How to make smooth curves and rough edges

Question

I'm currently trying to make a plane, a Short SC.7 Skyvan.

And as you see here, on the tail, there is a smooth curved corner at the front and a sharp edge at the back. How could I do this?

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I've started with a cube but I've no idea how to make that shape. Any ideas?

Answer 1

Here's one approach:

1. 6-sided circle
2. Fill (F), and Knife cut (K) using Ctrl to hit center of edges
3. Drag out back edges. (Scale thinner if you like)
4. Add loop cuts (CtrlR). Assuming you might want to bend the aerofoil.
5. Extrude (E) perimeter edges
6. Maybe pull out the middle edges of the side? and put in a holding edge-loop (CtrlR).
7. Add a Mirror modifier,
8. And a Subsurf modifier.

Answer 2

Not sure why people downvoted this question. Try this:

Add a subsurf modifier (prob render and view 2)

Add a loop cut (Ctrl + R) and push it to the far edge of the cube making a face at the end. You can inset this face to get rid of the cup effect.

Add loop cuts to the left and right to make it so that there are three flat faces and one curved.

Scale the face you want to be a rough edge in the Z direction till it’s negligible.

Hope that helps :).

Answer 3

You can model the sharp detail vs. smooth detail. Or, you can apply a subsurf modifier and add Creases for sharp edges.

1. Model something you're generally after, and apply the 'Smooth' shading option in the left-hand 'Tools' palette.
2. Apply a Subdivision Surface modifier. this will 'blunt/smooth' your mesh.
3. In Edit mode, select an edge.
4. In the right hand Transform palette of the 3D window, slide the Creases value up. The mesh will draw closer to the modeled edge.
5. By adjusting adjacent edges in the same way, you train the subsurf modifier to 'ignore' the smoothing/blunting effect it does to generate more geometry.

Footnote: Are you sure you want to add a wing as a separate object? You will probably find it easier going by extruding wings from the fuselage: keeps everything all one mesh.

Answer 4

Get the plans.

The FIRST thing I would do is hit up google in image mode and download something like:

Then set up your model using one of the methods suggested in answers to How to assign different background images for different 3d views?

Here I've added a view facing plane in right ortho and extruded left and right edges to somewhat match tail wing profile. A mirror modifier is used on X axis, and the profile is extruded along along X to form the wing.

Other useful links

Do I need to even use blueprints?

Round corners of plane wing