SCULPTBLOG!

More Sculptris testing...

2011-07-20T15:57:00.001-07:00

Sculptris...

2011-07-13T01:19:00.000-07:00

...little brother of ZBrush, and a helluva lot of fun. Even less thinking between you and the sculpt - and that ain't ever a bad thing, y'know? Here's a quickie test head. Kinda fat vampirish thing; a blood glutton...

And a rider of a, well....

2011-07-09T17:03:00.001-07:00

...thing...

CG goodness has been inspiring me to quick-sketch in ZBrush...

2011-07-09T16:54:00.001-07:00

...so here's a hammerhead, uh, thing.

...a quickie

2011-06-30T00:37:00.001-07:00

That General dynamics look...

2011-06-08T15:38:00.001-07:00

I really love the design, or lack thereof of the General Dynamics line of products - the stryker vehicles, the m1 Abrams tank.... all designed with very utilitarian intentions, i.e., deflecting damage, keeping a low profile on the battlefield, etc. The resultant look is a sort of function-over-form brutalism. I wanted to adapt that approach to walking tank - something that'd be completely ludicrous in a modern tank battle, but really fun to think about..

Military drones...

2011-06-08T15:35:00.000-07:00

...are really fun to model. This newish modification of the SWORDS class combat-support drone is still only deployed in small numbers with the U.S. armed forces, but seems to be getting more popular lately. It looks cool too! Texturing in progres...

WIP goblin footsoldier

2010-12-17T16:31:00.001-08:00

This ugly little fellow just came along and demanded some armor. I think I'll give 'im some...

More buggy; different renders

2010-12-17T00:00:00.000-08:00

A friend suggested the BPR. British Pod Race? No, as it turns out.

Buggin'

2010-12-16T00:51:00.000-08:00

whoa! It has been a while since I've updated here. Been busy working! Woo! Anyway, finally got back to my learnin', and I made this little guy as a quick zsphere-to-textured model in 2.5 hours. Shoulda' spent less on the detail modeling, as the lovely spotlight thing lets you add it from photos - and so quickly! Next one will be a bit more involved - and I might even learn to make the texture blend and flow realistically...

Fun with new Zbrush toys

2010-08-18T01:35:00.000-07:00

This fella is in the works, but I like his pretty face, so, here ya go.

A bit of a twist...

2010-07-01T01:06:00.000-07:00

....gives us Demom. Demom hates your girlfriend. Demom thinks that lipstick is trashy. Demom will devour her soul. Have a great time, sweetie!

Smirky bat says:

2010-06-30T01:08:00.000-07:00

Hey there

Okay, I'll admit it...

2010-06-29T23:03:00.000-07:00

...mudbox is damn fun. Changing it up a bit - from demon to the batfaced boy. To quote Dutch, "Youah wohn UUgly muthaf**kah.."

more mudbox madness minus paint

2010-06-27T17:06:00.000-07:00

ok, I'm sensing a theme...

Mudbox...

2010-06-25T14:18:00.000-07:00

...is great for editing flesh - not so great for appending separate geometry; like eyes...

update on suitboy

2010-05-01T17:07:00.001-07:00

A learning experience

2010-04-21T23:53:00.000-07:00

Welp, the retopologizing worked, but my arms-down pose didn't. I don't know what I was thinking - I fixed the position before reprojecting the detail on to the new mesh. Oops. So I've started recreating the details.... next time, Zbrush, next time...

Finally!

2010-04-20T21:19:00.000-07:00

Retop, for better or worse, is done. Now to learn how to project my old detail back onto this mesh...

Feels like the first time....

2010-04-19T23:41:00.000-07:00

Retopologizing is almost fun. Trying to remember how to do it correctly; not so much. As fun as the zsketch method of creating sculpts is, one thing it is not is low-poly. Try as I might, I can't seem to get a base mesh out of that system! So I turn to the retop tool. The idea here is to make my own base mesh with the sort of polyflow I want, and then subdivide to my wacom's content. Thus continues the saga of suitman.
P.S. - I know the mesh ain't pretty -it's just built for flow and easier manipulation. We'll see if it was the best approach...

Working on it!

2010-04-10T01:09:00.000-07:00

...I'm trying to emulate a particular sort of organic hard surface effect type thing. The planar, polish, and trim brushes are key, I think. Definately the lovely Dam Standard.
I saw the work of an excellent zbrusher who turned in an awesome stylized 'bot - and I'm trying to figure out how he did it. This is, again, ol' meaty, cleaned up a bit and stuffed in techy armor. I think I'm getting it....
This is the first pass, gonna get crazier with him.
Bonus poses. Don't look at his stretch marks, Meaty is very sensitive.

Getting aquatic

2010-04-09T11:31:00.000-07:00

This pleasant fellow came about while I was watching some late-Victorian period drama and sketching. One of the characters was an older gent, with a a bit of a gut - all strapped up in period regalia. He looked a bit like like an apple on a stick, well, on two sticks. So I thought, "what if dude was cursed by a sea-going magician, turned into an assemblage of aquaticky things and forced to guard the magician's watery lair?" I mean, duh, right? What else do you think about in period romance/dramas? Yep. Here he is. Sketch included.

Plane Study

2010-04-09T01:25:00.000-07:00

trying to find a stylized flow of planar surface to planar surface - and learn some of the tools as well. All hail the Damien Standard brush. Amazing!

The last of the unrefined meaty

2010-04-08T18:17:00.000-07:00

Man, it is a pain trying to simplify forms on a 600k mesh! I may have to retop sooner rather than later, as the mesh density becomes more of a problem when trying to work on detail -which, of course, is the fun part of zBrush...

More meaty man...

2010-04-08T18:02:00.000-07:00

Just a few angles on meaty man here - still refining. I plan to use him as the basis of experiments on armor, extracted subtools, and retopologizing. I'm scared of topology, but I think he needs it -the unified skin from zsketch is massive and unclean. Unclean in a topological way, and not a demonic way. Just in case you were confused.

Meaty!

2010-04-08T17:51:00.000-07:00

....okay - trying to build myself a good man. Wait, not like that...hey now! Zsketch is awesome and trying -especially when trying to get good geometry in the skin. After lots of experimentation, I was able to block out something I like, and after lots of muscly studying, I've got ol' meaty here.

The object here was mostly to get the big forms stated, and begin to explore the interaction of muscles. I built him in an exaggerated fashion in order to make it clear where the planes are, and which major muscle groups underly others.

A rigging experiment, or 'The Whale'...

2010-04-07T01:38:00.000-07:00

...and if you got the joke in the headline, you are a bigger Moby Dick nerd than I am. But probably not, 'cause I modelled a Sperm whale as an excuse to learn how to use the zspheres to rig a model.... Anyyyyyway, short story - it works! Long story is that it takes a bit of tweaking and importing/exporting magic to work at high subdivision levels.
This guy really needs some high detail, like creases and barnacles and whatnot - but that's an experiment for another day; one after the day where I learn how to use HD geometry...

More attention for dragon head

2010-04-06T19:57:00.001-07:00

Here there be dragons. Well, dragon. Ok, ok, just a head, fine!

2010-04-06T19:41:00.000-07:00

Trying to improve my scultping, and wrap my head around Zbrush in one go. First off - the new ZSketch tool. Awesome. Like laying down actual clay, except when it isn't (CRTL-Z ftw). I love it -very organic workflow, though it can be difficult to get it to do what you want. Luckily, you can just lay it on thick and tweak it up later with standard tools, make a skin and then work on top...