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8.4. ATTACHING 3-D OBJECTS 91
not great. Plane Maker cannot make the complex model required for a 3-D cockpit, and it cannot
create a highly detailed model of the craft as a whole to overlay the basic Plane-Maker model from
which flight physics are calculated.
Instead, you can use a 3-D modeling program (such as 3ds Max, Blender, Google SketchUp,
or AC3D) to create these objects. You can use any modeler able to export to the X-Plane OBJ
file format. Many of the more popular modelers have plug-ins available to enable this; even if your
modeler does not support it, you may be able to export to AC3D and save to an OBJ from there.
Note, however, that the X-Plane OBJ format is not the same as the Alias OBJ format.
Regardless of which modeler you use, note that in order to use the OBJ with X-Plane, the file
must use one texture per object.
You can find plug-ins for exporting from AC3D on the X-Plane Wiki. For exporting from Blender
or SketchUp, see Jonathan Harris’ plug-ins on his site. For danklaue’s updated Xplane2Blender
script, see its X-Plane.org Download page.
The easiest way to get started modeling an aircraft is to let Plane Maker create a starting
point OBJ for you. To do this, first create the ACF version of the craft in Plane Maker. Then,
open the Special menu and click ”Generate OBJ from Aircraft.” Plane Maker will create a file
called ”aircraft.obj” in your top-level X-Plane directory. This OBJ can then be imported into your
modeling program for further editing.
Note that, in the export, Plane Maker will ignore any parts of the aircraft set to invisible. If
you want all parts of the aircraft in your exported OBJ, open the Invisible Parts dialog box from
the Special menu and click the “Show all parts” button.
8.4 Attaching 3-D Objects
Having created .obj files for X-Plane per the proceeding section, you can add objects to your aircraft
file in one of two ways. The 3-D cockpit object will automatically be added to the aircraft when
it is saved as [ACF file name] cockpit.obj in the top level of the aircraft’s directory. Other objects
must be manually added to the aircraft using the Miscellaneous Objects dialog box.
While miscellaneous objects can use a texture file with any name they specify (so long as the OBJ
file references it), the 3-D cockpit must use a texture named [ACF file name] cockpit texture.png,
and it must be stored in the aircraft’s top-level directory.
Miscellaneous objects (all OBJ files which are not [ACF file name] cockpit.obj) must be stored
in your aircraft directory, in a subdirectory called “objects.”
Figure 8.4: Controls for adding a miscellaneous object
With the miscellaneous objects saved in the correct location, open the Miscellaneous Objects
dialog box from the Standard menu. Using the two tabs in this dialog, you can attach up to 24
objects to the aircraft. To place an object in a given “slot” here, first click the small square in
the left-center of the window. This will open a standard “Open File” dialog box, where you can
navigate to your aircraft’s “objects” folder and select an OBJ file.
With the object loaded, you can use the standard position controls (as described in the section
“Fundamental Concepts” of Chapter 3) found here to change the object’s location and heading.
Some aircraft designers, however, prefer to have the relative positioning of each piece of the aircraft
set in their 3-D modeler, thus bypassing the positioning in Plane Maker.