Some renders

After a really nice Christmas weekend, I got a couple of these put together. It feels pretty nice :) There was some error uploading videos directly to the blog, so unfortunately I have to provide links instead. Please check them out :)

These are also up on my website, which I overhauled a couple weeks ago.

http://vimeo.com/34260761
Francois, looking as haughty as any Fancy-Goat should!

http://vimeo.com/34298670
Jack Mamba, all coloured at last :)

These were uploaded in SD, when I put my final reel together, I'm going to upload in HD.

Happy Holidays!

Wow, it looks like my blog fell victim to the same fate as my facebook account... Doomed to be used once every few months! I'm going to work a little harder to keep this here updated, because I'd love to be able to look back at my own work years down the road.

So what happened between now and forever ago? For one, I got an amazing new computer that it great to work with... the old one had a bit of a problem with crashing constantly while I was using creative software.

I got work done on Francois:

Here's Francois with all of the Control Objects from the rig visible. It might be a bit cluttered, but it works great for my first try and I am happy with the results :)

Here's the rig with all of the hidden objects and enveloped bones shown. I'm not used to doing rigs like this, so for me the hierarchy and constraints were a challenge to work with!

D'aww, Francois.

He's the most pompous goat ever (Not counting the other Fancy-Goats, of course).

I got to learn about poly painting and projections with Jack Mamba:

Pretty happy with how this guy turned out too.

 Yeah, in the final version his shirt isn't actually high-gloss. That was just a material mix-up.

I spent a great deal of my time actually trying to bake a normal map of the detail from this sculpt onto the low poly version that I started with. Wow, I mean a lot of time. I feel really defeated by the problem I'm having with it.

I'm also creating a couple of still life scenes, one using that skull I launched this blog with. It might look neat with a camera panning around it. So yes, that's still to come!

Random Stuffs and Things

Here's a preview of some models I've been getting ready for a scene I'm working on (No textures as of yet.)

It will be nice when it all starts coming together.

(The furniture is based on photographs I found on Google images.)

Where's Francois?

So Francois is coming along. I subscribed to Digital Tutors in the hopes of learning a bit more about what I do, and I've been going through one of their courses on rigging in Max. The videos are helpful, but it's hard for me to figure out how to adapt what I'm seeing being done on a rig built for a human onto a goat, but it's a sure learning experience. Here's Francois so far:

I did a little bit of texture work as well. Now I was sad to discover that the version of Photoshop that I've subscribed to can't open DAE files, so I can't do my texture painting right on the model, so I  have a bit of a problem with the seam visibility. Sigh, I'll figure out a way to fix that, but it's disappointing. 

That Offbeat Orc

So I have this website called offbeatorc.com where I do a little bit of nerdy business making paper miniatures for tabletop RPG games. I'm very pleased to say that I finished a custom order today what was received rather well. If he ever randomly happens to see this, thank you Scott, and yay! I hope you enjoy endless hours of Earthdawn-playing fun. 

I'll add those two to my ever-growing shelf of my own hand drawn miniatures! It's a source of happiness. :o)

Many Goats, GOAT ISLAND!

Come join me! Let us take a walk around Francois!

Poot!

Ew! Anyhow, I've been lately in the process of UV unwrapping him. That will occupy my time for a bit and then I will post the results. And now, I away~~~!!!

Francois, the only goat with a fancy wig.

So I've been working a bit more on Francois, and though there is still fixing up to do I'm happy with the direction he's going in. His design has changed a bit since that initial drawing I made, I have a bit of fun doing that while I model characters of my own creation, anyways here he is:

I really wanted to make Francois a quadrupedal modeling/rigging experiment, and I'm eager to get to the rigging part, but I'm trying not to get too ahead of myself!