Building a Spitfire, any advice? - Page 3
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Thread: Building a Spitfire, any advice?

  1. #51
    Last post in what's definitely been quite the productive day on my part - the beginnings of that timeless wing!






    At the moment it extends through to the centreline but it'll be refined to true outline of the skinning in the real deal. Thereafter the wing fillet is the final basic contouring shape needed. Once that's sorted I can get onto the finer details, which I'm both anticipating and dreading.

  2. #52
    Speaking of the fillet, here's its beginnings!

    First the middle contours of the upper fillet were drawn as splines, plus a lovely CrossSection then Surface modifier, then converted to poly. Thereafter it was fettled and fitted to shape.




    Then, the end section section (actually a metal sheet attached to the fuselage itself) was modelled to the contours of the rearmost fillet section, then fitted to shape.



    Next is the lower "gull wing" section, which is in my opinion one of the most important shapes in getting the contours of the Spitfire correct. Stay tuned.

  3. #53
    The upper wing root fillet does look good, I’ll be interested to see how you get on with the lower one.
    Tom
    __________________________________________________ ___________________________________________
    Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom: and with all thy getting get understanding. Proverbs 4:7



  4. #54

  5. #55
    This is where it's at this afternoon - the wings and fillets have been stitched together at the vertex level into one continuous piece to simplify construction, plus some cleaning up has been done on the shape of the underside.




    Here is the completed basic wing shape, overall I'm very happy with how things have turned out so far. Planform, thickness, dihedral and washout have all turned out to my liking.


  6. #56
    Progress continues! I've made an experimental interior by copying the requisite polys, copied them to a new object and applied a shell modifier of 6mm. Obviously I'd want to go thinner but I don't think anything closer than 5mm is acceptable in CFS3. Additionally I've cut the rear-view panel from the fuselage, applied the same shell modifier and given it a glass material.




    Additionally, for some fun, I've built the extended wingtips of the Mk VI! I'm personally a huge fun of this look and the HF variants though I know they're not to everyone's taste. They've also *never* been modelled in a commercial sim, something to think about...



  7. #57
    My late night experiment for today is a rudimentary version of the Mk I-Vb windscreen and armoured glass. These were built freehand without splines or reference so they are undoubtedly inaccurate and will therefore be rebuilt later.



  8. #58
    This afternoon I got straight to work at further detailing the model. First was a new early/PR windscreen drawn to actual references - here is the view of the "cockpit" of this external model:



    Afterwards I got to work on creating the guide rails for the canopy, along with the beginnings of the entry door:



  9. #59
    The overall shape and flow is looking very good, but have you tried exporting to the sim yet?
    Tom
    __________________________________________________ ___________________________________________
    Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom: and with all thy getting get understanding. Proverbs 4:7



  10. #60
    Quote Originally Posted by hairyspin View Post
    The overall shape and flow is looking very good, but have you tried exporting to the sim yet?
    I have! When importing to Gmax from Max 2008 I had to reset the scale of each mesh, plus a few needed their normals flipped for whatever reason? (as can be seen from shading/smoothing in the results, I think some need to be flipped back, OR it's an artefact of the fuselage, tail unit and nose cowling being separate meshes) But nonetheless, it exported to sim perfectly - scale, camera rotation, buttery smooth 120 fps despite the high poly model, though of course that may change when detail is increased and textures are added.






  11. #61
    Excellent, make a habit of it!!
    Tom
    __________________________________________________ ___________________________________________
    Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom: and with all thy getting get understanding. Proverbs 4:7



  12. #62
    Hello! Having taken a break, learned some new skills in MAX, and found flaws in the basic dimensions of the model, I've elected to do the maths and very rigorously plan out the dimensions in a jig - accurate to the millimetre. This should allow better cross referencing of dimensions. Additionally, I've figured out a way of scaling plans/drawings based on the size of individual parts and panel lines according to engineering measurements as opposed to the full length/wingspan of the aircraft, as these measurements are commonly and broadly misquoted; the wingspan of Spitfires Mk 1 through Seafire 47 (excl. extended and clipped tips) is 11.25m/36'11", NOT the commonly quoted 11.23m/36'10". Similarly the length of the Spit IX with small rudder is 9.51m, NOT 9.47m. The use of these commonly and erroneously quoted measurements found in books leads to errors which exacerbate themselves dramatically as more of the aircraft is modelled.

    Whether I start from scratch or go through and modify everything I've made so far I'm yet to decide

    Click image for larger version. 

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