Cannot correctly import 3DS model

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#1

Hey, guys, it’s been a long time. I’ve matured a lot since I was last on here.

I have a 3DS model to reverse engineer in Blender, but I cannot seem to get it completely like the original. Here is the file.
As you can see, the render looks really good, especially for a free model. I’ve taken the trouble to import it because the model’s scale is huge and is extremely far from the center of the scene when imported.

So, basically, how do I turn what you’d get when you render the blend file into what’s in the preview picture?

#2

Basically you would break down the surfaces of the model and apply the included texture maps to it, if that’s what you are talking about.

Another thing to try is to see if they offer an .obj format as well. This usually preserves the UV maps pretty well.

#3

If you have not watched the BlenderCookie video on how to clean up imports, I would recommend it.

Basically, on any mesh import there are a couple of things you always need to do.
1.) Put the mesh in edit mode and choose Remove Doubles. (This F15 model had 413 duplicate verteices).
2.) While still in edit mode and all faces selected, choose Triangles To Quads in the face menu.
3.) Smooth the objects, the plane looks faceted.

NOTE: When I smoothed the object, bad results occurred in the mesh. This means the mesh is not modeled as well as it could be so you may need to do some fixup or custom selection smoothing to get it to look right.

Also, if you do not have Poser, it is a great tool for cross-converting meshes. I pulled the .3DS file into Poser and it found all the image maps. I exported it as Collada, from Poser. Then I imported the DAE file using Blender and all the image maps are already in place.

I am attaching the collada conversion I just mentioned. Save it into the root of the F15 folder and Blender just might pick up the pathing. Otherwise you may have to browse to reestablish the pathing to the images.

Attachments

25_F15_collada.blend (259 KB)