Dragon Fruit (former SMC 68 wip)

[Finis]

Here is my wip for an SMC 68 entry. TS 7.6 model side.

I'll start with a dragon fruit and if I finish it with some time left then maybe add a cherimoya or other fruit. I hope to show a whole and a cut half version of each fruit.

I pondered whether to extrude the the segments of the body of the fruit or model them separately. Modeling separate segments allows for easier texturing, individual customization, and moving to achieve convincing distribution so that is what I'll do. I'll reshape a sphere to the basic fruit shape and use the bend tool to fit the segments to it.

A reference photo on a plane provided a guide to sweep a segment using dx transparent wire display (model side not workspace) in one view (4 view mode). In the wire below the progression from a rectangle to sweep to point editing to sds is shown. The rectangle has 2 vertices along each long side which create some of the edges. I closed the ends by adding edges in point edit mode and adjusted the shape with point edit tools.

There were exotic fruits in the grocery stores here in years past. Horned fruit, cherimoya, star fruit, pumello.

Time to this point: about an hour.

[bitkar]

good start...

tip: if you work with photo reference, its good to use Rotoscope plugin by chikara kojima ;) great one. works in modeler side. This will enable you to set the realtime render mode per object. Pretty usefull for these things ;)

thanx for participation

[Finis]

Here is a test of tools and methods. I made a fruit like shape, guide oval, from a sphere and curved a segment to fit it with the bend tool. Then I made three radial arrays of those objects and fit them to the guide oval.

Manipulating a radial array:
- You can select an element, member, of the array as if it was in a group.
- Object rotate and scale applied to an element of an array effect all elements of the array. Careful with scale since it can scale equally or create a graduated small to large effect. What does moving an element do?
- Use the array's radius to change its radius without changing the scale of elements.
- Object move and rotate and maybe scale will work on the array as a whole.

The expanded array and middle fruits have a color + bump texture. The fruit on the left has an image texture made from a photo.

Time to this point: 1 hour 20 minutes.

[Finis]

Problem. When I tried to work on the fruit today the radial arrays would no longer respond to rotation of one object within them. That is, rotating one object doesn't open/close the array like an unbrella. It only effects that one object like it was in a normal group. I can just hand place the few objects I need for this project but I wonder what broke the array.

I saved an array to a cob file then loaded it into a new scene. It still wouldn't rotate the other array items. I made a new array in that scene and it worked normally. Saving and reloading the scene didn't fix the broken one or break the new one.

Update: None of the controls on the array panel (radius, number of objects) work on the broken one but they do work on the new one.

Anyone know anything about this?

[Draise]

Question... is this a radial array in the workspace side (a plugin)? or the model side?

I froze a radial array in the workspace once, by accident. I can try look into it if you want!

[Finis]

It is on model side which is essentially TS 6.6. I don't use workspace although the high speed render would be nice for some animations.

Do you know what froze your array? Did you find a way to unfreeze it? Even though it was in workspace the problem or fix might be similar.

[Draise]

I duplicated the array, or duplicated an item within the array, then saved the scene and opened it again and the new array had lost all it's connections, essentially being frozen. Also.. in another occasion, I accidentally told the array plugin to convert it to an ordinary group. I couldn't fix the array again, except make it again..

[Finis]

It does seem to have happened on save/reload or stopping/starting TS. I'll remake it and save as a cob in case of trouble. Those segments/petals and that fruit was a test although it worked well and I would have continued with it. I did not accidentally convert to group. It is still an array but it behaves like a group now.

[bitkar]

when you open tS it loads up the last saved scene... but... its somehow buggy (for me), so i always load the last scene manually. Also its better to make more scenes as you progress and make some unreversable steps. Its very usefull.

[Finis]

I usually do keep a backup scene. I redid it and it works ok so far. The redo time will be added the the total of course.