X:FC Magneto helmet, 3D modelling advice needed.

jaybible

jaybible

Well-Known Member
Hi all, I am just about to make a start on a solid model drawing of the Magneto helmet i sculpted in order to create a pep file. The problem is i am not sure how exactly to go about it.

I was originally going to try make it Solidworks as i am most familiar with that, but im not sure about how to go about it. I know there are 101 ways to do it, so i'd like suggestions on the most time efficient way of going about it. Is it possible to do organic part manipulation in SW?(to shape to a background image)

I also have 3dsMax but i know very little about it and whether is would be easier/harder to create the helmet using this.

Any advice would be very much appreciated as i'd like to get stuck into the project while a have some free time.


Hopefully I can achieve this:
DSC01525.jpg


DSC01522.jpg
 
Here's what I woud do:

1. Draw a half circle and revolve boss 180 degrees along the straight line as an axis for the dome.

2. Draw a circle on the bottom of your new dome.

3. Draw the ellipse or whatever shape the bottom of the helmet would be if it went all the way to the bottom, not with the angled slope from high back to low front.

4. Lofted boss from the circle on the dome to the shape you used for the bottom. You might have to add some control curves to get it exactly how you want.

5. In the side view, draw a shape and extruded cut it at the angle of the helmet I talked about in step 3.

6. Draw the face cutout shape and extruded cut it into the solid you've already created. It doesn't matter how deep.

You should now have an approximation of your helmet, without the raised edge accents.

7. Select the outer surfaces only, and then (either export or save as, can't remember) an .STL with a reasonable resolution so you don't have a billion tiny pieces in your pep. It should only export your helmet portions, not the weird inner shapes caused by Step 6.

And there you go, should have a reasonably simple PEP file, but you'll have to add the accents afterwords, which IMHO would be a pain to pep.

Good Luck!

EDIT: Forgot Step 5.
 
It's probably doable in solidworks. To answer your question though, solidworks isn't really meant for that "organic" manipulation. It's a parametric modeler so everything is based on numbers, so you need to know the exact dimensions you want for every radius, etc... 3ds max is much better for manipulating, but the learning curve it probably 10 times higher.

I would suggest starting in solidworks and see if you get something you like, otherwise try moving to max.

Do you have the actual helmet and you just want to have a 3d model of it? If that's the case, google project photofly. It's an Autodesk labs beta project that lets you take a bunch of pictures of an object and it converts it into a 3d mesh. It's pretty good at what it does and you can save the model so you can open it in Max if you need
 
Re: X:FC Magneto helmet, 3D modelling advice neede

You could also use Blender or Sketchup, they're free and there are a lot of tutorials about 3D modeling with those.

IMO Blender is the better for those kind of works.
 
Re: X:FC Magneto helmet, 3D modelling advice neede

Thanks for all the info guys, much appreciated!

@ Drew: That sounds like a pretty sound method, i didnt think of doing the front to back slope by just extruding a cut thru, thanks:) I will give that method a go tomorrow After i take it out from the mold... And i will probably shell the helmet to avoid the weird inner shape:)

@Bosh: I was hoping for some manipulation as im dreading trying to learn 3dMax:p Hmmm im going to have a look at that photofly, it could be really cool and a lot easier if Solidworks lets me down.

Sketchup is a nightmare, its pretty good for a free package but it has a lot of limits!.. I never gave blender a go, it might be worth looking in to.
 
Re: X:FC Magneto helmet, 3D modelling advice neede

If you shell it and export the whole thing to an STL and then unfold that in Pepakura you'll have the inside, outside and edges to deal with. If that's what you're going for, great, but If I were doing it I would just use the PEP stuff as a base. Just my $0.02...
 
Well, i guess i can always save a shelled and unshelled version and see what kind of headaches the pep designer throws at me:).. thanks for the advice man
 
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