[BFG] Weapon Packs

[Islacrusez]

Hope you can read the numbers; it would seem this forum likes to scale inline images, and hasn't got a way of overriding it. Personally I prefer the approach of some boards where the image is autoscaled to fit, but has a bar that says it's been scaled and can be clicked to toggle between original size and scale to fit. Image links are provided if you can't make the numbers out.


Anyways. Here are the barrel dimensions.

Battleship turret. The single-barrel version is exactly the same as the twin, so just did it once. The diameter of the barrel can still increase slightly as it isn't touching the edges (but sketchup glitches up if I make it touch)... The length is measured from the closest point to the end where it can still be braced against the turret. I'd like to avoid joining the barrels together if I can.

http://i41.tinypic.com/66dklu.jpg


Cruiser-grade turrets:

http://i42.tinypic.com/xbldnp.jpg

http://i41.tinypic.com/15gf12g.jpg

http://i41.tinypic.com/2h7e42e.jpg

As you can see, the quads are the most troublesome, with the longest and thinnest barrels. They'll be getting edits at any rate, and most likely will require the barrels to be joined. I might scrap them and start again, depending on how I fare with the edits.

Do you think the battleship and other cruiser turrets will be fine as they are?
Also my main reason for wishing to have the barrels separately, it allows a little customisation, such as posing turrets in elevated positions, or the option to create either a single gun or a twin gun as the turret body is the same.

[Islacrusez]

In the meantime:


http://i43.tinypic.com/r6z492.jpg

[Islacrusez]

Someone requested an eldar turret, and so I've attempted to beat sketchup into submission. So far, I think sketchup is winning.

Still have a lot of cleaning up to do with all the curves. Sketchup hates them and at this scale it likes to combine points which completely breaks everything pretty much every time it does it... If I do any more eldar turrets it'll likely be using this same design. Barrels are still to be energy weaponified.





If there's something very wrong with the shape, speak up before I polish it, because it'll take days.

[Malika]

Hmm, in what scale do you work at? I kinda noticed it works best if you work at 10 or perhaps even 100 times bigger than the actual model, and then try to shrink it when you're done.

[Islacrusez]

I've found this too, but in really complex shapes the points will break after the shrinking anyway. It also causes some problems when working as to how big things really are, as converting back and forth on the fly isn't actually that easy when you're working with 0.1mm, 10mm, and everything in between.

Anyways, that'll save some of the point mergers, but it still doesn't help with the nightmarish experience of complex curves in a program that's designed for lots of straight lines.

[Malika]

It becomes a total madness yeah. SketchUp isn't the best program for that sort of thing. But don't worry about holes of 0.000whatever. If you enclose the holes using netfabb for example that stuff tends to get fixed. But it might also lead to disfiguration of the model, I've had that with my fighter craft (which is why they're no longer available on Shapeways).

Which reminds me: maybe I should start using Blender...

[mangozac]

[Islacrusez]

Hey folks, sorry, no shiny new models to show off.


Does anyone have any experience with the SparkMaker 3D printer? I've made the decision to back their Kickstarter for their slightly upgraded version, and I was wondering if I've made a terrible mistake that I should rectify (by running for the hills) before the campaign ends.