WIP: F-14 B/D
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@molnibalage Are you serious ? I agree for Block 15, but honestly, block 1 didn’t stayed for more than 2 years… They were all brought up quickly to block 5 or 10… For me, the F-16A that we should have would be block 15.
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@Radium said in WIP: F-14 B/D:
@molnibalage Are you serious ? I agree for Block 15, but honestly, block 1 didn’t stayed for more than 2 years… They were all brought up quickly to block 5 or 10… For me, the F-16A that we should have would be block 15.
From cockpit point of view they are ~ 100% similar as Block 1. Anytime I say “Block 1” just extend to any A variant with the same cockpit.
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@molnibalage said in WIP: F-14 B/D:
@meteor said in WIP: F-14 B/D:
In my opinion, F-14 is the orphan child of BMS.
Nope, that would be F-16A Block 1.
F-14 is just a nice to have extra, it would be only a visual upgrade, but modeling the plane itself would mean creating a new code for the F-14 because of its very complex radar system.Make all potential bogies in the sim within 130mls turn and run once AWG9 is fired up, there I modeled the radar in a realistic fashion for ya. Make it 150mls for Persian Cats.
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I’ve combined and loaded the current version into Blender 3.6 LTS. As for the model, the only changes I will make are the position lights as they currently only consist of an emmissive surface. I have some ideas to create a refracting effect with light housing, lense and glass using transparent objects and normals layers with pretty cool results even when the engine is unable to create self reflections. Apart from that it’s only clean up and some welding.
The big thing is translating all anims into DOFs that the editor can work with. We’re talking about 57 DOFs in total including AB and including a deflatable airbag around the wing glove area which I am excited about. It is not accounting for some left/right duplications so this will take some time but I do already have start and end points/limits set so it’s just a bunch of manual labor.
I assume the flight model will call on multiple anims at the same time and enforce limits for example pivoting the wing back will affect the auxiliary flap, the cove door, the airbag and the slat at the same time so I will not parent any animation but instead have every single part ready to be called by the flight model. If my assumption is incorrect please let me know.
As for textures I did see Radium’s plan to include dynamic textures through the use of alpha channels which I was planning to do here too. I am not currently planning to have this go beyond image textures to allow users to change model layouts as I don’t see it as necessary.
Once the anims are done and I can move to the editor I will update here. Then textures can also come in.
PS: Yes, this entire model is less than 80K tris including two modeled jet engines
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@Seifer said in WIP: F-14 B/D:
@buraktunahan said in WIP: F-14 B/D:
I used to dream of seeing the F-14 and F-15 at the BMS one day. My F-15 dream has come true. I still have hope for the F-14.
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F15 opened the door. For next aircraft we will need:
- references.
- a modeller (for cockpit)
- a passionate coder.
I’m a big fan of the tomcat, but honestly I’m terrible at coding avionics. But… who knows?
Konichiwa! I can provide references and possibly a cockpit (at least for the D) but am for sure even more terrible at avionics coding but there should be someone who can do that who’s a fan as well.
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@mykinge Hello,as publicly available info - no news on your cockpit. I know BMS team have the files, maybe you should ask someone from the dev team.
Your work was really good and it will be a shame to go to waste. Maybe you can try to finish it some day…Cheers,
Airbuster
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@Airbuster said in WIP: F-14 B/D:
@mykinge Hello,as publicly available info - no news on your cockpit. I know BMS team have the files, maybe you should ask someone from the dev team.
Your work was really good and it will be a shame to go to waste. Maybe you can try to finish it some day…Cheers,
Airbuster
I’m not sure if anything changed on the modeling or avionics side but we’ve had this discussion a few yrs ago. As far as I recall the pit turned out to be very difficult to implement due to a lack of functionality and moving development on from the unfinished state it’s in (by someone who didn’t build it none the less) seemed more work than doing it all over again for a fighter that (at the time) could not ever be fully functional anyway.
It is a thing of beauty no doubt but having worked on various ports and model mashups in the past I do understand the challenge especially with sth as complex as a pit.
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Question to the model gurus, can I export animations along a path? For slats, flaps, intake ramps and some other bits a rotation DOF won’t do. If it is not possible or an alternative has to be used I don’t have to create the path animation hence my question.
Also I remember Pumpyhead referencing a scaling (resize) DOF, is that a usable function? Would make things like the nozzles easier to animate.
I did remember that the wings still need anti collision lights and some faces/areas need to be made two sided to avoid transparency on the backside.
I’ll put out a video of the animations of all moving parts running at the correct speed for all possible scenarios. Obviously then the goal is to have a 1to1 transition of those via DOFs into the editor.
Final bit (exterior model wise) then are textures. I still cannot believe that I may be able to export this into an editor to then have the model flyable in Falcon - Who knew, Baby.
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Hey there, sorry I’m not able to help, but on a completely unrelated note, here are some links to reference images for the US Navy aviators during the late 1980s to the 2000s. Just thought you would like it. Anyways good luck, that F-14 is turning out awesome!
https://www.salimbeti.com/aviation/equipment2.htm
https://www.salimbeti.com/aviation/helmets4.htm covers helmets for the 1990s to today
https://www.salimbeti.com/aviation/helmets3.htm 1980s era helmets
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@BuckyTooth90 said in WIP: F-14 B/D:
Hey there, sorry I’m not able to help, but on a completely unrelated note, here are some links to reference images for the US Navy aviators during the late 1980s to the 2000s. Just thought you would like it. Anyways good luck, that F-14 is turning out awesome!
https://www.salimbeti.com/aviation/equipment2.htm
https://www.salimbeti.com/aviation/helmets4.htm covers helmets for the 1990s to today
https://www.salimbeti.com/aviation/helmets3.htm 1980s era helmets
All good, figured out that I can use a combination of rotation, scale and translation DOF.
As for your links, dude! Thank you! That is very helpful, I keep forgetting about the crew as I, as mentioned about 500 posts back, do not like modeling organic stuff like humans .
With these resources you’re forcing my hand now, crew will be coming up.
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Yep no problem! Good luck!
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Not really a model update but I’m just blown away by how far Blender has come. For users of other programs this is probably what they’re looking at on a daily basis since 2010 but for us Blender crazies it is quite something
Animations are going well.
Those 60s blueprints always give me a warm and fuzzy feeling.
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Kneeling and steering is now functional, still playign around with parenting and types of animation to get the NLG to behave as it should with the strut extending, connecting rods rotating accordingly and the whole assembly moving for steering on the ground/deck. This the upper most of the 3 kneeling positions. I’ll add animations for all positions as these can be called upon manually by the pilot as well as automatically by the catapult/launch position on the carrier.
I also need to play around with how the DOFs are triggered, for example the refueling probe extends out of the fuselage after the small front door opens, once it is fully extended the front door closes again so it needs to be a rotation up and back down while the probe extends.
Since I modeled every single moving part of the jet I’ve decided to add the ladder and folding steps.
The outer weapons pylon has been moved out about an inch as the front outer main landing gear door was colliding with the pylon.
The horizontal stabilizers are at the maximum angle of -33 degrees down, the up limit is 10 degrees.
Wings are fully parented and the pivot point has been finalized, here in 20 degree ‘zero sweep’.
Wings at maximum sweep of 68 degrees. The wing has a maximum sweep of 75 degrees, as far as I recall there is a wing fold DOF that can be manually called upon.
Note the continuous line from the starboard intake all the way to the tip of the wing only ‘interrupted’ by the wing root hub. There will be some final alignment but I’m quite happy with it at the moment.
Next up intake ramps and nozzle animation, then onto the landing gear.
I know this is only a tier 2/3 aircraft in Falcon so obviously all of this is needless overkill, then again, it always was, Baby.
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Added anti collision and position lights, position lights on wing tips still missing.
Currently they all light up as emmissive faces, I will do a simplistic light housing with refraction effects on the position lights, nothing fancy but better than a texture.
@Tazz One of the pics you sent me years ago inspired me to do this perspective, sort of a ‘parked on deck’ shot
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When all shiny like that it looks like the infamous F-14Z stealth cat
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@stingray_SIX_TWO said in WIP: F-14 B/D:
I know this is only a tier 2/3 aircraft in Falcon so obviously all of this is needless overkill, then again, it always was, Baby.
Nope
2/3 or not, details of all fighters (Even second line) should be high enough. We are getting to an era where BMS support NP 300K tris models. The F-14 is important enough to get all the details you can.
Cheers!
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@I-Hawk said in WIP: F-14 B/D:
@stingray_SIX_TWO said in WIP: F-14 B/D:
I know this is only a tier 2/3 aircraft in Falcon so obviously all of this is needless overkill, then again, it always was, Baby.
Nope
2/3 or not, details of all fighters (Even second line) should be high enough. We are getting to an era where BMS support NP 300K tris models. The F-14 is important enough to get all the details you can.
Cheers!
Cloth simulation for the wing airbag coming right up
Kidding aside, good to know!
Cheers for the heads up.
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Small demonstration of currently animated and movable surfaces:
Top view:
The slat is currently not animated, the cove door (flat surface on the bottom of the wing that swings up when flaps are deployed beyond 10 degree manouver position to aerodynamically seal the wing) is operated but I need to check my Tomcat picture bible later because I’m not sure if it moves as one piece and when it is deployed. As far as I can see it should only go up when both main and auxiliary flaps are fully deployed.
Also the eyelid door (aerodynamic sealign surface on the front top part of the flap) is not animated, basically I need to clarify same question here, how and when is it moving with the auxiliary flap.
NATOPS provides this:
So far so good.
Still no problem.
Here is the question as this profile view obviously does not distinguish between main and aux flaps.
Once this is clarified I can also move the spoilers down to meet the cove door and seal the area.
On a sidenote, you can see why multiple DOFs will be required to ensure accurate movement of the slat and flaps as they rotate but also shift point of origin (because in RL hydraulic struts push the pivot point out which then leads to a rotation of the surface). No problem to implement, just requires some trial and error.
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@stingray_SIX_TWO Nice work but please keep in mind that BMS uses its own animation system via DOFs - so you will have to redo those properly.
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@richionizor said in WIP: F-14 B/D:
@stingray_SIX_TWO Nice work but please keep in mind that BMS uses its own animation system via DOFs - so you will have to redo those properly.
Thanks, I’m aware. The current setup of rotation nulls allows for seamless translation into BMS DOFs when the time comes.