opening up a cylinder.

[starbase1]

As I got such helpful responses last time, I thought I'd ask again.

I want to make a 'space taxi' to go on the side of my Orion, and the style I am after has large sections of a cylinder that fold out. I can think of a couple of ways of doing this, but I have got in a mess before now. (They involve using booleans).

I attach a couple of pictures, one of the overall type of vehicle, and one of a simple cylinder showing the basic idea more clearly. (This will not do as the walls have no thickness and are just double sided polygons)

So what is the elegant way to do this?
Nick

[Nangleator]

Classic approach is to build the main body and all the separate moving parts as different layers in the same model. Carefully position the pivot point of each with the Pivot tool.

Use the Layers panel to set up the heirarchy. Very important.

When importing into Layout, make sure Parent In Place is selected. (I think. If it imports wacky, then try it again the other way.)

[Giacomo99]

So what is the elegant way to do this?
Nick

Well, I always find that a monocle and top hat convey a certain elegance. So if you wear those while working, it will be a start. A dry martini might also help. Ha, ha.

In terms of modeling the doors, I'd start by drawing the cross-section of the door--with thickness--and just extrude it. You can generate the cross section by drawing two flat cylinders and Boolean Subtracti-ing them. Is that what you're getting at?

In all fairness, Lightwave is pretty clunky at this sort of operation (as are most free-form modelers.) If you're looking to really get into hard-surface modeling, you'll want to check out Form Z or Rhino--which have a workflow far more suited toward this kind of work.

[Silkrooster]

You could look at this the same way that clothes are made. Select the polys on the cylinder and cut them to a new layer. I would put each door on its own layer. Now you can use multi-shift or any one of the other tools for thickening the polys. Once the three objects have the same thickness, then you can decide if you want them to be subpatched and if so add edges where you want the bends to keep a fairly flat side so the doors will mate with the cylinder.
With each door on its own layer you can set the pivot point for both doors allowing them to swing where the hinges should be.
Good luck and have fun,
Silk