Military AI Works

Sloooow progress on the Reaper for eventual inclusion in MAIW packs. Long ways off yet, please do not ask when.







Still sorting out some texturing issues. The curves of the fuselage are proving a bit difficult to get painted correctly. Also still sorting out some XML animations. I've gotten basic textures on it for now just so I can play with the texture mapping. Might be time to hand it over to the King so he can work his magic on it. Still plan on doing the USCBP version as well for a USCBP package down the line.

Totally love it already.

Mike -
Remember you can split fuselage up (top, bottom and sides), texture each sub part seperately.
Then in poly mode set the texture to custom for each poly.
Rejoin all the parts, snap to scale and the polys retain the texture assign from poly mode.

It was the only way to get the textures right on the T-38's main fuselage.

is this the first MAIW-made UAV? just trying to think but I don't remember any others.

jaguar1 wrote:is this the first MAIW-made UAV? just trying to think but I don't remember any others.

Nope there is the Global Hawk in the Beale AFB package.

Mark

Nice!

I stand corrected Mark. Haven't been to Beale for a long time. It may well be time for a visit!!

Weescotty wrote:Mike -
Remember you can split fuselage up (top, bottom and sides), texture each sub part seperately.
Then in poly mode set the texture to custom for each poly.
Rejoin all the parts, snap to scale and the polys retain the texture assign from poly mode.

It was the only way to get the textures right on the T-38's main fuselage.

That's what I've done essentially. The fuse is split into a top and bottom half. The difficult part has been getting the texture sheet right. I've settled on having the two halves of the fuse, one on top of the other both facing in the same direction so that they are a mirror image of one another. That allows me to use enough extra texture to make sure that nothing gets left out for the curvy bits at the front and back. But the texture sheet looks a bit weird as you can't really see the "shape" of each half of the fuse that way. Using the paintkit it's easy to turn off the "extra" fuse paint layer and see the exact outlines from the wire model. But for someone who wants to come along and just add a new insignia or something simple, it will be difficult to see where each half of the fuse starts and stops.

Kevin are you saying to just texture the sides using the poly mode? A bit of work but I would assume that it might be a better way of doing it?

Not sure I understand your texture sheet layout.

Why not pop a copy of the model and texture onto the share site and I'll take a peek at it.

I'll do that.

A lovely model Mike, great job. Applying textures is always a bitch on rounded surfaces like this model.

Mark

Well Kevin is working some of his magic on the model as we speak. He went to the effort to actually call me in person from across the pond the other night so we could chat real time about how to get the textures to stick properly. Talk about customer service!

One more for you guys showing you what a difference it makes when you get a good set of textures on it. This is the handy work of Weescotty who spent about a week tweaking on it to get it to this stage. Can't thank him enough as I think you can all see the difference from before.

I threw the two figures in there to give a perspective of the actual size of the aircraft.

MIKE JG wrote:One more for you guys showing you what a difference it makes when you get a good set of textures on it. This is the handy work of Weescotty who spent about a week tweaking on it to get it to this stage. Can't thank him enough as I think you can all see the difference from before.

I threw the two figures in there to give a perspective of the actual size of the aircraft.

WOW!!!

Nick

Amazing work Mike!!! Somehow, I more like the Reaper than the Predator

They'll look great at Kandahar! Nice...

Matt's Grey Butte and El Mirage sceneries will look great with these beasties flying around. Does anyone have knowledge of any Creech AFB scenery ?

Didn't know they're that big

Looks amazing!

It's wingspan is 21m so they're a pretty decent size. The MQ-1 is probably half the size of it's bigger brother.

They are starting to look really foreboding...as far as Creach AFB goes, I dunno, maybe...