The Beginners GuideContentsIntroductionThis is intended as a streamline guide to get you started in MilkShape 3D. It should hopefully help you understand some of the concepts that are used when modelling. For this tutorial we will build a simple model of a plane using various techniques. When modelling, it is common to stick to one feature such as extrude and shape the faces using scale and move as the model progresses. We are going to tackle the task by using a combination of face creation using placed vertices and extruding faces. This tutorial is very much 'on rails' but if you feel that at any point you are getting bored or just don't like the way I'm doing things feel free to break off and try it you own way. After all, self-tought skills are often the hardest to forget, just reading instructions doesn't give the same learning. Trial and error is how I learned to model. Mid-SectionTo start off with we will create one half of the model, this is becuase the model will be symetrical. The only way to guarantee symetry is to work with one half, duplicate it then mirror it. When working in this way you also have to remember to weld the vertices in the middle of the model to the adjoining vertices of the other half so that the completed model is shaded properly throughout its vertical equator. For the sake of perfection we wouldn't like to leave it in two halfs anyway. 1. To start off with, create a box. Do this by clicking box on the Model tab of the Toolbox on the right. 2. Create the box in the Front perspective in the top left viewport, this is really just a matter of preference. 3. Drag the box from the top left grid line... 4. to the bottom right grid line to create a box whos extremes lie on a grid line, this again is another preference rather than a must but it ensures the steps mentioned later will give the desired effect. 5. The box will turn red to indicate that it is selected. Select the scale tool from the Model tab, the same panel you selected the Box tool from. In the Scale Options panel that appears below the main part of the Model panel enter 0.2 in the box above the Y axis button. This panel is explained more in the Toolbox: Model section. Then press the Scale button. This box will form the main part of the fuselage of the plane we are creating. 6. I usually prefer working with the left hand side (viewed from behind) of the model when creating symetrical models so we will delete the faces that are facing to the right (when viewing the model from the back). Click the Select button in the model panel then click the Face button in the panel that pops up below this. Make sure the 'Ignore Backfaces' checkbox is checked. 7. Goto the viewport that has Left side view in the Viewport Caption. If none do then just click the drop down perspective list and select the Left view. If the viewport caption is not visible then click the menu item Window->Show Viewport Caption. 8. Select the two faces (triangles) that make up the side of the box. Do this by holding in shift and clicking approximetely in the centre of both faces, their wireframe outline will appear red to indicate they are selected. Press delete, this will remove the faces. One side of the model should now have no faces. The inside of the model is usually black as this is where no light reaches. 9. Now we are going to scale the box and move it so it is on the line of symetry (in this case the YZ plane). Use the select tool with the Face button pressed in, except this time uncheck the 'Ignore Backfaces' checkbox. Drag a selection box over the box in any view to select the whole model. 10. Click the Move button in the Model panel. In the panel that pops up below, enter 10 in the box above the X button then press move. This moves the box over 10 units. You will notice that it does not sit on the line yet, but the next step will make this so. You will come to realise that at this zoom level (in the 2D orthographic viewports) that each grid unit equals a 20 by 20 unit area. Therefore moving the box by 10 units moves it halfway through the grid boxes. 11. Click the Scale button. The Scale panel will pop up below the main Model panel. The last operation left the value in the Y box at 0.2 so to avaid changing the Y axis again enter 1.0. Enter 0.5 into the X box then press 'Scale'. 12. This block represents the mid-section of the plane's fuselage so we will shape it a bit better, after all a blocky mid-section would look kind of boring. So Use the select tool but instead of pressing the Face button in the Select Options panel, press the Vertex button instead, make sure 'Ignore Backfaces' is un-checked. 13. Use the Front viewport perspective and select the top left vertex of the box (a vertex is a dot in the viewport it appears bigger than the lines that construct the model wireframe). Because 'Ignore Backfaces' is turned off the vertex toward the front and the vertex towards the back in the region you selected are both selected. This is what we want. 14. Use the Move tool again and click and hold in the viewport in which the vertices were selected and drag the vertices up a bit. 15. Do the same again with the vertices on the bottom left of the box. 16. The next step is to bring in the vertices to the back right of the shape. In the top view select the vertices at the top right hand corner of the shape. Move these vertices to the left a bit, bringing them closer to the center of the x axis. Here is the result. Front of Airplane17. Now we can start forming the front of the aircraft. Choose the Select Tool and in the Select Otions panel choose Face and make sure 'Ignore Backfaces' if checked. In the Front viewport (remember that if there is no front viewport, use the viewport caption to change one of the others to a front viewport) select the two prodominant faces (the ones facing you). Remember to select these faces hold shift and click approximately in the centre of each face. 18. Now go into the Top perspective. From the Model panel on the Toolbox, choose the Extrude tool. 19. In the Top viewport click and hold in an area just off to the side of the model, drag the cursor down. The faces that you selected will start to move down as you move the cursor down. This is called an extrude operation, new faces are created in the gaps between the selected faces and the faces that they were attatched to. Keep extruding until the faces reach about halfway through another grid square, to stop extruding just let off the mouse button. If you cannot get a good view of the extrude operation as you perform it, Undo (Ctrl+Z) the extrude operation and press Control on the keyboard and Left Click and drag in the viewport. This pans the camera around. Notice, in the following image, the extrusion to the front of the shape we had before.
20. This new extrusion is the first part of the front of the plane. We will shape it a bit now. In the Top viewport, select (with Vertix and 'Ignore Backfaces' unchecked) the vertices to the bottom right of the model (the ones on the extrusion that we just made). Use the move tool to shift these a bit to the right to create a shallower gradient than that of the line above it, i.e. creating an acute angle instead of the obtuse angle it was after extrusion. 21. Now deselect the moved vertices (just click in the viewport with the select tool). Go into the Left viewport. The extrusion should be to the right of the viewport now. Use the select tool again (with Vertex and 'Ignore Backfaces' unchecked) and select the two vertices to the top right of the extrusion. Move these up a bit. 22. Deselect the vertices. Go back to the Front view and again select (Faces with 'Ignore Backfaces' checked) the front two most prodiminant faces (the two facing you in the front view). Remember to select these faces hold shift and click approximately in the centre of each face. 23. Go to the Top view. Extrude the faces as we did in the last extrude operation; downwards, about one and a half grid squares in distance this time. 24. Use the select tool (Vertex and 'Ignore Backfaces' unchecked) to select the vertices in the bottom right corner of the extrusion that was just created, this will select both the vertex you can see and the one underneath it. 25. Use the Move tool to shift the selected vertice to the left, bringing them closer to the centre point on the x axis. 26. To add a bit more shape, I used the front view to select the top left vertex on the extrusion that was just created, I moved this down a bit because this is very near the tip and will give it an aerodynamic look. I also moved the vertex to the top right of the new extrusion down a bit in the front view. I used the Select tool with Vertex and 'Ignore Backfaces' checked. In the top view I also selected the bottom left vertex of the previous extrusion, then used the left view to drag it up a bit. Finally I selected the two top vertices at the opposite end of the model (in the top view using 'Ignore Backfaces' with the select tool) and moved them down a bit using the left view.
26. For the tip of the plane, select the front two faces of the model in the front view with the select tool (Face, 'Ignore Backfaces' checked), then once again extrude them. Extrude them about half a grid box in distance. 27. To create the tip is easy, if you have not done so already deselect the faces. Now use the select tool (Vertex, 'Ignore Backfaces' unchecked) and select in the top view (or appropriate) the vertices of the new extrusion. Now goto the menu and click Vertex->Snap Together (or Ctrl+N) don't deselect the vertices just yet... After snapping you must remember to weld (it may not always be neccessary to weld but this depends on your needs), so goto the menu and click Vertex->Weld Together or (Ctrl+W). You now have one vertex where four previously existed. 28. Don't deselect the vertex just yet, Move it to the x axis centre line to the left. To keep with the laws of airodynamics (roughly) I have also moved the bottom right vertex of the previous extrusion a bit more to the left, towards the centre of the x axis. Tail of Airplane29. Now we will start to work on the tail of the airplane. Change your front view to a back view if a back view is not already available, if you do not know how to do this see the Viewport Caption section or right click in the viewport and from the popup menu choose Projection->Back. 30. Now for the aid of making future modelling easier, to temporarily hide sections that we are not working on we will create a new group and hide it. Click on your Groups tab on the Toolbox. In the list box immediately below the Group name on the tab you should see one group called 'Box01' by default. This is because the first thing we created was a box. 31. In the box to the right of the Rename button enter 'MidSection' then press the Rename button. 32. Next, in the top view use the select tool (Face, 'Ignore Backfaces' unchecked) to select the faces shown in the next image. 33. Now, with these faces selected, goto the Groups panel again and click the Regroup button. A new group will be created called Regroup01. This group contains the faces that were selected. Enter the name 'Front' in the box next to the Rename box then press the Rename button. Two groups are now shown in the Groups list box, MidSection and Front. Click on the Front group in the list box and click the Hide button. This removes the group from the display so that it is easier for use to model the back of the aircraft. 34. We can now model the back of the aircraft. In the back view that you created in a viewport (step 29) select the two faces facing you (with select tool, Face and 'Ignore Backfaces' checked). 35. In the top view (or the left view whichever you prefer) extrude these faces about three quarters of a grid box distance. Don't deselect yet... create another extrusion in the same manner about the same distance. These extrusion will form the basis of the tail. Now deselect the faces. 36. Now using the select tool (Vertex, 'Ignore Backfaces' unchecked) in the top view select the top three vertices down the right hand side of the model and the Move them to the left a bit. 37. If you have not got a Right side view visible change your Left view to a Right view. Choose the select tool again (Face, 'Ignore Backfaces' checked). Now select the two faces on the side of the last extrusion, these are facing directly toward you in the right side view. Remember to use the shifl key when selecting multiple faces, and to click approximately in the middle of each face you mean to select. 38. In the Top viewport, use the extrude tool on the Model tab of the Toolbox to extrude these faces about three quarters of a grid box in distance to the right. 39. Deselect the faces. This will form the back wing of the plane. Still in the top view use the select tool (Vertex, 'Ignore Backfaces' unchecked) to select the top right vertex of the new extrusion. Move them back a touch to create an airodynamic look, much as they would look like on a commercial airliner. Do the same with the lower right vertex of the same extrusion. Move it back a bit and in to the left a bit. 40. In the Right viewport, use the select tool (Vertex, 'Ignore Backfaces checked) to select the four vertices of the new extrusion, the ones that you just moved in the previous step. Don't drag a region over them because you will end up selecting other vertices as well. Instead drag a box around the first two, to the front then hold shift and drag a box over the next two, to the back. 41. Use the scale tool on the Model tab of the Toolbox, then click in the Right viewport and hold, drag the mouse down to make the top and bottom vertices come closer together. When you are satisfied with the height between the vertices. This is called an arbitary scale operation. If you wish you can move the vertices up a bit before deselecting them. 42. Now we will create the back fin of the aircraft. In the top view select (I'll leave you to figure out the select configuration combination for this one) the two faces at the top of the model on the new extrusion that was created, these are the two faces to the left of the tail wing we just created. 43. Use the extrude tool in the back or right viewport to extrude the faces up a bit. 44. Using the scale tool, perform an arbitary scale operation (mouse click-hold and drag), in the top view port to decrease the width of the extruded faces (they should be the selected ones). Decrease the height of the section a bit as well. 45. Next, move the two selected, extruded faces to line up with the back of the model. Then move them to the right a bit to be closer to the back fin. 46. From the back view, with the same faces still selected, use the Rotate tool in the Model tab of the Toolbox to rotate the faces. Do this by clicking and hold in the back viewport to the right of the faces then drag the mouse cursor down. The way the faces rotate in reaction to the direction you drag in depends on where you originally clicked to begin the operation. The markings shown in the image are just a guide. This operation is called an arbitary rotate operation, that is controlled by the mouse and not actual values (as would be entered in the Rotate Options panel that appears upon selection of the tool see the Toolbox: Model section for more details). 47. From the back view Move the faces down and to the left a bit. Then extrude them upwards, creating the back fin. Feel free to shape this as you desire, using any tools you deem neccessary. 48. We are now getting close to something resembling an airplane. We will create another group of the back section so that if we require it, we can hide it. Select the faces shown in the image below, using the select tool. Goto the Groups tab and click Regroup, rename the group 'Tail' (do this by entering the name in the box first then clicking the Rename button). The Wing49. The wing will be realtively simple, or at least, it should be by now. Unhide the Front group in the Group panel of the Toolbox, do this by clicking on the name of the group in the list box then click the Hide button. The Hide button acts like a toggle, turning the display of the group on and off depending on its current display setting (visible/not visible). 50. Goto the Right side view of the craft. Select the vertex indicated in the image below and move it to be in a straight line with the remainder of that section. 51. Now, still in the right view, select the four faces that are immediately to the right of this vertex that you just moved. (I'm assuming now that you know what Select Options to choose). 52. In the top view Extrude these faces to the right, about one and a half grid boxes distance. 53. Still in the top view use the select tool to select the vertices at the back of the wing (to the top in the image above). Move these vertices back a bit more to create a streamlined effect, move them to the right a bit more as well as this will be the part of the wing that protrudes the furthest from the fuselage. 54. I finished up the wing by moving the other two sets of vertices to the front of the wing (the vertices to the bottom of the wing in the image above) into a position that would give a better look of aerodynamics. I also selected all of the wing vertices (six in total) and scaled them in the right view in height for a structure that would cut the air better (if it were a real plane). Here is the final top and right views of the wing. Tidying Up & Finishing Off55. If you were paying particularly close attention during the modelling process you would have realised that there were new faces created as we went along on the side visible from the Left side viewport. Change your right viewport back to a Left viewport, there are nine faces in total to be deleted, so use the select tool and select the faces shown in the image below. 56. Just press delete to be rid of these unwanted faces. Keeping them won't make any physical difference to the overall structure of the plane but they add to the poly count and aren't seen so we should remove them. 57. When we extruded the wings we selected four faces in total. When we did the extrude operation an extra four faces were created in the wing shown in the image immediately below. To get rid of these faces is quite a complex operation so I will elaborate.
58. Because of the extrusion of the wing and the faces we deleted the shading of the model will now be wrong (look strange) when we come to finally give it a shading group (more about this later). So we have to weld the vertices that were left behind. For every vertex between groups and on the wing, select it then press Ctrl+W to weld the vertices. Why is this you ask? Because in certain places in the model two vertices exist where it might seem like there is only one, don't get paranoid, this happens as a result of the modelling process we used in this tutorial. To sort it, for every vertex selected in the image below, select them individually (one at a time - I have only selected all the vertices in this image to show you which ones need welded) and press Ctrl+W or click menu command Vertex->Weld Together. As you do this and before you start, goto Tools->Show Model Statistics and check the number beside the vertices entry (at the top). You should see the number decrease as you progress. I managed to get the number from 53 to 43. 59. Now that the model is clean, here comes the last bit. Use the select tool to select all of the faces in the model, this is done to select the whole model (all groups), you could also use the groups panel to individually select each group or use the select tool with the 'Groups' option. 60. With the model selected goto Edit->Duplicate Selection (Ctrl+D). Then goto Vertex->Mirror Left <--> Right. You will now see in the 3D view a complete aeroplane, but we are not finished yet. Deselect the duplicate. 61. The vertices down the middle of the model are not welded together, becuase it's a duplicate of the original. The effect this would have in the final shading is that a split would be obvious down the centre of the model. This split cannot be seen in Flat Shaded so switch to Smooth Shaded briefly to see the effect (right click in the 3D viewport and select Smooth Shaded from the popup menu). 62. We must therefore weld all the vertices down the centre of the model. The image below shown all the vertices that must be individually welded. As said before the image only shows all the vertices that must be welded... individually. So start at the front of the model in the top view with 'Ignore Backfaces' checked when using the select tool so that you don't select any of the underlying vertices (remember that there are vertices on the underside as well), then weld them as before. Then switch to the bottom view and do the same again. The vertex at the front of the plane only has to be done once as it is a point. Use the back or front view to make sure you are selecting only a vertex from the top OR the bottom side, NOT both. Switch to Smooth Shaded while you are doing this to see the effect it is having on the shading of the centre part of the plane. 63. Lastly, we will assign a smoothing group to the model. So use the select tool to select all of the model. Goto the groups tab of the Toolbox and in the Smoothing Groups panel to the bottom of the Groups tab click assign if it's not already pressed down (if should be paler if pressed down) then press 1. This should clean up the last bits of shading on the model. As you assign Smoothing Groups you may want to assign different groups or faces to different Smoothing Group numbers. Think of the 32 numbers there as 'slots' for you to store your Smoothing Groups in. To read more on Smoothing Groups goto the Toolbox: Group section. SummaryThis tutorial may have been hard for you to understand as it was for me when I first started with MilkShape 3D, although when I first started I had a decent grounding in programming computer graphics so it wasn't as hard for me to pick up, fortunately. With perseverance, however nothing in this tutorial should pose a challenge (other than my English, perhaps). If you are computer litterate and are determined chances are this will have been a breeze. I hope you like the model even if it is a little basic, with time, experience and skill you should be able to knock something like this up in minutes. *Sob*, goodbye!
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