Halo Reach Assault Rifle Project

[Anonymous]

Hey guys, just wanted to post and show a project that I'm working on currently. Been doing mostly smaller objects to learn the basics and decided to try something a little more complicated. It's been a learning experience working thru the in and outs of the program. Still have the entire back portion and adding in various details. Looking forward to completing it and printing it on my printer once it arrives in the next couple of weeks.

[Anonymous]

Looking good. Got a updated version to share with us?

[Anonymous]

I'm actually just finishing it up. Will be posting up tomorrow.

[Anonymous]

So, finally finished the the Halo Assault Rifle. Back end needs a little more work but mostly done. Learned a lot going thru the build and found some glitches here and there while going thru the modeling process. Right now I've been tinkering around with to Thea Render. Looking forward to move on to the next project.

[Anonymous]

are you doing a mirror feature with this?

any tips on how to design this? im looking to design a rifle chassis for a .22 long rifle

[Anonymous]

I did use mirror to duplicate the other side once it was completed and then I merged the frame to make one solid object. I'm not quite sure what method to use for your rifle. Try posting a picture of it up so we can visually see it. If its a conventional .22 frame I would just box it all out and use the fillet command for the desired look. If the frame is more organic and contains many curves I would use a combination of free form with box modeling.

[cekuhnen]

hahaha nice work!

I love the fact that now also game asset designers start to use Fusion instead of Maya Modo 3DMax or such

and they all said NURBS is dead for yeas - ah well

[Anonymous]

Thanks man!

I feel that the whole platform is fairly easy to learn. I like that the whole interface is really streamlined. Unlike other programs where there is clutter on top of clutter where users can get really confused. The program has its up and downs with certain features but there is great potential for growth. Working on the Halo needler as of right now. Has a lot of nice complex shapes but running into issues now because my laptop cant handle subtracting some of the pathways on the main upper body. Have to look at saving some money up to build a desktop.

[cekuhnen]

@Anonymous

Hmmm the PC should not be a limit here to model this. Can you show a screenshot? Maybe you build to complex.

I found Fusion even on old hardware to be pretty fast when doing surface calculations.

I currently also teach furniture design and have a lot of interior design students. They were so mad after I gave them

an introduction into sketching in Fusion 360 that they were not shown how to use constraints in AutoCad and also

cannot build their models in Fusion 360 but have to use SketchUp.

The more I teach Fusion360 the more I feel this was the right decision to switch to it because it is powerful and easy to learn.

[Anonymous]

Yea, I currently use a older mac book pro. So, the attached picture is my reference picture. On the upper portion of the gun there are a lot of small details cut into the curved surface. I project all of those lines to the surface. I made a rectangular shape which I used to follow the path I projected. It literally took over an hour to get it to follow the path when dragging it. If you have any tips on how to make that run faster open to any suggestions.

So, how come your students cant use fusion and can only use Sketchup? I've watched some of your videos. Keep putting out great content. It helps out a lot.

[cekuhnen]

@Anonymous 

Why do you think they cannot use Fusion but SketchUp?

I teach Fusion together with Blender as a combo so the focus is on Fusion for CAD and Blender for Ideation and generative mesh design that is too hard

for traditional CAD apps.

The needler would be a great example for blocking out the design via mesh (Blender or TS directly) and then in Fusion using the CAD tools to slice trim combine etc objects.

[Anonymous]

These are .22LR conversions ive done using gutted airsoft bodies

I'm at the point where i just want to design my own and have a CNC shop cut it out for me

I have a 3D printer Mendel Max 1.5 but im having trouble calibrating it.

[Anonymous]

some work i did in Solidworks but was frustrating with errors i was getting

 

 

[Anonymous]

Looks like your chassis is coming along. Yea in fusion you can sketch that out really quick and extrude all of the members. Wouldn't take to long at all to get to where your at now. Would probably take you between 5-10 minutes to get to that point. I don't have any working knowledge of solidworks, but in Fusion you could smash that out pretty quickly. You should tinker around with it and if you have any questions hit me up. I would be more than happy to help you.

[Anonymous]

Sorry, I misinterpreted what you initially wrote. Yea I saw you use thea render I might have to bounce some questions off you. Used it a little here and there. Blender looks really good as well and pros over using over fusion? 

[cekuhnen]

@Anonymous

One cannot really compare Fusion and Blender this is like apples and oranges.

Fusion 360 is fantastic for CAD work precise parametric but with that comes the down side you need to pre plan your design when you want to use

the parametric workflow well.

Blender on the other side is more a free form sculpting workflow. You cannot use dimensions or sketches as Blender is more like Direct Modeling.

But Blender adds object end mesh edit modes so you can pose an object and then in edit mode manipulate it including local and global translations which is a killer feature.

Adding the modifiers which are like features you have a very fast and productive sculpting tool that allows you to work a bit like in CAD or Fusion.

Blender I mainly use to make concept models, hard edge models, or general organic shapes all CAD apps including Fusion T-Splines is not able to do.

Well thats no surprise since Blender is made for animation T-Splines is not.

But because Fusion allows you to import OBJ mesh and convert it either via TS into smooth BREPS or Mesh2Brep convert flat quad faces into flat nurbs it is a killer combo.

In my class I teach less software centric. I think it is not ideal to try to make Fusion to be able to do everything. So Blender is just a toolbox of sculpting tools.

Fusion is just a toolbox of CAD tools. The clue is how you mix them in your workflow.

And from my experience both apps are fantastic together!

Thea render is also incredible powerful. Quite cheap for what it does and it offers GPU based rendering.

So you can use the Fusion build in while exploring designs and when done use Thea to do the pro grade renderings for print and such.

[Anonymous]

That's awesome, I wish that I had a class like that when I was in school for architecture engineering. I'll have to download blender and play around with it.

Do you happen to have any videos incorporating from conceptual design in blender to importation into fusion 360 for tweaking?

Wouldn't blender be considered t splines to or is that mesh? Really new to all this terminology.

[cekuhnen]

@Anonymous

I guess it really shows how some industries just don't really embrace technology. I am quite sure that all interior designers that teach CAD

only teach AutoCad drafting based on how they learned it which 99% does not include constraints. I try while I am in ID teach interior

and exhibit designed based on what I feel students should learn. If they will be later to use it is a different questions. But I found often

that they brought new knowledge to their future work places.

Blender is like T-Splines but on steroids. If what you need to sculpt can be done in TS then there is no need to leave Fusion and use Blender.

However if TS is just not able to do it then one can and should use Blender.

For example Fusion offers no deformation tools. I helped a client where we build the temples for a new set of glasses in Blender.

We imported from Fusion the reference frame to work with.

I sculpted the temple flat and then bend the design along a path as needed. Afterwards the temple was exported as OBJ back to Fusion

and via TS converted it to BREP.  Worked perfectly.

For more about Fusion and Blender check this you can take a look at my YouTube playlists.

The 2016 playlist just started. Next week we will do a basic rendering and studio design session and then after next week send the design

to Fusion 360 to finish it. Each project will include Blender2Fusion to Fusion2Blender2Fusion simply so the students learn both equally

and don't pick a preference.

Industrial Design: 2016

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLO-CARrxyXozzG7mKj3dGWvobD_S6Z_nW

Old 2015: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLO-CARrxyXox3AK-8rmFTBM9gQlohsRMf

Furniture Design: 2016

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLO-CARrxyXoxF2hujNqnYbPsB3D-6MDYS

Thea Rendering:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLO-CARrxyXoxB7gIdvOPWqv19efr_pl0H

[Anonymous]

This is an awesome model.

I've been using Fusion for a couple of years now for smaller projects and more practical pieces I've needed printed or to design.

I've recently begun modeling a Marines Plasma Rifle from Aliens.  There are lots of inconsistent side projection drawings, and I've done quite a bit with those, but I think that I've been starting doing all the of detail in sketches of the side of the rifle, and then trying to work from there has been my biggest problem.

My end goal is to piece it such that I can run it through one of my 3D printers and assemble the prop.

The design of the prop was around the basic Thomson machine-gun, and I think that one of the drawings I have is a very basic one of those. I might try giving it a more built from the ground up attempt. See if I can finish that and use it as the basis.

There was recently a full youtube series of three videos of modeling an AR-15 although I think it was a fully functioning model. But the techniques would be interesting perhaps.

I'd love to see some simple videos of build ups or even a very quick scroll through the design capture of yours. That would be very cool to see. 🙂

[Anonymous]

@Anonymous could you show a picture of the rifle your trying to work on? Is it this one?