the SLUF - A-7D Corsair II in Cinema 4D

#1

This is my WIP for a flight model for Flight Simulator FS9/FSX. But I intend to use it in some serious aviation art as well. I’m no Anders Lejczak, but he’s inspired me so much, that I just had to try my hand at modeling aircraft in Cinema 4D. I use Cinema 4D 10 Studio Bundle. This model will have to be converted to 3DS Max and then imported into MSFS.

Essentially this is my very first, complex, model in C4D from scratch. I’ve done a lot of modeling here and there, but nothing on this level. With work and family life, I don’t get to spend all of my days on this, so I just try to work on this as much as I can. Consequently, progress isn’t as fast as Anders. Thanks Anders, (aka bazze), for you’re work in Cinema 4D and for posting a tutorial on how to do this stuff.

comments or critiques welcome

~DJ


The fuselage roughed out. Very rough at this stage. The A-7 has a very particular design in the nose and inlet, so it has to look right. At this point I’m not satisfied at all, and I’m going right off of blueprints, which I later find out, are not 100% precise.

The basic canopy. I had to totally scratch this one and remodel a new one, because I wasn’t satisfied. I guess I’m being too picky.

Working on the tailpipe area.

Since I’m doing this project in conjunction with a simmer who has his own A-7D cockpit for real, he get’s to critique my work too. He also provides me with rare photos of his A-7 pit. We collaborated and are thinking of a group name for ourselves. This plane will be offered as a free-ware plane for Flight Simulator, since this is really my first time. It’s a learning project for me.

Working on the fan blade section. This thing is barely visible from the inlet, but it will look sweet when you can see it.

Working on the radar.

Working on the nose wheels. Keep in mind that I’m creating this for a simulator so I can’t have things totally smooth as it’s too many poly’s. I probably can’t use these wheels in the game as they are 22K poly’s by themselves. So you’ll see some faceting here and there, but if you’re a gamer or simmer, you’ll understand. :slight_smile:

#2

Okay, moving onward…

The fan installed. There could have been more detail, but since I’m trying to poly budget, I decided to leave, as is.

Working on some cockpit detail. the texture for the instrument panel is only temporary as I’ll be building individual instruments for a virtual cockpit. I’ve also worked on the wings, tail and parts of the nose gear wheel well. I’m moving fore to aft. Sometimes when I get bored of one part, I’ll jump to another spot.

The ring or rim seal around the cockpit. I just have it in red so that’s it’s easy to see and work with. I’m not adding any real textures until the model is done.

Starting work on the HUD.

Starting to lay out switches and dials. The HUD is just in it’s basic stage. I really can’t go ballistic on it as I want because I gotta keep the poly’s to a descent level.

More work on the HUD and the Magnetic compass. The logo of the “Gecko” is the nickname of the guy that has the A-7D pit, so I did a decal for his pit.

HUD detail from the back

HUD detail on the front (minus textures)
I had to search high and low for detailed pics of this cockpit, the A-7 is a rare bird, only being flown by Greece nowadays. Hopefully I’m kind of “restoring” it, so to say.

more HUD deail.

and another angle.

#3

Very nice progress so far. The HUD is looking good.
But all the colorful icons you´ve pasted into your WIP-images are a bit disturbing (my personal opinion). They move the focus on them instead on the content.

Coming back for more :slight_smile:

Cheers
André

#4

Good progress indeed. The gunsight is great and I love the subject. Be sure to post it on http://www.military-meshes.com/ - you’ll probably get more feedback there :slight_smile:

#5

It looks like it’s coming along real nice. Btw, if you’re going to freeware release it for sims, you and your friend might also want to drop by FlightGear.org. I think they could use some more contributors.

#6

Cool, I’ll check that out!

#7

Oh great, that’s a wonderful site, thanks!

~DJ

#8

Very good work as for low poly modelling

#9

Good work, and nice subject. never seen that one done before in 3d…

#10

Thanks! Actually, funny thing is, that for MS Flight Simulator, this is a high poly model! Low Poly would be about in the 10-15K range. This one is planned for 80-100K range for FSX and beyond.

Here’s some recent shots of the ESCAPAC ejection seat WIP.

Enjoy!

~DJ

#11

and more of that seat continued…

#12

Thanks Galgot! Boy I love your work!

A friend and I chose this plane because for that very reason, we haven’t seen a good hi-def. model of it. He actually own a real A-7D pit, so he gives me a lot of good reference pictures and tips.

I’ll have to conquer a pilot for this plane next, got any tips and techniques? hehe.

~DJ

#13

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