Haruki Art Trade

Created this as part of an Art Trade with a friend :)

This is Sarovsky's character Haruki drawn by me using Art Academy :)

Prof Odine head mesh test build v1.0

Took a small break from the house and made a start on my low poly mesh for the head sculpt I made in an earlier post. I'm currently experimenting with the best workflow for character models using Zbrush.
As the original sculpt was created using Dyna Mesh I had to create the low poly from the high density mesh exported from Zbrush.

For this process I used a program called 3DCoat. Using this software I was able map out my geometry over the existing Zbrush sculpt. This made the process faster and easier than box modeling the low poly from scratch. There are a few kinks to work out though and I'd like to strip out some of the geometry in the mouth and chin area too. Currently the head alone is just over 1,600tri, so hopefully I can bring it down a touch more.

Townhouse W.I.P (pt3)

Not far off now. Just finishing up the door frame and chimney stacks, whence done with that its on to embellishing the set with props.

Townhouse progress (pt2)

 

It's coming along slowly, the house itself is pretty much complete in terms of build. My next task is to get the normal maps for the windows and doors made up. I also need to rethink the normal/bump maps for the lower half of the house. Though when those are done it's just a case of sorting out the props and lighting to set the scene properly.

I've got an extra long weekend coming up, so I will be gearing up to finish this soon. Posted some of the sketches I made before hand, though I will replace it with a finished colour version soon.

500tri character model & some previous work

Working through some files on my laptop and found a project I started before work took over. The character model is 500Tri with a 256x256 texture map. It took 2 afternoons to make the character model, the Saturday to build and unwrap and the Sunday to texture. I was never happy with the layout of the UV's on this model, so when I finish the Townhouse I think I may revisit this model and see if I can tweek it.

This was the first sub 500Tri model I made, a little bland on the face but was great to work on while getting to grips with smaller texture sizes.

This was a practice using some rough textures while trying to work out a style. It will eventually become part of an Island setting for the first character model. Again though will move on to it whence the house is complete.

Ahh the memories. Found a render from an environment I put together during university. May fire up the file and get some more put up in the future.

Art Academy

An app was released for the WiiU a little while back, it enables the game pad to act like one of those flashy drawing tablets you see where you draw directly onto the screen. I've always experienced problems drawing directly with my PC Bamboo setup because of the disjointed feeling between screen and tablet. I'm fine with texturing but not actual sketching, much rather a pencil and paper personally. The App is pretty decent and I'm able to go from rough sketching to something a little more detailed with ease. So while I'm working on the townhouse I'd thought I would throw up a few of the doodles I've made in the last month or so.

Townhouse project

 

(Click images to enlarge)

Currently I'm working on a Townhouse. I've been working on it a few hours a night after work, though after a few re-tries I think I'm starting to get somewhere with it now. Ive still got a way to go and I've just started to throw up a few textures to see whats going to work. Below is a rough paint over of things I plan to add.I'm currently experimenting with using texture ID's and tileable textures. Having never really spent a great deal of time making environments, I thought this would be a good opportunity to see how long it takes me to put together.

 

The biggest criticism of past environments I've tried is the relation of small objects with the rest of the space. They've always felt empty and bland. So I plan to try and improve on this this time around by thinking through all the little details that make up the outside of peoples homes. I've got a second environment in the works, while I'm going for a sort of realism with this environment I'm going for a more cartoony feel for the other. So hopefully I can take over any experience with this project to the next

My first two attempts (see above) went well in terms of build and the texture ID's were easy enough to set up. I didn't like the shape of the first house and the second began to get a little more interesting. For the second house I mixed two textures together in the material editor, the result has given the brick work a nice weathered look. While its still a little too much I think, It's definitely something I will try again on the final house.

ZBrush and DynaMesh

(click images to enlarge)
I have to say I didn't expect to enjoy working with DynaMesh as much as I did this afternoon. I still cant believe that the face in the images above was pulled entirely from a single poly sphere in ZBrush. Today was all about getting familiar with ZBrush and most of its workings,  though I still stumble a little with the camera controls.

I found sculpting simple and natural, so much so in fact that I began deviating from the tutorial I was using as reference.The above image is a rough stage by stage so you can see how I began developing the shapes and features of the face. I'm always paranoid about making too many mistakes or worse overworking a particular aspect, so I like to have a previous file to re-visit just in case I take something too far...

The above image is me messing with some shapes too much. While I like the way it was going it was too square and masculine for what I wanted with this particular bust.I wanted thinner more pointed face and features, though even then I think I've probably softened too much of the final face. Though it doesnt really matter as it's just so easy to go back and begin re-working the details.

First post to launch the blog!

(Click image to enlarge)

Over the last 12 months or so I've been posting pictures and comments on Miiverse! it's a sort of community software built into Nintendo's Wii U system. So I thought to get the ball rolling I'd share some of the pictures I've posted since owning the system.

Check back soon as I'm getting ready to post some of my recent work to have a gander at.