Tutorials in the area of organic/free form style modelling?

[blacktip]

Hello. I've been dabbling on and off with F360 for the past year or so, and think I got the hang of the basics when it comes to a more "mechanical" type of modelling. But, when trying to understand how to deal with more rounded shapes, sweeps and what not I'm lost. Also, since F360 has a quite high pace of updating the application, it makes it confusing to try to follow a 2-3 year old YT-clip. What I'd like to have – if such thing exist – is a step-by-step tutorial on how to create something that contain both basic shapes but also more organic, free-flowing … eh, stuff. For example: I have a couple of scanned blueprints of a helicopter that I'd love to model up, but when I try to create the curved glass on the cockpit, or the main hull I'm stuck. Same if I start modelling a boat (I actually saw this tutorial of a guy making a boat, but the tutorial itself wasn't super-clear at times).

Perhaps there isn't any full blown tutorials of the above, but any (recent) tips or help with a recommended workflow would be awesome. 🙂

thanks,

Markus

[PhilProcarioJr]

@blacktip

Are you using the sculpt environment to try an model this stuff?

If you share some of your blueprints I can throw some quick stuff together for you.

I have not seen any good tutorials on T-Splines as 90% of them teach bad habits or incorrect information.

[blacktip]

Hi, and thanks for your reply. Yes, I guess I am speaking about the sculpting environment. Some 5-6 years back I was trying to learn Cinema 4D and actually did make some sort of attempt of that helicopter I mentioned in my previous post. I do understand that F360 doesn't work the same way C4D does in its poly-modelling-way, but it seems like it's a lot easier to grasp how to combine rounded objects with more mechanical/machined objects. On the other hand, I do love the airtight/solid model-way F360 has.

But yeah, some sort of "get started the correct way-tutorial" would be awesome. I'm attaching a snippet of the helicopter blueprint I was using (as well as a pic of what I previously modelled in C4D). The helicopter is an old Swedish Army chopper (HKP4), originally named "Boeing Vertol helicopter".

Btw, I only use F360 as a way of learning 3D and make visuals of things. Nothing will ever reach some sort of CAM-state, so as long as it looks good I'm happy 🙂

[TrippyLighting]

I you still have retained any of your C4D modeling skills then that carries over into Fusion 360.

In fact, you can export your quad meshes from C4D into .obj, import them into Fusion 360 and convert them into T-Splines.

If you' ve learned proper Sub-D modeling techniques, then the only thing you'll have to learn is the equivalent tools in Fusion 360. However, C4D is a very mature Sub-D modeling software and has many more modeling tools than Fusion 360. But with the .obj export/import you can enjoy he best of both worlds .... as long as you stick to quads.

[blacktip]

When I was fiddling around with C4D back in the days I was using my previous employer's licence, and can't use that any longer. I do have C4D Lite (part of the Adobe CS-suite), but unfortunately C4D Lite can't export any models … And apart from that I really would like to be using one modelling software.

I just now stumbled on a tutorial explaining t-splines. Looks promising. Hope that the guy teach the "proper way" though 🙂  -> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NjWUf5xxuVg

[TrippyLighting]

Nope!

@PhilProcarioJr and I had a  bashing of  conversation about that vid just recently.

Any T-Spine or polygon modeling tutorial that does not model at least a good part in box view mode is not worth it's salt. Period. I've seen to many AD tutorials that don't get this basic technique right and that is quite disturbing.

[blacktip]

Hah, I see. Guess I should be happy to hear that there's other/better ways of dealing with this type of modelling. Question is: where do I find such learning material? Care to make one? 🙂

[tommVS2MB]

It seems that this should be good: http://au.autodesk.com/au-online/classes-on-demand/class-catalog/classes/year-2017/alias-speedform/t...

Autodesk University, qualified presenters.

Please post what you think.

Tom Meyers

[TrippyLighting]

---

@tommVS2MB wrote:

Autodesk University, qualified presenters.

---

Well ... for what it's worth, I am not sure that means much. I've taught a Fusion 360 class at Autodesk university 😉

Anyway, I think for a lot of people that watch this it won't be very helpful unless you have had prior experience with polygon modeling.

There are some good key takeaways from this course, however. I mentioned earlier that no T-Spline tutorial that does NOT use any box mode modeling is worth it's salt. He models all of it in box view mode!

I really like the spline snap method! 

He knows what he's doing but has a hard time explaining it and his difficulties with the English language are only partly responsible for that. I think the main reason is that T-Spline (and Sub-D) modeling is really a craft that has to be practiced and experienced to develop a certain intuition for what works and wha t not. That is hard to explain!

[PhilProcarioJr]

@blacktip

I will put some stuff together for you but it might take me a few days as I have a pretty full schedule for the next 2 days.

[blacktip]

---

@TrippyLighting wrote:

---

He knows what he's doing but has a hard time explaining it and his difficulties with the English language are only partly responsible for that. I think the main reason is that T-Spline (and Sub-D) modeling is really a craft that has to be practiced and experienced to develop a certain intuition for what works and wha t not. That is hard to explain!

---

Wow, nice results! But yes, the presenters engrish was/is quite hard to follow (and it itched in my skin to see him re-opening that movie inside PPT over and over) 🙂 

Thanks for this course though. I'll watch it in full when I have more time and see if I can repeat what he did.

[blacktip]

---

@PhilProcarioJr wrote:

@blacktip

I will put some stuff together for you but it might take me a few days as I have a pretty full schedule for the next 2 days.

---

Hey, no rush! I only have 3D-modelling as a part time hobby so I really don't expect other people to fulfil my personal needs. But of course, I'm very happy for all of you guys giving a helping hand.

[blacktip]

Just a short status report from me: given some ideas (bad or not) from the two videos posted earlier, I started to chop (pun intended) away with the tools in order to try to model up that helicopter. I probably have made hundreds of bad decisions model wise, but it looks like it's coming along. I still don't really understand how curved bodies relates to solids and how I should think about them in terms of "ok, now is a good time to make them into solids", but perhaps it's just a matter of seeing them as either "flat polygons/sheets" (the orange tube icons) or "solids" (the regular white icons).

Oh well, I'll see what I come up with in a while 🙂

[blacktip]

I also do realise that I really shouldn't learn 3D by jumping in on modelling stuff that takes too long to get right. I know how much trouble I had in my first 3D-project (a tank), but eventually it became sort-of-finished. The tank can be viewed further down of this page: https://markusnorsted.se/illustration

On the other hand, it's much more fun to just dive in and see where you end up.