Aztek

It's looking tight Rod. I'd play with the color of the formation light on the nose though. When they are turned off they are an off-white with greenish tint. Very light tint of green. almost greenish yellow white. It's really hard to explain the color. When lit up at night they "glow" rather than illuminate with a blue "Indiglo" style glow. If you can't find real world refs, let me know ...

Takani meaning for Bandai and Arii model kits? Who is Takani?

I'd have to say the VF-1 only cuz of the headaches it's caused me while trying to create it in 3D. While I think some of the other valks have just as functional noses, I like the near circular cross section at it's pivot point in battroid (hip) and dual purpose FLIR sensors (leg attach joint) and "old school" head on shot with bubble cockpit canopy. I've probably spent more hours on my nosecone object than any other object in my mesh due to it's complexity of design and importance to the valk appearance as a whole in non-fighter forms. Overall appearance goes to the other valk designs, but on functionality and realistic feasability for transformation I dig the VF-1 more than any other.

coby, Maybe it was the animation studio at the time, but I remember the TV -1J being white. Later in the series after Roy died, the -1s appears grey*ish* and if I'm correct made the other VFs look whiter in contrast. Mech, Please don't take this opinion the wrong way, your textures are awesome. Leaps ahead of where I'm at on mine ....

I dig the textures Mech, but is your basecoat a grey or white? With all the weathering, it seems to be tinted grey, but if I remember correctly, -1Js are white ...

Anyone know any good Max tutorials to animate the blue exhaust coming from the main engines? and the white "thrust" that's expelled from the veniers? I'm assuming that some form of liquid fuel is used for the veniers giving it the white tint we see in DYRL scenes. I have yet to try and use particles for animation, so if they are used, I may need a remedial version ... "Particles for Dummies in 3dsmax" Any help will be appreciated ... thanks!!

Mech, I heard there was a cameo Orguss mech on Macross during a firefight w/ other destroids. Maybe THAT one could be included in the project. It IS canon right?

I might be able to get some screengrabs if no one has any already. I also remember that on DYRL the shoulder pads lit up when Hikaru and Minmei were trapped in the SDF-1. *Also, go here ...DYRL backpack, chest and helmet ...

LMAO, I was just saying it would've worked ... sheez.

DG, I feel you ... You could have used the glass and frame as booleans, notched the frame, and reinserted a non boolean glass canopy. Again ... overkill.

Mech, speaking of the canopy, that was one of the harder single objects I had to model believe it or not. Simple extruding the basic outer shell inwards toward the pilot resulted in a jacked up looking glass canopy. My frame and canopy are two seperate objects, the canopy glass is about 1 inch thick and portions of the frame being anywhere from about an inch and a half to 4 inches in the thicker areas. This are just estimates proportionate to the valks dimensions as a whole.

Can you highlight the area you are talking about, I'm not seeing it at first glance ... maybe I'm missing it.

Mech, All the objects in my valk have an stl check run on them. I've seen other meshes where people haven't been concerned about open edges on polys. But as I've always wanted a realistic valk ... I've always "built" it realistic. It makes for a high poly overhead, but I think it has been worth it.

Mech, I like the realistic look a thousand times better than anime style. Your texs are beautiful ...

Les and DG, Are you guys leaning toward the pose you currently have in the corner of mine? or still waiting for the textured boosters? I don't want them poking to far up into someone elses space. That's one of the reasons I wanted to get the DYRL money shot pose going. We really need to figure out this lighting rig deal. I also think that even though the lighting is somewhat an issue, it's probably not going to be as bad as we think. If whoever is doing the compositing has a semi-powerhouse PC, then adjusting and filtering the individual valks to a baseline shouldn't be a prob. I'm changing shifts this week so my mornings and late evenings should be opening up to start smoothing out my piece of the pie. I haven't forgotten about the new and improved tex for the ARMD platform. That's still in the works as well. Tomorrow I'm off on a trek to Fry's Electronics up in Phoenix. Those of you who know how fun that can be, HA! I'll be thinkin of ya ... BTW, does anyone have a PC that uses Intels Hyper Threading function in their 3d apps? Is it worth the hype? Are the gains noticeable? Is high res rendering sped up at all? Thanx if anyone has the info ... Az

Happy Turkey Day to all that apply, and for those that do, NO CG TODAY! Spend time with your families and enjoy the time off (if you are lucky enough to have it ) Take care all, Az

Zeta, for your artifacting, I'd up the poly count unless you are conserving. More polys are usually a bigger headache but there is no substitute for the appearance. ... and Dat, I'd say the Yamato looks good in ALL modes, but if I had to pick one, it's battroid. I honestly feel they sacrificed a little I mean LITTLE of the toys' fighter appearance to give it the beef it has in battroid.

Wide and thick is the key for battroids, sleek and thin is the key for fighter. That is the intrinsic delimma of trying to model a non-morphing valk ... ... and the reason for many sleepless nights ...

Totally, I'll post some shots and we'll see how close we hit it it.

Mine unfolds from directly under the intake on the chestplate. It is hinged to the chesplate itself. I'll try to post an animated gif or vid of it deploying and try to get you that ep number. It's really early in the series, before the 5th episode if I remember. I'll find out. BTW, as far as detail goes, you should see how I have my backpack hinged to the chesplate, it deploys with an actuator. I'll post some renders in the CG thread later.

HA! Found it. The screen cap is kinda hard to read. The left upper portion is a side shot from the lower right of the battroid panels we are talking about. The right side, I'm assuming, is the cockpit activity that got the panels to pop open and create the thrust (not shown in this cap). Hope this helps and not confuses.

Damn, I've never seen this thread. I was able to model these to fill the void up to the shoulder hinges. I'll have to poste some cutaways or wireframes to show you my take. I remember seing an episode where they "fanned" open and a burst of thrust came out, like a venier. So I made the lower half able to "fan in a similar fasion when not closed. I'll try and find the screencap. Check the recent valk in the CG thread, you can see them closed. It's hard to tell which panels are which since none are textured yet.

I think I've seen that one too, I also seen some front shots of the -21. They were of someones model, but it was dead on and would provide at least a good silhouette.

In inches, cuz my ruler measures in 32nds, here they go ... A. 3/32 B. 3/8 C. 3/8 With a near 90 degree bend at the, the finger is not straight D. 5/8 Opening to stow arms, wide 12-13/32 or 25/64 and 9/16 tall. All dimensions are exact to the 32nd exept for the one with the 64th measurement. I just reduced the fractions to their lowest level. I'd also examine those line drawings, cuz on your first pic all of the knuckles above the g row are combined, i.e., the farthest two "bones" towards the tip would be one solid bone. I used 2 pivots where one knuckle would be to give it some extra length and grip for when holding the gun pod. Hope this helps !! Maybe it will get me dibs on a set should you ever mass produce them !!

Sorry, VF-1 I have some good box scans of the -19 but I think it may only be side and top.