Making FMS models with Metasequoia (part2)

A few more steps in the creation of a airplane model in Metasequoia.

Ok, you had a half airplane at the end of part 1. If you mirrored the right parts while you were making them, you should see the entire airplane when you hit the Si button.


PT stands for POINTS
LN for LINES
FC for FACES
Si for SIMPLE VIEW
Fr for FRONT ONLY
Img for BACKGROUND IMAGE (not available in demo-version)


The result should now look like this.

Let us now make the hole inside the wing, so the pilot can sit in the cockpit (and not be cut in two by a still active wingpart halfway his body).

We start by making the cockpit part invisible. Use KNIFE to cut a extra line at the same place where the cockpit edge is.

Once you have those extra points, you can delete some points at the center and see some un-needed faces disappear.

The result can be seen below.

The hole is visible when you let disappear one point. How do you do that? Easy (as always). Just click that point and hit DELETE or BACKSPACE. 
You continue to remove points till you have all the un-needed surfaces gone. Go check your size of your cockpit from time to time to avoid deleting too much points.

If you now would make the cockpit visible you would see a nice cockpit internal space.

 

Now we need some landing gear. Again... not so hard to do. Just use PRIMITIVE and click the donut. If you click property, you are able to change the dimensions of that donut.

 

 

Diameter 40 cm and width of tire 10 cm.

The result is this beautiful donut. Just make some kind of wheel for it by placing faces between of set of circle-points. And ... it is ready.

While I was drawing this proposal of a low aspect ratio in Metasequoia, I changed my idea about its design. I made quickly another drawing, but I didn't make a lot of screenshots in the making. Sorry, forgot it in the heat of creating.

But, I can help you to better understand what I did. First, look at the result.


I used a transparent fabric material too let the viewer see the internal structure and the pilot.
Impossible to imitate? No no, easy to do. Takes a bit of time to learn and to repeat.

HOW DID YOU MAKE THOSE RIBS?
I used PRIMITIVE and created a box with some length, but with a cross-section of 2cm by 2cm (about inch by inch). I placed it along the middle rib. You will see that the rib is made out of a few copies of that tube. Each time rotating it once near the edge of the rib and then selecting one side of it and dragging it so the seize does fit.

HOW DID YOU MAKE THAT SPAR?
I used again the tube-like primitive and used two to create the top and bottom cap of the spar. Was not placed at angle at that point. Just made it in frontview. Then I placed the vertical tubes at the places of the ribs.
OK, when you make the rest visible again, you will see it is not at the right place from the topview. I placed it so the spar was at its right place at the wingtip. Then I started to rotate it forwards, keeping the wingtip part on its place. I saw that the spar caps were no longer touching the centerline. OK, lets scale it a bit. I played with scale and rotate till the spar parts touched the centerline at the right place. For the rear part of the main spar (pointing backwards, green) I did the same. Just copied the front parts and rotated and scaled them till they were right. Take a few minutes to learn, but once you get the grip, you don't understand that you couldn't do it the first time.
The result is still not good, when you look at it in 3D. The spars are going through the fabric. Reason: the airfoil is less high in the front. NOT HEALTHY! Don't panic. Just select the top point of the spar (upper points of the verticals and the entire top cap). Rotate them in frontview (while keeping the covering visible) and keep the centerpoints at place. Once the points all disappear under the covering, you can let go. Do the same with the underside of the spar. Euh ... I forgot to tell to do it two times. First make the rear part invisible and fix the front part. Next, make the front part invisible and fix the rear part. Finished ... after some time.

HOW DID YOU DO THE PILOT AND THE SEAT?
Cylinders and rounded boxes! Make a good side view of the pilot on paper with squares. Make that it is based on true dimensions, but make the shapes basic. Select sideview. Make each part as a primitive and place it on its place and rotate it till it is right. Now go to topview. Drag the arms, legs, hands and feet to the right distance. And MIRROR them. Done.
The seat is just made out of four primitives. Just create four boxes with a height of 1 cm. Drag and rotate them till they make the seat. Select the endpoints of the plates to reduce them to the right length. Done.

Now it is up to you. Create a simple airplane on paper and translate it into METASEQUOIA. Enjoy.

part 1 part 3

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