Model Sculpting Progress – Hair

Research

I decided to sculpt the hair of my model next and looked at a lot of materials to try and figure out how I wanted to approach it.

This video was incredibly helpful, and I thought I could definitely use it with some changes to get the look I wanted. I also ended up having to watch some videos on how curves worked in Blender though, as I couldn’t wrap my head around it for some reason.

Modelling Attempt

I started off making the bangs using the method in the video, although making it a lot thicker and witch less strands.

For the main body of the hair, I took a sphere and sculpted it into the block shape of the hair, and then added the buns too. I liked this look for the stylised, chibi approach I wanted to go for. However it was also due to time constraints that I didn’t try making it all out of strands.

Then I used the strand hair method to add more small hair details, as I was getting mildly carried away with making it look detailed.

I sculpted the hair with it looking like it was being blown to the side, due to the pose I had sketched out having the hair moved like that. I figured it would be easier to just sculpt it like that than try to move it all afterwards. I’m pretty happy with how the hair looks overall, especially with the added smaller hairs for details.

 

Model Sculpting Progress – Hands and Feet

I decided to next work on finishing the actual body of the model, as I didn’t want to start modelling clothes with the base still not done.

I’m pretty satisfied with how the feet ended up, which was due to the video tutorial in the blocking out blog post and the bit about how they modelled the feet.

As for the hands, it was just as hard and fiddly as I dreaded it was going to be. I found a very helpful video tutorial on how to block out/hard model the hands in blender and decided to try it.

It was a really helpful video, although I made the fingers too thin, forgetting I was going to be softening it and they ended up looking a bit weird.

Model Sculpting Progress – Details and Face

I had a look at an article about the process of somebody sculpting a character in blender, which was helpful to see the workflow and get a general feel and idea for how to go about things, and in what order.

I had a go at trying to sculpt out the face of the model, and I decided I definitely wanted to go with the more cute look with the big eyes.

 

Then I decided to join and remesh the body, so I could try and make it more comprehensive and smooth, instead of blocky and obviously different parts.

I then continued with the details on the face, adding a flat surface for the eyes and pupils. I also used a cube and extended it along the outside of the eyes, to create stylised eyelashes, as I had no real clue how else to do this part.

This is the video I watched on how this person did their eyelashes, as I was desperately trying to figure out how to do them.

Blocking out the model

The first thing to do is to block out the character, which I did here by using the primitives and then using the grab tool mostly to pull and push things into a shape I thought would be a good base. It was suggested to me before I started modelling, due to me being incredibly behind, that I should try shaping the block out instead of just leaving primitives.

Overall I’m pretty happy with how this block out of my character looks, especially since I have basically no clue what I was doing at the beginning or how to build it up. I need to practice breaking things down into basic shapes more.

I need to actually finish blocking out the hands, which I’m avoiding because I have no clue how to go about it at all. I used a lot of 3D model block out examples to help me figure out basic shapes and proportions. As well as using turnaround photos of people.

 

I also watched a video tutorial of someone making one for more help with mine.

3D Literacy Assignment 2 – Concepts

For the second assignment in the 3D Digital Literacy, the brief was to sculpt a cute character that follows two rules;

  • The polygon count can’t exceed 40,000 polygons in the scene
  • The characters cannot have hair, fur, or feathers unless they’re sculpted

I went to Pinterest and Sketchfab and searched around for cute character concepts, and gathered some I found interesting to try and get some inspiration from. I had initially thought it’d be interesting to look at doing a character concept that was an animal or something along those lines.

Some of the animal pins that interested me, especially the axolotl since my sister makes crochet axolotls to sell at markets. Additionally, the glass frog concept was adorable.

However, I’ve always had more interest in human characters personally, and I was struggling to come up with a concept for an animal character that I liked and didn’t feel was too simple. So when I was trying to come up with ideas I had started doodling some of the characters I had before and realised one of those characters would fit the brief pretty well, as I find her design quite cute.

My Pinterest Board for character designs

This is Melanie, one of my characters. The first image was me trying to draw her in the style of the cute chibi-ish designs. The second image is more how I usually draw cuter characters.

 

Animated Narratives Overview Post

Animated Narratives – Production

3D Short Film – Character Designs, Animatic and Pre-vis

Snapdragon Model 1st Basic Pass

Work-Load Split up explanation

Snapdragon Final Model

Snapdragon Texturing

Snapdragon Rigging and Controls

Animating Process

Last Day of rendering – Panic

Animate Narratives Portfolio Post?

Animated Narratives – Forest Party – REFLECTION

This Semester – Reflection

Final Animation

OneDrive Link

3D animation – Forest Party

This Semester – Reflection

Throughout this entire semester, I’ve been able to experience a variety of new things that I’d never really tried before, like digital art, animating in general and 3D modelling/animating! I’ve thoroughly enjoyed all of it, even working in teams and having to give presentations, and I can’t wait to continue developing all these new skills in the next few years of this course.

I do have to admit that I’ve been incredibly disorganised and have had more personal issues pop up in my life than I ever have had in a year before over this semester. I’ve had a few extensions that I’m desperately hoping I won’t need again. I will definitely not be moving house again next year, or any of the other stuff so hopefully, I can dedicate even more time to this course next year. As I would’ve loved to spend more time experimenting with the various new skills and things I’ve learned than I was, unfortunately, able to.

I loved the first half of the semester, as I was able to develop my art more and learn about the different aspects of animation or digital art that I’d never really learnt before, like colour theory and perspective! I was happy with my portion of the animation, although I know I can definitely improve and create much higher quality work if I continue trying to 2D animate!

I honestly think the second half of the semester may have been my favourite due to the 3D literacy module, as I think I am in love with 3D modelling. I love the details you can put into it and the work process is incredibly interesting to me. It’s definitely not a part of the animation that I thought I’d be interested in but I definitely am incredibly interested! I will definitely be looking into doing more 3D modelling independently as I want to get to a point where I can make incredible things with it! At the time of writing this for the Animated Narratives deadline, I haven’t done much in the blender due to moving house and time constraints. I have an extension for this assignment and will be moving on to work on it fully now for the next few weeks. From the small amount I have done, however, I think I will enjoy soft surface modelling/sculpting as well! 😀

Animated Narratives – Forest Party – REFLECTION

I am a lot more confident in using Maya and 3D in general than I was at the beginning of this semester and module. I was able to transfer everything I learned during the 3D literacy first module into working on the models for this one quite well! Before completing this module I had never attempted to animate anything 3D before, and now I have an animation which is pretty impressive for me overall. It’s not perfect, and I’m sure I could’ve done a lot differently or better but I’m happy I’ve managed to create something!

I won’t lie, I was incredibly behind on this module for quite a while, due to working on the deadline for the other module and then moving house into a new build where we had to floor and paint the whole thing too. So I had a lot less time to dedicate to this module than I would’ve liked, as this meant I didn’t get to experiment a lot with some of the things like IK handles, rigging and animating itself. I will absolutely be doing more of this independently over the summer as I’m really interested in 3D animation and modelling! So I’d love to become more experienced and confident in doing it.

I was already a lot more confident in modelling than before, however, this module helped me learn how to pose the models properly for rigging and how to paint skin weights and more! I am definitely not confident in painting skin weights, mine are still pretty interesting but they work well enough for this animation and I’m impressed I managed to do that at all. Definitely wish I could’ve spent more time on rigging altogether, as I’m just not understanding it past the basics of joints and parenting. So this is definitely an area for improvement which I intend to follow up on.

I feel like I’ve come a long way in terms of my confidence in working with a team, as I was able to make myself more readily available and I provided my team with constant updates as to my progress, even when I was falling behind. My experience with this group was definitely not one of my favourites, as towards the end everything seemed to fall apart due to some unorganization. However, I did love working with these people (apart from the last minute panic, haha) as they were incredibly nice and generally really fun people to talk to! I enjoyed meeting up with them to do work and sometimes just to hang out a lot!

Overall I’m pleased with the results, although I can see areas I’d definitely have loved to refine if i had enough time.

Animate Narratives Portfolio Post?

Final Animatic

Final Design of Snapdragon

Final Model of Snapdragon

Final Animations (Snapdragon and Leaves)

Final Renders of scenes I didn’t animate