CompuServe Messages

>>do you just use the old model a refrence and reloft it? and what do you need the path for if you are not loftting the object The basic steps for the cow went something like this; 1) Make the grid object and array it along the length of the cow; adjust the various grid positions to key areas (scaled the grids to fit various areas, rotated the grids in the neck area to make the grids follow the 'spine' of the cow) and add grids if nessessary. 2) Make enough copies of the cow for the number of grids, and boolean intersection each grid with a cow mesh. This will give you the cross sections to trace in the shaper. Hide/delete any 'whole' cows remaining. 3) Choose a side view of the cut up cow sections and go into the lofter. Make a path based on the positions of the slices and bring that into the lofter. 4) Go to the editor and hide all shapes except for the starting one. Switch to a front view (or create a user view if the slices are not aligned to the front). Go back into to shaper, trace the shape, put it into the correct place on the path in the lofter, and make whatever position adjustments are nessessary. Go back to the editor, hide the first slice, unhide the next, repeat until done. 5) Make sure everything is correctly positioned in the lofter, and loft (the reason I said make sure the mapping is on is because on my first test I had it off, used stucco as a quick cowhide for tests, and was amused to see the cow running through the texture :^). Use Optimize or the freeware viewer Gus did (at least I think it was Gus; apologies if I'm wrong) to quickly check the model. Make changes if nessessary. I did the body and the legs seperately, and both required a little tweaking to get right (the cow had a_very_flat rear end after lofting :^). If any other clarification is needed, feel free to ask. John Stetzer JWS