Dabbling in Fusion 360

Rob, any ideas why they wont combine into a single entity, that's a pain in the proverbial, my get around is definitely a bodge.

 

Now that would be an interesting thing to do Andy but I haven't a clue hoe to set about it.

 

Perhaps a challenge for Mr Pulham, he always seems to find a way certainly beyond my skills.

 

There's a free program called Blender that you can apply textures to 3D models with. Unfortunately, I'm only just scratching the surface with it and using some of its basic features to make casting trees, and I don't really know how go about adding textures. There are lots of tutorial-type videos out there on YouTube though I believe there are various 'ready made' textures, and I even think there is some clever way of manipulating a photograph of a texture, into an actual 3D texture itself that can be applied to models......no idea how though!

 

Paul,

I agree option 1 isn't wants needed, as for option 2 I'm bugging out of that thank you just a chicken at heart.

 

Rob, I'm glad the detail freak doesn't see the need for graining. I decided against it after looking at the videos Paul posted - just a lot beyond my skill levels.

I've been tinkering with my planking method an have come up with a slightly easier method which I think gives more consistent results, I will right up a brief precise and post it later.

 

Rob, after 30 years as a software designer I absolutely agree with your comments, need or desire is totally to get a grip on complex software, I've seen numerous development fail because of a lack of both or either.

 

Agree too. I've learnt the bit of blender I needed for my purposes. For me it's the time it takes (and my lack of available time!) to learn the new bits, which prevents me from getting any further with it than necessary. When you look at some of the things people who make minis for wargaming can do with Blender, or even jewellery makers, it's clearly a very capable bit of kit.

 

While trying to improve my new method of plank cutting, Rob suggested a different way of doing it. It's more difficult to explain than do and after a couple of practices it's quite easy and makes a better job than my method.

The basic diagram, half and end with the end post on the right and a line 2.2mm in from the lefthand side. My planks need to 2.3mm wide with a 1mm x 2mm groove on each side and this method starts with the righthand cut of the left most plank, hence 2.2mm. There is also a line .1mm from the left edge and running horizontally across the end, but that's for later.



First step is to extrude the basic shape, in my case 1.5mm deep



Next a thin extrude (this was a new bit to me). Open the extrude dialog and click on thin extrude and select the line 2.2mm in from the left.
Distance is the depth of the cut, Wall thickness the width of the cut, this defaults to 1mm so is also set to .2mm. This creates a single cut line.



Next Pattern on a path. Again a new to me select features as the object type then select the single cut line as the object and the construction line as the path to follow.
a random distance, start point 0 and the quantity of cuts required in this case 11. I then adjusted the distance until the cuts fitted into the space, you could have calculated this before hand.




The final step was simply to select the .1mm section on the left and extrude it .2mm. This produces the half width cut which is needed for the mirror of the other half, and extrude the end post.




End result after mirroring a nice van end ready for detailing. Give it a go it's much easier than any other method I have used and would work equally well on flooring.

 

Help! I have obviously hit some strange combo of keys and lost my history bar, how can I get it back?