That makes more sense than just plowing ahead, possibly damaging the work already done. So bear with me for a while. When the article resumes, it will be on the smallest details.