Animation test

This is a shot test. I used wrap deformers to drive a very high poly mesh. I'll keep posting updates on this shot as more details are added. I'm just about ready to start on the actual animation of this short. I still need to tweak some of the storyboards to get the timing just right. I just know that I'm in for one hell of a rendering time. The poly-count of a single shot averages by thousands of polygons, not to mention the effects, textures and lighting I need to add still. But I hope for the best and that it will turn out right. Shoot me an email, or post a comment!

Pistols

Alright, I decided on pistols instead. I wanted to create something that has an old Western feel to it, but wanted to add something different as well.

I added a lot of detail, but I like the double-barrel idea. The way I imagine it is, when the trigger is pulled, the cocks fire with a 50% time delay, that way there will be two shots for one squeeze.

Sword

I'm not sure if I'm going to go with a sword for this character. But I modelled one nevertheless. It took me about an hour to model. I used curves and then used the BevelPlus tool to get the shapes on the blade. I haven't spent any time on the textures yet. I just slapped a blinn on it with a procedural sky map as reflection. I'm considering modeling a cool pistol or gun instead.

Animation Short

I decided on a short animation project based around a character. No deep story lines, just raw CG. I started with a few thumbnail sketches...

I was looking for a streamlined action-based character. Something I can really have fun animating.

While drawing the thumbnails, I considered some of the dynamic elements - I don't want to spend too much time on things like cloth dynamics, so I gave her skin-tight suit.

Once I was happy with the design, I painted the character to establish color and refine some of the details.

I kept working and sculpted the character in ZBrush. This step was quite easy. I used subtools to extract the clothes. The next step would be to re-topologize the entire character and reduce the poly-count for export to Maya.

If you have any questions regarding these steps, please shoot me an email. In the future I will post some video tutorials on painting and sculpting...