Pepakura
Ok, now we've manipulated the model enough in Metasequoia, and now we want to open it in Pepakura. No problem, just open it up. It will run through a quick conversion and tada, it's there. But, of course, nothing is always that simple in the world of paper modeling. On some models, there may be red lines that appear on the model. That means that there is an edge that doesn't attach to anything. If you select "Join Adjacent Isolated Edge" and BING the lines may disappear. But not always.
Some edges line up in on the models, but if the verticies (corners) don't match up, Pepakura won't be able to attach them. This red line was from the old way I made modules. It doesn't happen anymore, but this is a good example on how to fix this problem. Sometimes the redlines won't go away. If that happens, you either need to go back and edit the model to fix it, or just accept it. Fixing the models take a little more work, so I won't go over it here. But if you go to step five of the Homeworld 2 tutorial, you can see how to overcome the problem.
So, now we are ready to unfold the model right? Sure, go for it. See what happens. Actually, I'll show you what happens. The pic on the right is what Pepakura will produce when you just hit the "Create Development" button without any planning. It just does it's best to keep the part count to a minimum and avoids overlapping parts. If you notice we have a whopping 6 parts and no overlaps. But is it easy to make? Hell no! Oh, you can cut it out of paper and make the model, but it will be pretty tough to build with all the funky folds. That's why there are a few tools on the upper tool bar. One is a little hobby knife and the other has a big "NO" circle over a knife. If you select the knife and then click on a fold line (before you click on "Create Development"), it will turn orange. This means that the program will try to make a development with that as a cut. If you use the other one, it will do it's best not to cut that edge. Pretty simple. So, let's do some planning. That gun would be great to glue in last so let's cut that all the way out. And that bulge on the side would be easy to add, but we want it cut a certain way so we tell the program that. And that large black spot would be easy to add later... You get the idea. A good rule of thumb is bulges should be separated. Also leave an easy piece to add in the end so you can still reach inside to aork with the glue tabs. The rest is experience. Oh, use the Undo button to undo a development. WARNING!!! If you press that button you will lose any changes you made after making a development. Use with caution. (Saving wouldn't hurt either.)
Some Cuts
Some more
Cleaning it Up
Ok, now we'll try remaking the development. Tada! Much better. In fact, it almost looks like a decent model. But there are those single triangles floating around, and a few other odds and ends. Also, that one big part still looks hard to fold up. So while we are alomst done, we are now at the toughest part of making the model. You need to think about what it would be like if you were actually making the model right now. How would those two pieces connect together? Would that be an easy fold? Would attaching that section later make it easier? Think about other models and how they slipt their parts. Start to cut and paste and try different ideas out. And how do we cut parts? Here's how.
This little bar has all main tools that you will use right now. Hold your cursor over the button to see what it does. The main ones are the "Cut Part" and "Join Surface" buttons. Use these to disconnect pieces from others and join them back together. Also, you can use the 3D view on the left to see where the cuts are and how pieces go together. Our goal is to make easily folded parts with easy to connect edges. So, let's take a look at the engine part first.
We can see that while we could fold this part, it's not really shaped all that well. So, let's disconnect the white panel at the grey piece. Now, as we look closer, we notice that the orange section is missing a piece. That's because it overlapped the grey part that we just disconnected. So let's re-connect it. There, that's much better. Now is the time to start moving things around. Remember, the goal is to make the model so it's easy to build as well as see how it's built. Another thing to try to do it keep all flat faces together. When you glue two pieces together that should have been one flat peice, it will look pretty obvious, so let's avoid them. Also if we can make mirror parts or similar loking parts then we will make it much easier to build.
Get back in there!
So, now we've redone all the parts to our liking. But they aren't really arranged to make it obvious how to build it. So let's move them around. You can see where I started in the first picture and how I ended up in the second. By rotating parts to make them show how we would glue them together and then putting them next to each other, it makes much more sense. My goal when I make my parts and arrange them is to make it so someone who never saw the ship in the game could take the piece of paper, and the 3D image on the left, and make a decent model.
Better parts
And better alignment
So, how do I rotate parts? It doesn't make sense! Well, it took me a bit to figure it out too. First, click on the rotate button and all these red dots appear on the vertices. Next, pick a vertex. That's your center of rotation. Now, pick another vertex. This is the one you will move. You can see that it's not a free rotate, but 'notched.' I pick points that I want to align vertically or horizontally so it's easy to figure out how to spin the part. See my little demo below.
One
Two
Three
Four
Final Steps
Now, the last big hurdle: glue tab placement. The rule of thumb is that you want all the tabs on the same 'side' of a part. This means that you don't want table alternating back and forth along a glue line since it will deform the paper. And it's almost always easier to fold a part down onto tabs, with one exception. You want all the glue tabs on the white face. I do this so I can glue the white piece in last and I can make it flush with the parts around it. If I glue the white part onto tab, then there will be a visible gap when I glue the white faces together. If I have the tabs on the white piece and I fold them inside the part, it will be flush with the edges and won't be as obvious. If you don't believe me, take the Attack Bomber .pdo and move the tabs off the engine's white panel and make the part. You'll see the panel stick out some, which will be apparent on the finished model.
So, moving tabs. Easy. Click on the "Edit Flap" button and move the cursor either over the tab you want to move or where you want the tab to be and click on it. Select "Move to Opposite Edge," and there you go. You can also click on the tab and resize it if you have small parts. This can make it easier to move the tabs around when you are gluing the model together. Here's a tip. Place the tab on the side with skinny parts. If you put it on the other side, when you glue the tab you might have to overlap a fold and that can make it hard to build. Putting it on the opposite side (the skinny part) will have you glueing a tab against a large flat surface and avoid the fold.
Bad tab
Good tab
Ok, that last part isn't how I made it in the end, but you get the picture. So, that's just about it. The rest from this point is practice, experimenting, and gaining experience. There are some variations on how you make models from other sources, and I'll cover some of those specifics in other tutorials. You can also add comments and notes to the page by clicking on the 'T' button. It might help explain a not-so-obvious part, or say what order you should build the peices. You get the idea. But as you can see, we were able to turn the game ship into the physical paper model below. Now, go out there and make some models!
From the game
The built model
And from the back
Oh, and here's my finished .pdo if you want to see what it looks like when it's done.