After purchasing my first drone I was let down by the battery life. I started to wonder if one day drones could recharge in mid-air with sunlight. Even better what if the chlorophyll was grown synthetically and could mimicked actual leaves. This project explored what that future could look like. Xenops is an Artificial Warplane which main purpose is to scout the battlefield. Most of the structure is grown and printed. The A.I. Scanner captures the ground in 3D. The wings gills absorb oxygen to feed the machines synthetic cells. When taking in sunlight the synthetic sections become transparent.
Initial sketch models where done in Maya by appending thin ribbon-like planes. Most of the mechanical parts where kit-bashed which sped up the design process (Layout Tools). For the parametric details I used Grasshopper3d.
