Summer Project - deadf0x

Because I enjoy deamau5 music, but just a couple of his many songs are... let's just say, "OC inappropriate," I decided to blatantly copy parody some of his album covers using a fox instead of his mouse...this way it's kind of like saying I don't approve of everything about him; just enough to mess up his covers or something (I don't completely understand what I just typed either)

The first album cover, Random Album Title, looks like this:

 

Here is what I did in Maya- (the first image is an in-progress shot; the second one is the final render)

 

This is somewhere in the middle of my work, I wanted to change the camera angle and make the eyes more pop-out-ish - Also, I know the mouth is wrong but I could not figure out how to make the smile NOT stretch all the across the circle (I think the artist used a different program than me)

Here's the final render, completely done in Maya-

Here is the album cover finished in Photoshop - All I did in Photoshop was add text, darken the image a little bit, and add a little more pinkish highlight to its right eye- I wish I could have found the exact font for the subtitle, but I did the best I could (according to the original album cover the letters were supposed to be more spaced apart but I was also supposed to keep the subtitle the same horizontal length as the title)

After that I wanted to do his next album, for lack of a better name-

 

I was able to use the same model as the first cover I recreated, all I had to do was stretch out the eyes a little and move them closer together then change the material colors - The lights took a while to get right though- and it took me a minute to remember how to get shadows in there

Here is the light setup I ended up using - I was glad to use the knowledge I gained about Spotlights and Light-linking from Digital Tutors

 3 ambient lights, 3 spotlights, and 1 directional light - I made it so two of the ambient lights ONLY affected their corresponding ears, and the two spotlights shining on its eyes only affect the head-sphere

 The reflection, however, I could not do well in Maya; here are two tries-

 

This one I was simply trying to get a reflective surface - I used a Blinn and turned it black and upped the reflectivity settings 

This one was closer to the album cover but not yet what I wanted - I gave up after a while and decided just to add the reflection in Photoshop =P

 Here's the final image - The only things I did in Photoshop were the text and the reflection (I simply duplicated the head, flipped it upside down and lowered its opacity)

These two covers took 1 day each to make (and when I say one day I mean sitting on my bed for at least 5-8 hours each) - I learned that even though the modeling was quite easy, the lighting took 95% of the time to fix - I am glad I learned about Lighting and how to use the Render View from Digital Tutors!

The next cover was difficult - I gave up trying to get the eyes and mouth right - Now I am curious as to what program the designers used to make 4x4=12

I ended up accidentally creating a cool texture for the teeth by tweaking a "bulge" texture- Also, I felt too lazy to try to get the other eye right that I made him wink instead - This model consists of a sphere and NURBS curves I converted into polygons then smoothed - This is the first model so far that I spent more time in Photoshop making than Maya because I spent a day trying to get one eye right trying various ways

All I needed was an ambient light for my lambert because the green surface shaders appeared in the render whether there was a light or not

Final render used:

Final Photoshopped image - (text and spots added)
(eh, elf almost rhymes with twelve)

And because I saw some of his single song-art different colors, I imitated it in Photoshop

 

 

And this has nothing to do with Maya, but I did do another cover just in Photoshop - It fits in with the subject of this post

Reference album - Meowingtons Hax tour trax-

 

 My rip off version that proves I still have a lot to learn about foreshortening

So, yeah...this project gave me experience in both Photoshop and Maya - Most of it having to do with lighting rather than modeling, which I didn't mind - Trying to imitate the lighting was challenging but fun

Class Intermission!

Yes, I know this blog is for 3D modeling, not Photoshop, but now I have a chance to gripe about the length of time I spent in the maclab and its inability to let people go

If it makes no sense, it's because my brain is dead!!! (temporarily of course)

Finishing the Dragon 2

Before I start let me take the time to mention the numerous program crashes my friends have had on these computers...

I feel your frustration!!!

I got really lucky and landed a computer that barely anybody uses, so it actually did not crash when I tried to use it because it does not store multiple user's preferences on it

Therefore I am the exception rather than the rule that I completed the model mostly the way I wanted because the computer I used actually handled my dragon without crashing every time I select an object

By the way I used the mac side on that computer

Moral of story - Try picking a computer nobody uses and see if it works better (?) maybe?

Anyways...

Sorry about the huge progress jumps you are going to see here -

 

  

Back legs have been sculpted since the last update

I used a stencil that came with Mudbox to do the scales (you can see the frozen belly and spikes - he fell into a refrigerator for a couple of hours and when I took him out I had to defrost him)

Then I used stencils and PTEX paint layers to color it

 

 When I tried to PTEX the head it turned all blue and I could not see the color I was trying to add - All I did was press the "up" button and then it turned un-blue and worked again, so I have no idea what went on there

Here is the finished model - I do not know what to do with it, the background or anything, but at this point I do not really care much - I just want one or two hours of sleep and then to get up and study for my two Bible finals I have today

 Yes, I did model the tongue underneath there

Raaawr..

 I enjoy graffiti-ing on my models after I am done

 If I could do anything differently on this project, it would be to not build the wings out of curves - They were my ultimate modeling and texturing downfall - Also it is disproportionate so I would use an image plan to model on in Maya before I start

Also, I would have done more if I had more time, but I do not and also have little Mudbox experience, so I guess this is adequate for my first on-my-own model

UV-less painting is the savior of the world!!!

Verdict - I like Maya WAAAAAAAAAAY better for modeling - Mudbox is okay for texturing and coloring - that is if you have a super megacomputer that can handle objects with many polygons

Finishing the Dragon 1

Here is the dragon at the beginning of the day -

Here is what I accomplished

I realized I had forgotten to bring in the wings

I am having some random trouble sculpting parts of the dragon - I really need to use the grab tool on his front claws to make them curve downward, but the grab tool will not work on the arms and I do not know why - maybe I can fix that with posing

Also because I built it from a curve I cannot separate its fingers without totally destroying its hand - So I will have to accept that its hands will not be completely accurate to the model

How to make a Derposaur

Yet another obstacle in the road to finishing my Lego dragon...Oh well, I had fun posing it!

The T-Rex tutorial! ...Or, as mine came out to be, a Durp-o-saur tutorial...  First, we created a basic mud-dino - Then we added some detail through sculpting

Between videos three and four, the tutor Justin added what he called a "little" detail - (ha, LIES) Basically in video 3 his T-rex looked like mine, the one on the right - Then, in video 4, the one on the left appeared and I was immediately humiliated - I am sorry; I just do not know the muscle structure of a 6,000 year old beast

 So, instead of carefully trying to follow his realistic approach, I decided to unleash a hideous being upon the world instead

 During the stencil-creating tutorial, which I had bad luck with on the dragonfly tutorial, I failed at making a good-looking spine texture and instead created a spikelike stamp - Since I went to the trouble of trying to copy his stamp, I went ahead and inserted it anyway:

Then Justin had me make this lovely displacement map!

...But not after a quick but harmless program crash!

After coloring it and adding elf ears and a goatee, I realized it kind of looked like a demon...

But that did not stop me from creating half a dozen disturbing poses with it!!!

Here is its skeletal structure

Now can I get back to my dragon? PLEEZ?

Also all my finals (including the dragon) are due on Tuesday so this weekend should prove interesting...

Building Lego Dragons out of Mud

I attempted to re-render my "final" render from the last project before I turned it in:

I took away the clearly unrealistic fox from the scene and turned the light red - I also attempted moving the bike over to fill some of the empty space but it did not look very good - I also made the sky a little bluer and lightened up the street, which previously resembled an oil slick

Now on to the next project:

We picked out old toys to model - I took a dragon my history teacher gave me and will attempt to model it!

 

I modeled the base of my toy in Maya - It is a Lego-dragon (actually, it's Mega Bloks, but whatever...)

Here is how it looked in Maya (mostly built from curves then converted to Polygons)

Here is how it looks now, in Mudbox - I learned that you have to have all of the UVs in one square, with none overlapping one another before it can be moved correctly to Mudbox - Also, I kept wondering why it appeared in Mudbox super-blocky, and tried sending it over several times (frustrated), until Josh reminded me you have to subdivide it to smooth it (he he dur da dur I am an idiot)