Rigging

Rigging is going to be a pain. This tutorial gets way more advanced into it than any rigging tutorial I've done before. And there's a lot of new stuff to deal with because this character is bigger. Hopefully I can finish it by Wednesday.

I'm going to jump right into the animation challenge they post up on 11secondclub.com tomorrow. So finishing up this dinosaur will just be a part time thing.

Import/Export

He's all detailed, textured, and ready to go. Unfortunately the export/import instructions aren't quite working out. The ZBrush used in the tutorial must be an older version, and I haven't quite figured out how it translates into 3.5. I think I have a workable solution, but it definitely doesn't turn out as clean as I'd like.

It's ready to rig up and animate though. Hopefully I can have the rig finished tomorrow, animate on Saturday and render on Sunday. Then start the animation challenge at 11secondclub.com on Monday!

Blocking

I've finished the base mesh for my dinosaur. Took about twice as long as I expected, a time frame that I'll project onto the rest of the sections. So I sound be finished with the whole project by the end of November.

The next step will be sculpting in ZBrush, and then texturing in ZBrush. I figure 4 days for the sculpting, so I'll hopefully post the detailed model on Friday.

Walk the Dinosaur

I'm running through a tutorial from my 3D World magazine a couple years late. It used ZBrush, so at the time I just kind of ignored it. But now that I'm getting more comfortable with the ZBrush interface, I think this will be a really great project for me.

It runs through the entire pipeline. Modeling, Detailing, Texturing, Rigging, Animating, and Rendering. It will take a while, maybe 3 weeks. But I think it's do-able and will get me a finished and animated project. After this, hopefully I can get the time down to 2 weeks. Maybe even a week for small models.

I haven't done rigging and animating in a long time, and the last time I started texturing something I gave up halfway through... This will be a true test for me. If I can't finish this, I probably shouldn't continue pursuing a career as a 3D Artist.

I'll post an image when I'm done with the modeling portion.

Digital Painting

I finished my first digital painting today. It turned out ok, but not quite as professional looking as I thought it would. Just my first though, I definitely have a better idea about what I need to work on now.

I was going to make a full web comic, but after working out a story and storyboard I realized it would take way too much time to make it high enough quality.

This week I'll work on a 3D character. Hopefully focusing on a single character will allow me to put enough detail into it that I can have something worth putting in my portfolio. My problem is definitely starting too much projects and not finishing them. Which means I'm less skilled with the finishing touches. Not good for my development. So I'm going to do smaller projects and finish them. At least that's my goal.