How to Sculpt a Computer Mouse in Fusion 360 - Learn Autodesk Fusion 360 in 30 Days: Day #23

hey there it's Kevin Kennedy and welcome to day number 23 of a learned fusion 360 in 30 days by the end of this tutorial you'll be able to model a computer mouse in the sculpt environment we'll take a look at how to use the symmetry feature how to insert a new edge and how to use the crease command to create a flat surface to get started I'm going to insert a reference image into the canvas if you're sculpting a shape off an already existing object then this can be super helpful in getting the shape started I've also found that even if you're creating a new product from scratch that a rough reference sketch can be very helpful when using the sculpting mode I'll select attached canvas from the insert drop-down menu or by selecting it in the toolbar I'll select the right plane and then I'll select the image from my desktop I'm just going to drag the outer slider and scale it up for now and we'll calibrate the size in just a bit so I'll click OK let's go ahead and calibrate the size of the reference image so the sculpted form will naturally follow the realistic dimensions I'll toggle opened the canvases folder and then right-click on the computer mouse image and select calibrate then you'll see that I can select the first points on the canvas so I'll just click where the front tip of the mouse is and then I'll need to define the second point and I'll click at the furthest point of the back part of the mouse now after I add the second point I can type out a dimension so I'll type out 114 millimeters and click enter and you'll see that the reference image will immediately resize to those dimensions now the last thing I'll do is right-click on the reference image and I'll select edit canvas and I'm going to move the image up about 20 millimeters or so or until the bottom of the mouse is lined up with the bottom plane because I'm going to start to sculpt from this bottom plane and before I go any further I'll click the Save icon and I'll save this as computer mouse now let's get started with sculpting the mouse you can really start with a number of different shapes in the sculpt workspace but I find it easiest to always start with the pre-made shape that's closest to your final shape so in this case the mouse is really just a rounded box so I'm going to select box from the toolbar then I'll select the bottom plane I'll click on the center origin and I'll drag out with my mouse now I'll go ahead and type the overall dimensions of the mouse which are 114 millimeters long I'll hit the tab key to lock the dimension in place and then 62 millimeters for the wiff followed by the tab key to lock the dimension in place then you'll notice the box feature immediately prompts us for the height so I'm going to look at this mouse from the right view and you'll notice that the horizontal line of the box lines up well with this horizontal plane of the mouse or this imaginary plane if I were to cut the mouse through its side where I could get the largest flat surface here so I'm just going to click OK and you'll see that we have a basic shape approximately the same size as the mouse but not quite as tall now a few more quick tips before we reshape this box first off let's turn off the origin planes by selecting the light bulb in the fusion 360 browser now I found that anytime you're working in the sculpt environment you'll want to turn off any other objects that can get in the way as they can get pretty confusing when you're trying to push and pull on different faces also you'll notice that the box shape we've created automatically has a transparent appearance because of the reference image splitting it down the middle if I toggle the reference image on and off you'll see that the box is turned to 100% opacity and sometimes I find it helpful to turn down the opacity of the sculpted form so it's easier to see the details on the reference image if you want to turn the opacity down simply right-click on the body in the fusion 360 browser and change the opacity under the opacity control but for the sake of this video and making it easier for you guys to see I'll go ahead and leave it at 100% the last thing here you'll want to make sure that you have your visual style and the display settings set to shaded with visual edges only as this will ensure that you can see all of the faces that you're able to work with in the sculpt environment you definitely don't want your visual style set to shaded the first thing I'm going to do is set up symmetry so we can shape one side of the mouse and the other side will automatically be mirrored to do this I'll select the mirror option from the symmetry drop-down list then we'll have to select two faces so I'll select one face and you'll see it labelled it number one now the second face we select is going to determine the mirror or symmetry line so we want this mouse to be symmetrical right down the middle so I'm going to select the face directly across from the first face then you'll notice that this green symmetry line now appears and that is in fact the symmetry line that we're looking for so I'll go ahead and click OK now you'll notice that any faces that I select are automatically selected on the other side of the cemetery line so this is a nice way to save time be a little bit more efficient and of course to ensure that you do have a symmetrical shaped in the sculpt environment especially if that's what you're trying to achieve at this point I'll want to create this rounded hump of the mouse I'm going to select the back top face of the forum right click and select edit forum and then I'm going to look at it from the right view now one thing that I want to point out here and I can't stress this enough is that you really have to get into the habit of looking at your sculpted forms from different sides of the viewcube now this will make it easier to ensure you're selecting the right controls as you'll see that if I look at it from a perspective then I have way too many selection options here and it's easy to accidentally select the wrong one so again looking at it from the right view I'm going to select this rounded rectangle which allows us to move faces in a planar direction or in this case we're adjusting the faces along this right Y Z plane so you'll notice as I click and hold with my mouse I can drag this around and I'm just going to pull up to the left a bit and you'll see that we're already starting to follow the mouth shape I can also select the face just to the left of this one without leaving the Edit form feature and I can move that around until it's a little bit better now if you're new to the scoped environment you'll find that it's a lot more experimentation than parametric modeling so you'll want to get into the habit of experimenting and if you don't like something simply hit command Z on Mac or ctrl Z on Windows to undo the most recent action I'm going to look at this from the home view to give you another idea of why we created this center line of symmetry before we got started with sculpting so you'll see that it's a bit easier and we're able to focus on the shape without having to worry about this other side now at this point I'm liking the overall shape of the computer mouse but I want to reshape the front of the mouse so it has more of a sharp angle here if I right-click and select edit form on the front face you'll notice that no matter what I do I'm really not going to get the amount of control that I need so what I would do in this scenario is add another edge or two giving me more faces to control the object I'm going to double click on the centerline of the mouse because double clicking will select the entire line and then I'm going to select insert edge from the modify drop-down list I'm just going to use the slider to position the line so it's above the centerline and I'll click OK now you'll notice that right after I clicked okay it readjusts did the shape a bit and essentially cut these front faces up into smaller faces now I can go ahead and edit form on this top shape and adjust the face by dragging the center manipulator around because this icon represents Universal scaling so you'll see that we can adjust this to better represent this front shape of the mouse all ready so now I want to get the bottom to be a bit more square like this computer mouse reference image so I'm first just going to use the planar square to move the faces down a bit further and I'll do this for the front bottom face and the back bottom face now I would probably spend a little bit more time to tweak this side profile even further but for the sake of time I'm going to leave it at what it is and let's go ahead and take a look at the top of the mouse now to make this mouse a bit more ergonomic I'm going to add a groove to the side for the thumb now looking at the top of the mouse I'm going to select this top left edge and right click and select edit form and I'm going to select the planar Direction icon and drag it out just a bit so you'll see that looking at it from the back we're already starting to get a nice indent I can also select the points where all the edges meet in the middle and I can use the dimensions to control it a bit more I'll type in four millimeters and it looks like the top moved a bit so I'm just going to go back and forth here and move each one around until I'm happy with the overall shape and I'm starting to like this overall shape so I'm going to click OK now we want to make sure that the computer mouse has a flat bottom so it will slide on the desk properly so holding down the shift key I'm going to select all the bottom phases and then I'm going to right-click and select crease now you may have noticed that the edges are creased but the bottom isn't flat yet so holding down the shift key I'll select the two faces again and this time I'll select the flatten command from the modified drop-down list and now you'll see the shape is completely flat on the bottom now at this point if you want to make the mouse specifically for a left or right hand you could turn the symmetry off and edit the form on just one side so to turn the symmetry off simply go up to the symmetry drop-down list select clear symmetry select the model and then click OK I'm also going to show you another way to do this so I'm going to hit command Z and if I select the symmetry line first and then if I select clear symmetry you'll see that it not only saves an extra step of having to use that dialog box but this will also help me control a specific symmetry line if I did happen to have multiple symmetry lines set up in the first place at this point I can right-click on the top edge and click Edit form and I can drag this out a bit more to make this a right-handed Mouse and maybe I'll just push the back in a bit more so this is where the scope workspace can be really fun and you can really play around with the shapes and ideas that would take you way too long to create in the model workspace now obviously I did this mouse concept fairly fast so remember that one of the most important tips is that the more faces and edges you have the more control you have over that area of the model if I'm happy with this overall shape I'll go ahead and click OK and I will click finish form in the toolbar so I can go back to the model workspace now I can go ahead and take this model a step further by using the model tools to really define the features of the computer mouse including adding a center scroll here maybe splitting the keys down the middle and I can go ahead and hit the keyboard shortcut letter F for fill it select the bottom edge and I'll enter a fill it radius of four millimeters and click OK so that's all I'm really gonna show for this tutorial because again like I mentioned in day number 22 you really need to get used to these basic sculpt commands before we go ahead and take it a step further thanks for watching if you have any questions at all about this tutorial or fusion 360 questions in general then be sure to comment them below hit that thumbs up icon if you learn something in this video and click Subscribe followed by that little Bell icon to be notified of more fusion 360 tutorials

Channel: Product Design Online

Views: 64,593

Keywords: fusion 360, autodesk fusion 360, kevin kennedy fusion 360, product design online, fusion 360 tutorials, fusion tutorials, fusion 360 30 days, learn fusion 360 in 30 days, lars christensen fusion 360, fusion 360 beginners, fusion 360 kevin kennedy, autodesk fusion 30 days, #larslive, learn fusion 360 or die trying, fusion 360 sculpt tutorial, fusion 360 sculpt from sketch, fusion 360 sculpting tips, fusion 360 sculpt to model, fusion 360 sculpt symmetry, fusion 360 sculpting

Id: QwpB2uoOfUc

Length: 14min 18sec (858 seconds)

Published: Tue Oct 02 2018

Reddit Comments

[u/productdesignonline]

Another intro sculpting tutorial! I hope you learn a thing or two. Cheers, Kevin ;)