How to Design and Make a Ghost in Under 1 Hour!

Ghosts are one of the fastest, most forgiving, and most FUN starter characters to model in Fusion 360 — and in this guide I’ll show you how to design your own custom ghost from scratch in under 1 hour.

You don’t need to be an advanced CAD modeler for this one. This is beginner friendly, fast, and zero-stress. We’ll walk through the exact steps to create the body form, add expression/personality, export it… and if you have a 3D printer, I’ll also show you how to bring your ghost into the real world!

This style of simple organic shape modeling is incredibly powerful — once you learn this workflow you can rapidly create seasonal décor, charms, miniatures, ornaments, tabletop game pieces, Halloween LED diffusers, and character designs way faster than you’d expect.

Now grab your computer, follow along, and learn something new!

All you need for this project are a few simple tools and materials.

Required:

1. Fusion 360 (where you will be designing your very own ghost)
2. A computer (to run Fusion 360)

Optional (Highly Encouraged for Maximum Fun):

1. LED Tea Lights (if you want to light up your ghost and make it glow)
2. 3D Printer and Filament (if you want to create your design physically!)

That's it! Now follow along with the instructions below and by the end you will have learned how to create your very own ghost!

Let's get started! First, you need to have Fusion downloaded, and if you don't already have it, visit autodesk.com to download it (it is a fantastic and versatile program you will thank me for getting and is FREE for non-commercial use!).

Once you have opened Fusion, follow the steps below to get started.

1. Click the plus icon to create a "new design"
2. Under the "SOLID" tab in the toolbar, click the dropdown titled "CREATE" and select "Create Form"

Now that you have finished your first step, its time to set the groundwork for what's next by following the steps below.

1. Click "Plane" (its the window-looking icon)
2. Select the top plane and place the center-point at the origin
3. Add the second point to create your plane's dimensions (I recommend creating a 100x100 square but you can always scale up or down your ghost later on)
4. In the side-panel, increase the length and width faces (they default at 2 but I recommend setting each to 8 for this project to keep things simple)
5. Check the "length symmetry" checkbox (this will mirror your design so it will be symmetrical!)
6. Click "OK" in the side-panel

Congratulations, you have created your plane!

Now that your plane is set up, follow the steps below to learn how to shape it into your ghost!

1. Click the "save" icon on the top left of your Fusion to save and name your work
2. Click modify (its in the toolbar) and then select one of your centermost squares (remember, everything is mirrored, so you only need to select one quadrant)
3. Drag the up arrow to begin creating the frame of your ghost (I recommend making the initial height slightly taller than the plane's width, so 110-130 is a good place to start)
4. Now that the center of the ghost's body is created, select other squares and move them to shape it into your spooky desired creation (you can also select individual points and line segments and move them to refine your shape)
5. Repeat modifying the ghost until you are happy with your shape (this can take a few tries so be sure to experiment, and if you don't like how something turned out, simply press command or control Z to undo it)
6. Finally, click "ok" in the side-panel to finish this step

Congratulations, you have now created your ghost's body!

You are now in the home stretch and all that's needed is some finishing touches, so follow the steps below!

1. Click "Create Sketch" (its the canvas-looking button on the left-side of the toolbar) and select the front plane
2. Click on the "CREATE" dropdown (again, on the left-side of the toolbar) and select "Ellipse"
3. Locate where you want the center of one of your eyeballs to be and click
4. Click another point to specify the radius of the ellipse and then move your mouse until you are happy with the shape and click again
5. Click the "Fit Point Spline" tool (left-side of the toolbar) and click where you want the center of the bottom mouth opening to be, the choose a mid-point and click, and finally click where you want the top corner of the mouth to be and hit enter/return
6. Click the "Offset Curve" tool (or just press "O" on your keyboard) and select the curve you just created. Then drag the slider until the top half of the mouth is where you want it.
7. Use the "Fit Point Spline" tool to connect the top and bottom of the mouth together
8. Click the "Line" tool in the toolbar (or press "L" on your keyboard) and click once on the center-line of your ghost above the face and once on center-line below the face, and then press enter/return
9. Click the "Mirror" tool (left-side of the toolbar) and select your mouth and eye, and then press the "Mirror-Line" button and select the vertical center-line you just created, then click "OK"
10. Click "FINISH SKETCH" (its the green check icon on the top right)
11. Press "E" to open the "Extrude" tool and select your facial features, and then drag the slider past the front of your ghost. Then click the "Operation" dropdown and select cut and then press "OK"
12. Congratulations, you have now finished your ghost! Press the save icon to save your work. Now click on the file icon and then press "Export" to open the export window where you can name your file and choose your file type (this is only necessary for 3D printing and I recommend selecting "STL" as your file type)
13. OPTIONAL: Open your 3D-Printer's slicer (I use Bambu Studio), upload your STL ghost file, print, insert the tea light, and enjoy

I hope you have enjoyed this project and learned a new skill. Happy Halloween! 👻🎃