I do not have time to do a daily inspiration like some blogs. But I like the concept. I have decided that once a month I will post a blog post on inspiration.

I will collect one image for every day in the month and make a large post out of it. So this post will have 30 images for 30 days in September.

I tend to be a bit of an image collector on the internet, and now I can share some of my stash with you.

Please click on a thumbnail to view the full image if you fancy it. (Make sure to click the “continue reading” to see the images.)

Enjoy.

Hey guys,

So I just wanted to get a quick post out tonight.  In our Maya class we started a project where we have to add a skeleton to a mech model and make it move.  So basically in industry terms, we are rigging a model.

In this post I am going to just show you a small amount of the progress.  I wanted to show you my concept art, the model that I did in XSI, and a little bit of the skeleton layout for the rig from Maya.

When my mech is done, I plan on posting you guys a little YouTube video of what my rig can do.  So until then, here is what I have done so far.

If you are navigating from my homepage, please click continue reading to view the images. Thanks.

Hey guys, quick update today. I am continuing to practice my models. I just did this Punk Rock girl over the past three days.

I am including these three images in a gallery at the end of this post, click the thumbnails to enlarge them. Enjoy.

No special story today, just a practice model.

Hey guys.

Quick update today, I just wanted to share with you “Mr. Mud Face.”  This guy was a model done by my teacher.  My job was to texture him, rig him, hook up a proper displacement map.  I am also showing you a practice soldier bust I did…  It is no where near finished, but I don’t have the time to take it further.  I am also showing you a near complete drawing I did for Lightwave class.  The purpose of this drawing was to just study the contrast of light and shadow on a face.  I did not really finish his beard, and I barley touched his clothes.  Someday I may get back to finishing it…  This was painted in PhotoShop and I did not trace over the image.  I just used the image for color reference, and I looked at it while I drew.

If you are navigating from the homepage of this blog, please click “continue reading” to see the images for this post!  Also, click the images to see a larger resolution. Thank you.

First pass… Needed to fix the eyes and spec.

Second pass, testing the rig. Fixed the spec.

Final result. Added hair and fixed eyes.

Hey guys.

Super quick update today. Here at Think Tank, the second semester students gave our demo reel presentations to the owners of the school for approval. Our class ended up with four character modelers, four environment modelers, one visual fx student, and three animators.

Can you guess which route I took? That’s right, character modeling!  I am now 100% character modeling.  This means that every day I just have to build characters and sculpt models to get all the practice in I can, because I need it that’s for sure…

(If you are reading this from the homepage, please click continue reading to read on)

If you are some one who is considering Think Tank as an option for schooling, basically at week seven of semester two (about half way through the year), you declare yourself what route you want to take professionally. Once you pick your route, for example if you take character modeling, the only classes you will have from that point on are: digital sculpting, Lightwave, sculpting, Maya rigging class, Unity Engine class, production class, and Modeling. VFX, animation, and acting become optional.

For animators, VFX, modeling, and digital sculpting become optional.

My blog already has been leaning towards modeling; but now that I am decided, my blog will feature little else. Don’t expect to see any animation or VFX guys! Also, I have decided to post only TWO of my FIVE concepts I will be modeling on my reel.

You have to understand, a few of the characters on my reel are very original and have never been done before (to my knowledge) in 3D. I wish to keep it that way, until I model them! So I won’t be showing you all of my concepts. I will however show you the two I am starting with. — One of the two is still not 100% decided that I will model him, this may change in the process.  For my reel I am doing 5 models. Three male, one is a soldier type, one female, and one monster.

Enjoy.

Hey guys.

I just wanted to share some fun news with you today.  First off school… Two days ago I officially pitched my demo reel to the owners of Think Tank and my class mates.  I had to declare my target profession, and for me it was a no brainer: modeling.  I also had to pick the models I would be putting on my reel.  I chose four models.  A man, a woman, a creature, and a soldier from a video game.  We also had to throw in some studios we want to target for jobs…  I will be posting more info on all of this later.

Today I wanted to announce the creation of Pie Boy Studios.  Pie Boy Studios is a gaming company started by myself and my uncle.  We are going to be working on a legit gaming project in our free time.  More info on this in the near future!  We have a site that will be going live in the next few days.  Please visit: http://www.pieboys.com

That’s all for now, talk to you later.

Hey guys,

So here at Think Tank, our class decided to take on a game project.  We decided to make a first person shooter game in Unity.  My job is to simply model and texture a character for the game, and I picked a monster we will fight in the game.  This is “The Swarmer.”

Swarmer was modeled in XSI, then sculpted in Mudbox, then brought to a game resolution of triangles in TopoGun.  His UVs were created in UV Layout, and his texturing and spec map were done in PhotoShop.  I baked his normal map and ambient occlusion map (painted into the diffuse texture), in both XSI and XNormals.

For you non 3D people, this was a big process!  I think he turned out really well.  A classmate of mine will be rigging him to make him move, and another one will be animating him.  I will post a YouTube clip when I have something to show!

If you are navigating from the homepage, please select continue reading to see the images of the process.  Also click the images to see a bigger shot!  Enjoy.

This is the concept and the almost finished Mudbox sculpt.

This is the high rez sculpt re-topoligized to be game resolution, about 4000 triangles.

This is a high to low resolution comparison.

In-game engine Marmoset.  Game resolution testing normal maps.

The final result.  Game rez with all my maps applied.  This is rendered in XSI.

And a current off the topic work in progress.  I am practicing getting to know ZBrush and the subtools with this model

Hey guys,

Quick update today.  I recently participated in a Polycount.com mini challenge.  For no reason other than getting my name out there a little bit and doing something fun for practice.

The challenge was pretty cool actually.  Basically, we had one week to complete three models.  The model had to be a dagger, sword, axe, rapier… etc and had to be done to fit a game style like World of Warcraft.  Basically a Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game (MMORPG).  The first model had to be like a “starter” weapon.  Something simple and pretty weak.  After that, the second weapon had to “evolve” off of the first.  And finally, the third weapon had to “evolve” off of the second.  So in the end, they all felt like they came from the same start, but all had their own look and progressively got more menacing. If you would like to see the official webpage post, check it out here.

We had a week to do this, as I said, but also we had some other limits.  We had triangle limits.  For those of you who do not know games, basically everything you see in a game are made up of little tiny triangles that fit together to make the shape of what you are looking at.  That is honestly the easiest way I can describe it.  For the first tier weapon we could only have 500 triangles.  For the second tier weapon we could only have 1000 triangles.  And for the third we could only use 1500 triangles.

With those limits, I set off to make my models.  And this is what I came up with: (please click continue reading if you are currently on the home page.  Also remember to click on the images to see them in their full size.)

This is my super quick concept I did to get down my basic ideas. I did this drawing in about 8 minutes.

Here are my models finished and ready to be textured.

And finally the final result. Now, I only worked on it for two days, max time spent was about 10 hours.

I just had too much homework this week to put my foot 100% forward on this project.

My Triangle count:
Tier 1: 500 tris
Tier 2: 994 tris
Tier 3: 1490 tris
Rendered in Marmoset by 8 Monkey Labs

If I spent more time, what would I change? I would have done the normal maps in ZBrush instead of painting them in PhotoShop. There are also some corners I would have cut in my model to save poly count… I would have used these extra polys to make the hilt of the sword/axe more round. Each weapon has its own UV set and unique texture… Next time (because parts of the models are almost identical) I would reuse UVs on certain parts and therefore not have to texture as much (I redid the textures for every model), but at the same time I would have spent a little more time on my textures and improved the level of detail and quality (I only spent maybe 4 hours on them).

This was only my 2nd attempt at making game rez object(s). As I am a student and still very much learning… Hope you enjoy.

Hello gang.

Quick post today. I just want to show you a few things that I have been working on, the primary focus of this post being on “The Huntress.”

This model, The Huntress, is my fist real attempt at making a realistic human character using proper anatomy. Also, this is my first try using ZBrush to create a character in full from start to finish.

I am also going to show you a screen shot of the man I call Mud Face. Mud Face is a project for modeling class. The teacher sculpted and modeled Mud Face, but I am texturing him. Right now his skin looks too glossy and sweaty. This is very much a work in progress. I still need to work on the hair, eyes, and gloss.

My other projects are all taking quite some time. My updates are slower because all of these projects are taking longer. I still plan on updating when I have the time! Thanks for reading.

Remember to click the images to see bigger versions of them, and make sure to click continue reading so you can see the images in the first place. (If you are reading this off the homepage.)

Sorry for the delay, been kinda busy this week… I do not have time to do a daily inspiration like some blogs. But I like the concept. I have decided that once a month I will post a blog post on inspiration.

I will collect one image for every day in the month and make a large post out of it. So this post will have 31 images for 31 days in August.

I tend to be a bit of an image collector on the internet, and now I can share some of my stash with you.

Please click on a thumbnail to view the full image if you fancy it. (Make sure to click the “continue reading” to see the images.)

Enjoy.