Happy Christmas!

So here's the image that went out on my Christmas cards this year.  Enjoy!

I wanted to do the whole "A t-rex has short arms so can't do a thing" joke with dressing a tree.  Job done right?  I intended to do this as a purely 2D piece but was frankly laughably bad at sketching on my Wacom in Photoshop.  I probably need a Cintiq eh Santa?

I like:

• How I drew out seven different heads using pen and paper to explore the shape.  The tall snout came from this and that was me just trying something that pushed the norm.
• The tree, as it took many attempts to get the fidelity appropriate for the dinosaur.  It's got a touch of the monkey puzzle to it which suits with the prehistoric look.
• That I got to create a toon shader material in ZBrush for the end effect to help it be more illustrative.

I dislike:

• That he can still blatantly reach up and down enough to dress another couple of rungs of tree, but I was so pleased with the composition as it is.  Creative license.
• His texture's a bit wonky with the triangles, and after lighting and toon shading you can't tell his belly is yellower than the rest of him.  I'll push that more next time.

Oh and the inside of the card asks how he put his hat on.  A worthy question I'm sure you'll agree!

Introducing Ulala! (v1 3D print)

Greetings space cats!  This project is the intellectual culmination of a lot of the classes I've taken over the last two years.  The appealing character design from Mike Defeo's class combined with the 3D print knowledge from Joseph Drust's one.  Did you know you can't get a good Space Reporter Ulala figure?  Well, you still can't, but I have one!

So the combination process: I had Ulala finished from an earlier 2D piece, then I chopped her up for joints (after dressing her in trousers as her traditional short skirt would be too stiff to be useful when posing).  Shipped to Sculpteo to print (more on them later) and then painted with Games Workshop paints.  A bunch more involved than this paragraph would indicate!

Sculpteo then.  She's printed in their white plastic but only on their standard layer thickness (100-150µm).  I wanted the fine thickness (60µm) but apparently she's too fragile for that.  Now I chose to combine her pieces on a sprue to keep the cost down (Sculpteo wanted to charge me four times as much to print each piece on separate runs, so I made a sprue to force her to be printed in one go) but doing this didn't help isolate which pieces of her are too thin (probably the microphone).  I do intend to re-print her after working out the fragile bits and re-orientating parts to mitigate the tree-ring effect of 3D printing, but not for a little while.  I had thought to sand her down to remove layer lines but trying that had a tendency to give the material an almost furry quality, as though I was pulling apart a block of nylon, so I didn't do too much of that, so her fidelity is not as high as I would like.  This wasn't mitigated at all by three acrylic undercoats and two coats of colour paint and three layers of matte varnish.  Lots learnt though.  Oh boy lots learnt!

On to more pics...  She's about 16cm tall BTW, there's no real scale indicators in the pic.

I like:

• She's the best action figure of Ulala you can (can't) get, which is almost damning with faint praise, definitely not my intent!  I think she's just great.
• The outfit is a faithful recreation of the spy suit from Space Channel 5 part 2.
• A large proportion of pieces are reusable for a different outfit.
• That she stands on her own and can facepalm (two of my aims when making a figure).

I dislike:

• The thick layers.  Should there be a next time I'll work out why Sculpteo reported that the model was too fragile for thin layers.
• The muddy face paint job, it's a side effect of the thick layers I'm sure.
• The midriff joint.  It's big and invasive for what it does (adding the potential for some contrapposto swing in them hips).  Ball pop next time maybe as opposed to a Revoltech joint to give the capability for more sublte movements.
• The thigh joints.  I knew it would be touch and go how high the knee can lift upwards before the hips got in the way but it was a trade off between that and cutting chunks out.  I should've cut more.
• Paint chipping despite all the coats of paint and varnish to finish.
• She's too fragile to really get in there and pose like I might with a store bought figure.

More dislikes than likes but they don't have the same weighting.  She'll be posed, not too outlandishly, and probably stay that way, so the paint chipping and joint dislikes aren't such an issue, and from a distance she reads just fine, largely mitigating the layers and the face.  At some point I'll do a version two with the finer layer thickness.

Having said all that I think she's fab-u-lous.  Aah to have enough hours in the day to make the entire cast of Space Channel 5.  That is most definitely not a teaser for a future 3D print project.  I do not have that many hours in the day hah!

Memo to self:  Recreate the Max Fleischer - Betty Boop pose with her.

Tortilus Turntable.

Associated turntable for the Tortilus.

Tortilus Turntable from Tom Lewis on Vimeo.

Tortilus.

So this latest project has been in development (hell) for a long time. The initial idea and shape were conceived nearly three years ago but I lacked the inspiration and inclination to box model all the hard surfaces in ZBrush at the time. Paul Gaboury taught another Mastering ZBrush course at UArtsy and focused on hard surfaces expressly for making a mech. I marched to the beat of my own drum and didn't do a gundam like the majority of the class. I did a late 19th century steam powered exploration vehicle in the shape of a tortoise. I give you, the Tortilus:

Neat huh? There's a ton of detail under the shell which is rather obscured but you can tell there's stuff going on there which is good. Not millions and millions of polygons due to judicious use of bevels and dynamic subdivisions. New ZBrush stuff as it was a new course.

There should be crew. Think Michael Caine in Zulu but due to time constraints and wanting to do an illustrative end image rather than photoreal he's remained in 2013. Maybe one day he'll be in the balcony.

I like:

• The concept. It's mine. It's clever. It reads British.
• It's not a pretty lady or a humanoid! Variety is the spice of life.
• Getting on the course for free as an alum, seriously, they may be pricey but it was great to sit in on a course I took three years back!
• Using the ZModeler brush. I'm old enough to have box modelling as a skill; it's nice to have that supported in ZBrush.
• It should 3D print pretty well. There's very little that's a fudge, structurally.
• The blueprints in the background. You can see the flywheel. Made in ZBrush's own render passes.
• That the class including Paul Gaboury and Ryan Kingslien liked the finished product and concept.

I dislike:

• It all looks the same material, because it mostly is. Steam tractors are generally painted metal all over, but maybe the carapace could have been different in hindsight.
• You can't see the substructure because of the carapace or lots of other incidental detail at that angle (flywheel, gramophone horn, suspension springs, steering wheel, rear doors, it's all there)
• I haven't got a crewed up grimed up (this one's too perfect too but as it's an advertising poster I'm allowed it to look off the production line) version actually exploring through a jungle. Not enough hours in the day or Keyshot experience.

My next project shouldn't be too far behind. 3D print one too. Staaaaaay tuned!

Sphynx Warrior Turntable.

Associated turntable for the Sphynx Warrior.

Sphynx Warrior from Tom Lewis on Vimeo.

Sphynx Warrior 2015.

When I was starting to learn all this 3D stuff I had a short list of things I'd like to sculpt.  That list is now much longer, but sometimes I revisit items already cherry picked and ticked off.  This is one of those.  Four years ago I sculpted a "Sphynx Warrior"; a humanoid with a Sphynx cat head a sword and shield and chunky paws for hands.  I'll save you from an image of it, that description already does it too much justice.  Sphynx cats are amazing for sculpting though as they're hairless, and I could keep the accessories to a minimum to stop the project getting out of control.

While researching lightweight swordsmen, I happened across Angampora, a Sri Lankan martial art.  Looking reference up before the Internet must've been such a sleuthing job!  There's no way I'd've found out about Angampora from a library growing up in the 90s.  Anyways, perfect for the job:  Lots of lithe chaps leaping around with simple outfits and lightweight weapons.  In fact, the pose is largely taken (sword arm, feet kicked back) from a picture I found online.

I've rendered out two views, as I was intending just the right facing one as the hero image but that missed out on the sash knot (yeah I could've just mirrored the sash before posing) but it turns out the left facing view feels more dynamic.

The background is a recoloured Utah salt flats pic taken by me that is also about four years old hah.

I like:

• The anatomy.  Enough to not put "anatomy" in the "dislike" section.  The wrinkly Sphynx head is good, the incredibly rotated right shoulder is good from the angle I'm viewing from, the feet and hands suit the character.
• The knot on the sash.  It's again a real flow of geometry.  It's how you tie a karate belt!  I like doing ZSphere knots.
• The eyes.  They have concave irises and there's another spherical tool which is transparent over that.  Much better than just painting on a sphere.
• How the pose has a sense of motion and reality even though it's quite extreme.  Especially in the left-facing view.
• That it's a measure of how I have improved over four years since my last Sphynx Warrior.

I dislike:

• Not spotting the surface on the lower section of the trousers with its normals inverted, a feature extruding inwards on ZModeler introduced, which made the cloth texture noise displace in rather than out on the lower leg.  Fixed in the pics, after another two hours swearing at layers.
• Slight colour differences between the two views despite using the same layer stack!  Missed something subtle.
• The right-facing view has lost some of the movement that was there when sculpting, probably from when I pulled back the perspective distortion to make it less fish-eye distorted.
• The cloth is too clean.  I should try doing tattered cloth one time.  The lack of grime / wear and tear is a common "flaw" of my work.  The cloth is also missing seams and stitching.

Overall, very pleased, although my improvements are now less leaps and bounds between projects.  It's entirely possible that my next posted project is also an old one.  I'm back on Paul Gaboury's UArtsy class and it's giving me a chance to revisit a mech I left 20% done as I didn't know where to go with it.  A toss up between that and more Ulala!

The Moon.

So here's one of those thought experiments that looks more complex than it is: Can I make the moon based on NASA imagery data? A ZBrush sphere comes with a UV map like a Miller Cylindrical projection. To that add a topographical greyscale map of the moon, apply polypaint from texture, then mask by intensity. Now you have the surface very masked for low points, not so much for high. Inflate that, and badabing! Instant craters. This one's had that pushed way more than it is in reality otherwise you really wouldn't see the difference. To make it pop a little more I added a truecolour map of the Moon over the top of the inflated sphere, also from NASA, which pleasingly shared the same co-ordinate space:

Nice huh? Yeah it's precisely what displacement maps are for but this was a nice ZBrush-y way to approach it. Here's the video too but Vimeo has rather softened the image with its compression. Also as ZBrush spins the objects in the scene rather than the camera, the lights stay put while the moon moves. Slightly unusual for Earth based viewers of this blog!

Moon from Tom Lewis on Vimeo.

Ulala Turntable.

Associated turntable for Ulala.

UlalaTurntable from Tom Lewis on Vimeo.

Introducing: Ulala!

Another sculpt from the "list of things to sculpt".  One that had been on it a long time too!  Those who know me will know my favourite game of all time is probably Space Channel 5.  Part 2 technically as I can actually play that without digging out my Dreamcast from storage.  The star of this is Space Reporter Ulala.  She was due a good quality high resolution update.  Yeah this is an odd subject matter as I'm basing it on a 3D model already, but it's all from my own scratch (Space Gal's musculature and head) tweaked greatly rather than me finding the original SEGA meshes and subdividing those.  Here she is:

In the spirit of me getting projects to a "print and hang on the wall" level I've gone for a retro magazine cover which was a lot of fun to do and really matches her dorky nature.  Her outfit's colour scheme is her original Part 1 one, not the white one from Part 2, although as I have the model made, I'd like to think I can make time to do a whole series of Amazing Tales Space Reporter Ulala Adventures.  She may well get 3D printed too if I can work out hip joints I'm happy with and find a flexible material for her skirt.

I like:

• That she's Ulala, blatantly.  So this project is an outstanding success.
• Her index finger mittens.  Turns out these exist in real life so I felt okay with keeping them and not doing proper gloves.  I assume her original model had to keep the polygons down so four fingers and a thumb was too much of an overhead.  They add to her charm.
• The magazine cover.  I might do that as a finishing technique a lot.
• Her anatomy, especially the hints of knees, although having said that...

I dislike:

• Her stomach.  There's no hint of abdominal muscles.  That's a mistake.
• The angle of her on the cover.  She's got lots of curves going on and the view I picked is too flat.

Right, better get a turntable sorted, although the latest ZBrush has changed their export options for movies and I'm not a fan of that at the moment as I can't make them loop perfectly, which is a key point to a turntable!

African Drummer 3D Print.

And now for some more 3D printing!  My family and I lived in Nigeria for a couple of years when I was a kid and as such we have a decent number of knick knacks from then.  One of these is a collection of wooden figures doing various traditional bits and bobs.  I took a load of reference pics a couple of years back intending to "just" do the sculpt digitally but with 3D printing taking off I decided to go one better.  I got three copies of this chap printed out:  one for me, one for each parent.  My brother's missed out as his young son might enjoy the small parts too much!

Cute aren't they?

I like:

• Beige material - It looks almost patinated which really added to the hand made feel of the finished piece.
• No glue - It's all pegs, which makes them a little wiggly, which I think adds to the character (the head has some rotation in it for example)
• The reaction my parents had to them.
• The existence of 3D printing.  It's still bordering on magical getting physical output from my virtual toil.

I dislike:

• His stoop - due to a small amount of looseness on the feet / base connectors, a feature of the wiggle room.
• The elbows - Those joints were nearly impossible to get in.  Credit to Sculpteo's plastic that it didn't snap.

I needed to get this update published as the next project's just about finished!  Staaaaay tuned.