Mass CG project ...

[Aztek]

Dat,

From wing root to outboard edge, the wing usually runs the same airfoil. The airfoil is the shape if the wing if you sliced it in half and looked at it from the side. Believe it or not, the airfoil has the same basic makeup on highspeed aircraft as on heavies (cargo). Rounded front and trailing to a tip at the trailing edge. I took an airfoil I was happy with and splined it out in 2d. I extruded that spline all the way out to the wingtip assembly, the housing that has the formation and index lights. Scale it down to pattern the narrowing of the wing as it goes more outbd. The pain in the ass is cutting out and modeling flaps, spoilers, and wingtip assembly. Getting the roundeness, almost like half a teardrop from scracth, at least from me, was a bear.

Hopefully Woz's pimp ass wing will help you out some more.

[KingNor]

Dat,

From wing root to outboard edge, the wing usually runs the same airfoil. The airfoil is the shape if the wing if you sliced it in half and looked at it from the side. Believe it or not, the airfoil has the same basic makeup on highspeed aircraft as on heavies (cargo). Rounded front and trailing to a tip at the trailing edge. I took an airfoil I was happy with and splined it out in 2d. I extruded that spline all the way out to the wingtip assembly, the housing that has the formation and index lights. Scale it down to pattern the narrowing of the wing as it goes more outbd. The pain in the ass is cutting out and modeling flaps, spoilers, and wingtip assembly. Getting the roundeness, almost like half a teardrop from scracth, at least from me, was a bear.

Hopefully Woz's pimp ass wing will help you out some more.

what you do is duplicate the wing, cut out the peices you need and delete the parts you don't need. that way you don't create them from scratch and they'll look seamless.

Edited October 22, 2004 by KingNor

[David Hingtgen]

Or if anyone wants an F-14's airfoil for a nice comparison/base:

(This is not EXACTLY the F-14's, but close) Surprisingly un-symmetrical as fighters go. Wonder if it has to do with being swing-wing---the A-6 (next-closest wing to the F-14,) has a VERY symmetrical foil and it's not even a fast fighter.

Edited October 22, 2004 by David Hingtgen

[KingNor]

WOZ,

Can I see a wire to see how you approached the modelling of the wing? Been trying to make a decent wing but can't fugure the best way to go about it.

:Dat

you've already made "decent" wings man, don't sell yourself short.

[Metal_Massacre_79]

So when are you people going to make an online networked video game for all these models?

[KingNor]

So when are you people going to make an online networked video game for all these models?

ha! ha ha ha! ha

edit..

actually thats not a bad idea.

Edited October 26, 2004 by KingNor

[DatterBoy]

Panel Line bump mapping progress shot:

[Aztek]

Some noticeable jaggies, Dat. Can you increase the resolution of the panel lines or is it the bump renderer?

[DatterBoy]

You know, I don't know what causes the jaggies. I know if I get a closer shot there are no jaggies and the lines are fairly wide, not too thin. Recommendations? I'm thinking it's a result of the thin ness of the lines themselves and the distance between them and the cam.. but not sure. I actually want them to look as good from any distance as the panel lines in the tail as those are actually modelled in. Not sur ewhat I need to do to make that happen though.

Here's a closeup of the chestplate panel lining.

:Dat

[Knight26]

Great work DB, can't wait to see the finished product.

[chrono]

What's causing the 'jaggies' are the size and number of the rivet dimples. They cause a 'Z' movement.

Try the panel lines with smaller rivet sizes, less rivets AND no rivets at all to see how it looks. Sometimes you have to leave some detail behind because it's not additive to the overall scene.

[The_WOZ]

Hi everyone!

I was sick last week, and also testing my new computer.

DatterBoy: Try making the rivets to protrude. Make circles with dark edges and light fill color.

[Aztek]

I just looked at your recent render Dat,

Forgive the primitivity of the attachment, I tweaked it in MSPaint at work.

The wingtip from an ortho front view should be more like the inset. The mesh may be easier to model if you model it as a seperate object and then weld it to your main wing. You are limited to the vertices that attach it to the main wing, so some wing redesign may need to happen. Also, from this angle, the wing looks kinda thin, toyish almost. I'd apply a scale modifier to the z-axis (or whatever axis you have set to the direction of the arrow) and scale it wider until it barely clears the notch in the backplate w/o clipping it. This should also round the leading edge some more, and give you room for more flap track and spolier detail, if you are shooting for this.

I wanted my wings to look fat and functional I think I may have even widened my notch in the backplate to accomodate the wing design I stuck with.

You've come along way since your first few models that resembled the 1/72 Yammies. I'm only picking this apart since you've seemed to shift gears toward realism.

Edited November 2, 2004 by Aztek

[DatterBoy]

Hey AZ,

Funny you mention the wing since I just did a remodel on Sunday night. The wings I had really bothered me so i did what King Nor, David, and WOZ all said to do.

Used the teardrop shape as a base andextruded it to the length I wanted and the sized down the tear face on the far end. I then built up the wing tip from that flat end and modelled it independantly on the wing to taper up. Booleaned the pieces out by making duplicates and cut away pieces to maintain wing shape without getting artifacts.

Edited November 2, 2004 by DatterBoy

[DatterBoy]

And one more. Ia m trying to go more realistic as I want to move away from the toy look. I don't think I got the wing down quite right yet, but it's better than what I had. Also have the air brake panels and the flaps in there too but you can't really see em.

:Dat

Edited November 2, 2004 by DatterBoy

[DatterBoy]

And a wire:

[Aztek]

ALOT better. I'll post some of my wires and model to show you how I tackled that mini beast. Sometimes words can't do what a few graphics can do.

[Aztek]

Here we go, first image is a textured wing and looking outbd inset to show the airfoil I stuck with.

[Aztek]

Here's my wire.

[DatterBoy]

I see...

I like the outer wing tip and the rate at whihch it tapers. Looks to me like I should consider rounding out the center line of my wing as well as the tip since my taper literally completes too much towards the top of the wing.

Damn this thread, always making me want to remodel redesign... It's just more work!

:Dat

[CoryHolmes]

I see...

I like the outer wing tip and the rate at whihch it tapers. Looks to me like I should consider rounding out the center line of my wing as well as the tip since my taper literally completes too much towards the top of the wing.

Damn this thread, always making me want to remodel redesign... It's just more work!

:Dat

Look at it this way: It's not more work, it's more fun

[Doktor Gonzo]

OKay, for the TRUE Maya geeks out there - tell me what this code snippet is doing, and win the eternal admiration of your peers:

if (VF_1_Master_Control.BATTROID==10 && l_knee.keyableFlag==1) {

disconnectAttr blendWeighted263.output l_knee.rotateX;

connectAttr joint3.Kneepad_rotate l_knee.rotateX;

l_knee.keyableFlag=0;

} else if (VF_1_Master_Control.BATTROID<10 && l_knee.keyableFlag==0) {

disconnectAttr joint3.Kneepad_rotate l_knee.rotateX;

connectAttr blendWeighted263.output l_knee.rotateX;

l_knee.keyableFlag=1;

}

-DG, going gaga with midnight programming...

[The_Major]

having worked with maya for all of about 10 min i dont know much but ill take a stab at it, im gonna say that part of the Total animation code, in this case animating the knee joint of a battroid.

[mcpaz]

OKay, for the TRUE Maya geeks out there - tell me what this code snippet is doing, and win the eternal admiration of your peers:

if (VF_1_Master_Control.BATTROID==10 && l_knee.keyableFlag==1) {

disconnectAttr blendWeighted263.output l_knee.rotateX;

connectAttr joint3.Kneepad_rotate l_knee.rotateX;

l_knee.keyableFlag=0;

} else if (VF_1_Master_Control.BATTROID<10 && l_knee.keyableFlag==0) {

disconnectAttr joint3.Kneepad_rotate l_knee.rotateX;

connectAttr blendWeighted263.output l_knee.rotateX;

l_knee.keyableFlag=1;

}

-DG, going gaga with midnight programming...

Ufff....

well, let me put my little grain of sand on this as a programmer, not as a Maya user:

The code you're showing us is this way:

if (variable_master == 10 AND knee_flag == true) {

unlink Atribute_1 from Object_I_knee

link Atribute_2 to Object_I_knee

disable knee_flag

}

else if (variable_master < 10 AND knee_flag == false) {

unlink Atribute_2 from Object_I_knee

link Atribute_1 to Object_I_knee

enable knee_flag

}

Things to consider (keeping in mind that I don't know anything about the rest of the code):

1.- Not all the possibilities are taken under control in this if-then-else statement. This may cause a problem, due to the fact that in the rest of the cases (variable_master != 10 and flag=true, etc.) no action is performed.

2.- The flag: it shouldn't be modified in other parts of the code to avoid unexpected behaviour, if it's a 'key' to allow the linking/unlinking.

I fear I can't tell anything more about the code without knowing the meaning of all the variables, specially VF_1_Master_Control.BATTROID and I_knee.keyableFlag...

Interesting code, BTW

Manu

[Jackie_Chan_Fan]

question.

when the jet transforms... do the forwarms slide up and down the upper arm part?

In other words.. does the upper arm slide into the forewarm part when its in jet mode?

[Doktor Gonzo]

Manu,

Good analysis! That behavior is intentional - I want the code inert save for the first time the controlling variable hits/departs from the value of 10 - otherwise it'll throw an error, and I'm not adroit enough with Maya's try/catch scripting to work past that yet. And the flag is, as you note, unique to this bit of scripting and is not modified elsewhere.

As for what it does, it allows the knee part to be driven by animation keys linked to the transformation slider during transformation, then decouples it from those and attaches it to a computed value determined by the pose of the thigh and lower leg once transformation is complete and character animation has commenced.

Oh, and sorry for the random digression into geekery, all.

[Doktor Gonzo]

question.

when the jet transforms... do the forwarms slide up and down the upper arm part?

In other words.. does the upper arm slide into the forewarm part when its in jet mode?

Nope. They stay at their usual constant length.

[Jackie_Chan_Fan]

hey gonzo... i'm a character animator myself

I'm curious how you're going about rigging the valk. I'm an xsi user these days so i have a great nonlinear editor in front of me for 3d animation... Instead of trying to rig some insane skeletal setup to drive all the legs etc... i was thinking of just having 3 seperate rigs... and 3 seperarte valks all under a single node.

With xsi i could set them up perfect for each mode. In jet mode etc, gerwalk, and battroid.. Then set up a nice non linear animation clip where they transform from each mode to the next... And at key moments.. rig/model swap into the propper rig.

i'm still in the modelling process... but as i've begun to get proprotions correct... i was thinking of doing it that way because not only will it transform easier (i hope) i can have slight variations of the body for each mode of transform... so that it doesnt look odd.

The reason behind this is because the legs have so many complex behaviors. Reverse knee in one pose... Also there is a broken joint upper leg where it has a rotation vector in the middle to swivel the leg from left to right... lots of complex things going on in there and i'm not quite sure i could get them all doing everything with a single rig perfectly..

curious what you think as i will soon have to worry about this soon after i model the cockpit.

Here's a pic so far

Pic06

As you can see i'm going toon rendered....

Perhaps i can get away with the model swap easier than a more realistic render.. i dont know.

Edited November 4, 2004 by Jackie_Chan_Fan

[Doktor Gonzo]

Chan Fan,

Looks great! In answer to your question, I, poor crazed soul, did try to go with a single, hideously complicated rig that handles all 3 modes. it's a partial skeleton - essentially joint chains for each limb, without any joints in the body (too much reconfiguration during transformation for that to work, and besides, there really aren't any flexible areas in the torso that would benefit from it). The limb joints have IK solvers driven by scripting to only activate in battroid mode. That way, I can for example have legs with properly bending knees for the battroid that are nevertheless animatable in their reverse-jointed GERWALK configuration. My transformation sequence is driven by a slider control, so that I can just set keys on that to transform and not worry about redoing the whole animation.

This all sounds great and, on the whole, works great. But it was insanely complicated (I mainly did it as a learning exercise) and necessitated a great many compromises in the battroid-mode character rig. And it still wound up not working as an all-in-one solution - I have lately gained occasional access to a motion capture stage and wanted to use my Valkyrie with data from that, but could not make it work with the extant rig - so I wound up building a separate battroid-only motion capture-friendly rig. If I had it to do over again, I would probably do it as you suggest. Tweaking of parts scale in different modes, though, is something I consciously avoided - Aztek, myself, and some of the other guys on these boards had decided at the outset that we wanted to attempt to model "real" Valks, with no "anime magic" involved in their mode changes. Nevertheless, I love what you're doing, and will be interested to see how your swap-out works. My guess, though, would be that the toon shader will make the swap harder, not easier - everything looks so crisp, and there are sharp demarcations between color areas - that'll make any sudden "pops" stand out. Whereas with a realistic render, shadow, blur and fuzziness hide a multitude of sins

[Jackie_Chan_Fan]

hmm good point about the toon shader although i have no idea how it will deal with model swaps. I'm expecting all to be fine.

Another thing is.. i'm not sure if i'll be playing the animation at 30fps... i think i may be using say every other 5 or 8 frames of a 30fps.. to kind of simulate that anime look. I'm not quite sure about it though. But that may also help in the transform situation.

I havent started to even think about how good of a solution it is.... Its just an idea at this point that really needs a good test. I somewhat think this is how Macross Zero's transformations were handled becuase they transformed so fast in macross zero... and with rather poor animation frankly... which suggests whatever they did.. probably wasnt too pretty and speeding up teh transform probably hid all the oddities.

Like i said, i'm not quite sure if it will work as i expect but when i thought about it... i figured a single rig would be near imposible.

The problem with the model swap is going from animation motion.. to transform motion. Going mode to mode is probably not much of a problem.

I am certainly not set on anything.. Its one hell of a task either way i think

[Jackie_Chan_Fan]

also... i'm having one hell of a time getting the proportions right in each mode.

I followed the modell sheet for scale etc... side, top and bottom.. but my nose cone seems too big...

i'm a little confused hehhee

[DatterBoy]

Hey Jackie,

The model sheet is only for fighter mode. Does not work in other modes as well since the sheets are for a fighter only model. HASEGAWA has made kits for all the different modes and non of them can transform.

Generally, the modellers here start with the scans, and then modify proportions to find best fit for all modes.

Here's my fighter in comparison:

Note how my nose is both shorter and wider.

:Dat

Edited November 9, 2004 by DatterBoy

[DatterBoy]

BTW Jackie,

Your toon rendered fighter is excellent! Looks incredible. Kind of wish MAYA had a toon renderer that could do mine that good.

:Dat

[Jackie_Chan_Fan]

Thanks Dat... THAT CLEARS UP A LOT

I just altered the valk a little to fix the scale issues in robot mode... tell me how this looks. It seems that the legs and arms needed to be bigger.

Here it is. Let me know how it looks.

The head is temporary.

Edited November 4, 2004 by Jackie_Chan_Fan

[DatterBoy]

That looks excellent! Proportion wise I would have no complaints. Head size will be an important factor. Did you do any tranformation size morphing?

:Dat

Edited November 4, 2004 by DatterBoy