Pepakura size problems

[Wulf111]

Originally Posted by Julescrafter

pepakura designer is only an unfold software, it cannot use to modify your 3d model, if you could change a separate value from height, length or width then your template would be impossible to build, because the templates will be distorted. pepakura always has fixed 1:1:1 ratio.

to change the length / height / width you must use 3d modeling software. you can use google sketchup to edit your model by importing your 3ds file into sketchup.

source

i beg to differ with you on this point, you can edit/modify the 3D model in Pepakura but it is limited to one vertex at a time.

i am in the process of creating a few tutorials on how to use Pepakura hopefully have it somewhat done after the new years

[mckinnell]

Wulf111,

Firstly, sorry you can`t pm me direct, shall see what is a miss their and sort it out, secondly, my very very grateful thanks for such an indepth and involved response, that and some info from Armourman realy does it for me, my model is coming on swimingly, will send up a picture in the new year.

You know, this sort of involvement to questions and problems from any one in the forum is, what makes Papermodels.com, the very very best, with, the best of the very best people on board, kind helpful and friendly, what a great place to escape to..

Tom......

[grimpirate]

I'm slightly confused by your problem mckinnell. I've never used Pepakura so I'm unfamiliar with how it works. My confusion comes from your scale problem though. Are you trying to change the OVERALL scale of your model? Or do you want to distort the model by stretching it in one direction? Judging from the responses you've gotten I'd venture to say it's the first option. Working under that assumption I can suggest the following approach (assuming that you can print/export to PDF from Pepakura software):

Once you export the PDF from Pepakura, import it into a software called Inkscape.
Pick one of your parts to use as the scaling object, particularly one that has a straight line in it somewhere.
Trace the line to determine its overall length.
Draw another line that represents that same line but in the size that you want.
Divide the length of one line by the other to determine the scaling factor.
Finally, select all your parts and apply a numeric transform to scale the parts to the size you wanted according to the number you calculated.

If you want to create a distortion along one axis by only scaling along that axis, then it would serve you better to create the distortion first on your model in 3dsmax and then use Pepakura.

[mckinnell]

grimpirate,

Thanks for your response, i seem to be doing ok now, but, will give your suggestion a good try my friend...........cheers.


Regards,


Tom........

[Modeller]

Also, one advice.
Pepa would never unfold correctly if you try to put the whole thing at once. Make small exports of several independent parts, one by one, especially its applicable to the parts that have complicated mesh. (Lots of polygons in one part). They need to be exported from Max as the one peace only.
Overall, this method is used when something, can not be joined together rightly....