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36. Cartoons - Leroy the Hawk 5
 
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MODELER, RAISING LEROY SO FEET ARE ON GROUND

I will first raise up his body so his feet are even with the ground.

I press 't' to engage the 'Move' tool. I press CTRL-h to enter 'Select Polygons' mode and with the right mouse button drag a cyan loop around Leroy's body while in 'Wireframe' view type.

All of Leroy's polygons highlight.

I press the 'n' key to bring up the numeric requester.

You might think that you could just type a value into the Y gadget, then press RETURN, and it would cause Leroy to move upward. But, you have to click on 'Apply' to have him move upward.

When I created the box to contain the images, I created Leroy so he was 138.99 millimeters tall (5.5 inches).

So, if he's 138.99 mm tall, then that should mean that if I were to move him up 139 millimeters divided by two (69.5 mm), his feet should then be very close to touching the ground.

I enter 69.5 mm in the Y gadget and press RETURN to have it take it (but not yet do it).



... then I click the 'Apply' button.

If Leroy doesn't move up. Close the requester. Press 'n' again and you'll see the same 69.5 mm value in Y. Click 'Apply' again and Leroy should move up.

When I magnify the foot from the side, sure enough, the tip of his toe nail touches the X/Z plane. However, his back toe doesn't. It's raised above it.



That won't do. Leroy needs to feel like his feet are firmly planted on the ground, and that his toe nails don't go penetrate the surface. I'll worry about that later, though. Next I'll raise his size.

If I press 'SHIFT-h', then 'n' to bring up the numeric requester, we're ready to size him.

I see that the 'Factor' is gauged in percent of size increase or reduction.

Therefore, the calculator comes into play again.

It's more a question of how tall do I want to make Leroy.

I guage with my two hands, making an estimate for the approximate height I'd like Leroy to be relative to a human. Then, I measure that on a ruler... fourteen inches.

355.6 mm equals 14 inches (exactly 25.4 millimeters are in one inch. Thus, 25.4 * 14 = 355.6). Now, I can make a percent of increase. The question would be, "What percent would Leroy have to grow if he is currently 138.99 mm tall to become 355.6 mm tall?

Amount of increase in percent would be (355.6 / 138.99 ) * 100 = 255.85 %

I type 256 % into the 'Factor' gadget, then press RETURN to have it take it (but not do it yet).



I then click the 'Apply' button.

Next, I ensure that each toe lays firmly planted upon the ground, and that their angles relative to each other are correct.



There's a puckering occuring along the top of the back toe which I don't like. When I undo SubSurfacing, straightening the polygon edges, I decide that these split polygons don't need to be split.



I turn off 'Symmetry' mode, pressing 'k' to 'Kill' those triangles, then connect them as three polygons by selecting the points sequentially in a clockwise circle (to each foot), pressing 'p'. I can always split them in a more symmetrical manner than they were before if they don't look good as four-sided polygons.

I also spread the toes more evenly, rotate the toenails to better angles, and have them sit more firmly on the ground.




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