UVing take 2

Just checking in, I got side tracked from doing the UVs before since we had to change some things up. I had to go back on a few of the models and make some changes. That set me back a day.

Anyway been back on this for the last 2 days and it's going ok so far, by no means am I finished but I at least have an idea of what I'm doing now. I'm currently manually unfolding all the shells since I get some funky deformation when I auto unfold.

The way it stands, it's gonna take a while but It's gonna get done.

I dunno how Spence does it so fast. he's like a...a UV Ninja or something.

Anyway it's all good in the hood.

whoopsie

UV's be a messy business. As you can see. I started trying to sort out the UV's on the Hitman, however immedietly ran into a spot of trouble as the tutorial is for perfectly symetrical geometry, however, the Hitman's head is not that, due to the hair.

I worked around that, kind of. Anyway I made a start but it's proving to be a right git so I'm going to tangle with the Ninja first since he is a simpler mesh. Once I've done that I will have another pop at the Hitman since I'll hopefully have a feel for it after doing it once before.

Back to work

I was testing this base skin texture that Lewis is using on Pirates. He was kind enough to show me how it works but I never had a chance to try it properly with the dissertation going on. Since that's all done now I had a pop at it.

This one looks `ok` but this is with a simple colour an occlusion and a directional light. It's got some potential because you can play around with the specular and all kinds of funky shit.

I also just put a blinn on the shades for the sake of this render but I actually think they look pretty good with just the blinn.

I will probably play around with the settings of it a bit later and see if I can get it looking tasty, but this may be the simplest way of getting a skin on these dudes.

The month in summary

I have not posted over here in quite a while, I have been posting but most of the activity is over on the group blog. More often than not I can't be bothered to repeat myself after posting over there so I guess I'll just sum up everything that's going down in a post here.

The last post I made was before I even started the head for the Hitman so as you can see in the screenshot from above and over at the group blog he was finished a little while ago.

Since then I have been working on my dissertation and doing some research into my next jobs for Whack'd.

I started researching blend shapes but put that on hold since Ferhan seems to be taking the lead on that, I may need to help him get some expressions sorted out but on the technical side he's got it covered.

We also need to start getting this texturing done and it falls to me to try and texture the characters I built, and since I don't know much about texturing I have been researching unwrapping UV's and simple texturing. I'm also planning to look a little at bump mapping but after talking to Sam about it I'm feeling sceptical.

http://cg.tutsplus.com/tutorials/3d-art/how-to-uv-a-character-model-in-maya-2009/

http://www.dreamflyght.com/characters/MayaTutorial/WrittenTutorial.htm

Here are some links to fairly simple if not long winded tutorials I have found to help me out, with any luck I can crack on testing out the methods over the next couple of days and I'll have something more to show.

The Final Battle

Woah been a while since I posted on my individual blog. Once blogger gets through uploading images to the team blog I can never be bothered to repeat it over here. Hell I'm in a decent mood though so lets do this.

Since last I emerged from my hovel I have finished the Target model, and did it by the end of the week like I said I would. I have since moved on to the `Final Battle` which is the model for the Hitman. I figured this was gonna be the hardest of all these mopes but fortunately it is so far going smoothly. Still plenty of time for it to cock up ey?

Oh you want me to reflect on these two models? whatever you say chief. The target model came together fairly nicely in the end. I am not quite satisfied with the hair and the fact that I could not get the shirt to have a little overhang over the boxer shorts. Still I needed to move on and judging by Ferhans rig so far it should work out pretty good. He's having a heck of a time painting weights, I would like to help him out but I don't know the first thing about painting weights. Hopefully we can get it so the shoulders and chest deform properly.

Hitman as I said is going smoothly so far. I managed to sort out his suit jacket today, I thought this would be a really daunting thing to do but it worked out pretty nicely. The upper part is connected to the rest of the torso while the lower part I extruded out and shaped so that we can have it billow in the wind or something. I can't really reflect too much on this since it isn't finished yet.

Now I believe I earnt myself a cup of tea.

Until next time weary travellers.

Memo for me, myself and I

Just a list of stuff I need to finish up on the Target model before the end of the week and before I move onto the Hitman. This is just for me so I don't forget, If I write it down I'll lose the paper.

-Hair (Finish it, add quiff)
-Face (Just one more general tidy up, Try and fix anything that doesn't look quite right, bits that are pinching)
-Put the head on his body
-Shirt (Crease as best I can in maya, overhang)

-If I really need to take it into zBrush and see what I can do (I don't want to though)

- One final check before I pass it on to Ferhan or Dan to rig and get started on the Hitman.

Resolutions

Merry new year. First post of 2010, simply because it's the first time I've had anything worth posting since my last update. Work has been slack over these last couple weeks. I could blame it on the season and holidays or whatever but that's all bull**** cos at the end of the day it's on me.

Despite my recent lack of work ethic I don't feel too bad, Christmas was alright and New Years past by without too much fuss. I've been doing some work over the last 2 days as well and making some progress which is good. I kept saying I would have the target dusted by the time we went back but since that's monday it's looking doubtful. Been having troubles with it, but it's not far off so it should just take a few more days work, which is good.

No doubt I'll be more productive on the Hitman since we'll be back at coolege and unable to avoid work.

Anyway so some screenies of the model, it's going ok, for some reason the head won't mirror properly so that's why it isn't. Also the eyelids are a son of a bitch to do, it is a much more accomplished face than I have modelled before though and will hopefully be friendly for our resident riggers and animators. Managed to keep it all quads so hopefully it won't pose any problems.

Left to do...

-Solve the mystery of the faulty mirror tool

-Give him some proper hair

-Make the shirt, with collar and all.

-give him a neck...duh

that's pretty much all that's left for this guy, I think I can probably avoid zBrush altogether with this guy, although if I can't crease his shirt a little in maya then I will ship him over briefly.