ARRRGH!!!

So this is what the chamberlain looks like with the displacement rendered out in mental ray. LOOK AT ALL THE ARTIFACTS MOMMY!!! Have no idea why it keeps comin out like that, I mean at least its recognizing the displacement map now, but still this looks like crap, not to mention the loss of detail. So close to giving up on the displacement and just rendering in muddy. For crying out loud, this is holding me back from modeling the robe.

Aughra update

So far, so good. Took the 'ol gal up to level 3 in Muddy, she's getting closer. I think she'll really come together at level 5 or 6. I've been pretty strict on pushing each level limit as far as it can go so the economy should pay off; I should be able to paint it- with a good amount of layers. UVs were done in Headus. I'm really thinking hair in another program would really make this a good bust shot. We'll see.

Aughra progress

Dark Crystal Aughra is coming along slowly but surely. Haven't had all the time in the world, but I'm a DC (Dark Crystal) fan, so at least I'm into this sculpt. The base mesh was made in Maya with painfully simple indications of eye and mouth holes. The sculpt, at Level 1, is on the left, it's relatively close to the reference, and it's not clocking in at a high amount of faces- at that, so the detailing will definitely be afforded enough overhead, resources wise. I'll do what I can for the hair although I'm thinking this is a candidate for hair application in ReLight (!) what with hair being easier to apply in there as opposed to Maya. Will continue. "What is the Great Conjunction?!"

Chamberlain WIP update

Alright boyos, here is the latest progress on the Chamberlain. Got some details going on in the face, got a throat pouch, more refined neck and torso, elongated the upper arms and "seperated" the little back arms so they aren't a stuck together mass. Next I'm gonna do refining and put on some skin texture and export out a displacement map (if I can ever figure out how to get mental ray to render it proper). Then I build some spikes for his back to be detailed in Muddy. Then I will pose him in Maya and build the torn cloak to fit the pose, probably all in Maya on the cloak, wrinkles aren't very hard to straight model. Only thing is, I wanna go up to level 6 for detailing, but my computer don't handle it so well, might have to add geo to the base mesh or something. All in all, this sculpt is goin pretty damn well, haven't had many problems that I couldn't fix and I'm very satisfied with the sculpt so far. This is definitely one that I am going to take to completion; shade, light and render.

Bug Eyes Sculpt #011

Wasnt feeling so great last night so I put about an hour into this guy. Made from a cube base mesh I made in maya. Same one I used for the last sculpt. Anyway in the end kind of looked like a Tharkk from John Carter of Mars, just without the tusks.

I dont think im going to post here anymore. Probably just post on my blog. I post on both blogs and it is kind of a waste of my time. I dont need two blogs. So from now on Im just posting on www.kahiart.blogspot.com. If you want to see what Im up to you can go there.

Mahalo nui loa,

Kahi

cube Head Sculpt #010

A quick sculpt from monday night I did from a cube base mesh. I lost detail when I had to go back to maya, make his UVs and take him bak into mudbox for detail transfer. It doesnt work quite right. I got a few strange deformations that I easily smoothed out but in the process I lost alot of detail. Lesson is, alwys do UVs on base mesh before you start to sculpt. Or do it befre getting into the detail higher levels.

depraved update

Well heres an update to the depraved character Im working on as well. I cut the legs off, and I need to do some concept work to figure out what I want to do with the legs. I did do a rebuild of him but I really hated the look of the legs. So for now he is cut right in half until I figure it out. This is going to be a slow project that I work on over the next several weeks.

Im also designing an all new weapon that will still have the captured soul elements to it.

The Goon #009

Im a huge fan Of the Goon by Eric Powell. His stories and his art go hand in hand. If you havnt read them, go do it right now. Im waiting. Have you read them yet? you wont be sorry. Or maybe you will be!

So last night I put an hour into this guy. All one piece of geo, while im glad I was able to pull it off, Im not sure I would do it again. Probably better to do it with the hat separate.

Im happy with the profile and thats probably it. It has a Goon feel to it, but I think the translation from 2D to 3D needs a little more nudging. I will be doing this again at some point and really make it look cool. For now, add it to the 1000 other things I have that are half finished.

Thin Alien head sculpt #008

Here is a quick sculpt I started while showing Makaha Billy a few things about sculpting in mudbox. I spent about 10 minutes on it just to figure out shapes. I had no intention of keeping it, but I liked the direction it was going so I put another hour into it.

Finding time to sculpt has gotten increasingly diffiult lately. Between watching baby and everything else I need to do that are just general life stuff, I think the only sculpting time im going to get is after 9 at night but its not to bad I can listen to Coast to Coast am while I sculpt. Keeps me inspired, and it's fun to listen to.

Chamberlain WIP

so here is my first WIP of the chamberlain. I'm thinkin at this point I might have to retopo cuz I'm gettin some areas that wont sculpt proper, like the hands, and because this guy is gonna need quite a bit of rez. Anyways... gonna do the disgraced version, his torn robes are gonna be seperate geo once I finsh his body and pose him.

Garthim head sculpt #007

Heres my take on the garthim head. The design of the face on the muppets were pretty simplistic so I added a bit to improve the design a bit to make it a little more realistic and less "Muppetey"

The body will be truer to the original desin. This was a cool idea for a project. Thanks Cole and Brian for coming up with this.

100 sculpts

No I have not given up on the 100 sculpts. I have not forgoten either.
I had some major symetry issues in the hands of the depraved charater and Ive been working on a way to solve it. I think what I will have to do is retopologize the character and almost completely restart the sculpt. I have spent nights going back and forth between, Mudbox, Zbrush, Maya and Topogun and nothing seems to work right when I transfer details to the adjusted mesh. So it isnt any wasted time because Ive have learned a hell of alot that last few nights. Unfortunately the solution may be to fix the symetry on a low level version of the model and begin the sculpting process anew. Hopefully I can get through that tonight.

february sculpt challenge

So here is a brilliant idea.... fan art sculpt of a character from Jim Henson's "the Dark Crystal". I call the chamberlin, and Brian calls Aughra and Kahi has the garthim. The mystics, landstriders, gelflings are still up for grabs. so I imagine the challenge will begin ASAP 2/9/2011 and go till 3/13/2011 thats a sunday, so you can show final on monday 3/14

Scythe #006 WIP Depraved WIP

experimented last night with my newly created vector displacement maps.
I did a test on the scythe which taught me alot. I need to push the forms of the faces a little bit more before I make them into vector maps. The scythe model is a stand in did in maya. I modeled it quickly and ugly, and I would like to remodel it with better edge flow. But this is the Idea im going for. I also realized I need to make more of a variety of faces.

For the depraved, here is the progress, Im not liking the feel of the feet. I need to figure out what I want to do with htose and Im still having mirroring problems witht he hands. Im thinking a complete resculpt may be the ticket.

old, well... semi old quicky

piff, piff, you young skaliwags! May I present to you one Mr R.J. Nicklesworth Tacklebottoms. Behold! A most glorious example of sculpting vision! If I do say so my self, Oh ho ho, and I do.

Yah sooooo.... I did this a couple of weeks ago and then my computer went KAPUT!!! so I'm posting it now, gonna take it a bit further; moustache, a comb over, jacket, and maybe a pipe.

Faces of reaped souls #005

Well, Friday night I was so exhausted from a long week I crashed fairly early and never even turned my home computers on. Sometimes a body just needs the rest.

Saturday after some beach time with the family I spent the day getting Mudwalker, a plugin for mudbox that allows it to send and recieve models quickly to other programs like Zbrush, headus topogun, maya etc. I had some symetry issues with the depraved sculpts hands. Ive decided that I would like to take that sculpt to full final, with pose, color, the works. So I was using mudwalker to help me use the smartresym option in zbrush. After many hours of testing I think I have a solution to my problem. unfortunately by the time I figure it out I really didnt have time to sculpt.

So on to the faces here. The depraved is going to have a weapon. A massive scythe which I did some quick concept work on and I will post it tommorrow.(I forgot to scan it from my sketch book). This scythe will have the souls of the reaped embedded in the blade, so instead of sculpting them I decided to make a few faces on planes that I can turn into vectors and just stamp them on in the end and touch up the detail.

Anyway I think I need to adjust either the 1st or 2nd one to make it look like a different individual rather than just a different expression. Whats fun about these it that they are quick and easy, and after doing a few I've really started to get a better understanding of sculpting a face out of plane and getting the shapes pulled out correctly.

Depraved sculpt 004 WIP

I wanted to get away from just a bust so worked on this guy for about an hour and a half last night. I didnt get as far along as I liked but do like the direction its going.

I will most likely work on him some more over the weekend. I need to figure out what i want to do with the feet and I really need to get into the hips and legs and figure out the forms a little better. The fingers need major TLC after trying to elongate them.

I really need to figure out what the best way is to distort the proportions in mudbox. Probably the joint tools, but they were giving me hell last night.

Well this is what depraved creature that popped up in the festering lump of rot that is my brain. Man I need to sculpt a happy unicorn with some rainbows or something.

sculpt 003 Alien head

I spent about an hour and 15 mintues on this guy last night. I just started pushing and pulling without a starting idea of where I wanted this to go. This was the result. Some kind of Alien , thing, guy, chick, who knows.

Concept sculpting is alot of fun. Finding out what kind of crap is floating around the cess-pool I call my brain is also quite fun.

I dont think he is evil at all. Just very ugly.

"The Neck" sculpt #002

Well sculpt number two was a pain in the butt. I made a quick base out of zspheres in Zbrush and imported the mesh to mudbox to sculpt. WOW, Mudbox really hates zbrush base meshes. I guess its because of the funky topology and the strange areas that intersect on the mesh.

Sculpt control was out the widow, and it was struggle to get the forms to do what I wanted them to. So lesson learned. If I build a zsphere base I need to retopo it before I take it into Mudbox. Or instead of being a lazy bum, just make the base in maya. Anyway I spent about 2 hours on this and most of that was in frustration.

Old One Eye

I was looking at some Joe MAd art and decided to do something more stylized than I normally do. So I sculpted Old One Eye here. Took me about 2 hours in mudbox. I got tired and decided to call it a night right around the time I started to work the hair. Had a ton of fun doing this though. And he's totally like 37.5% less evil than the stuff I usually do. I guess Mark and his goodie-two-shoes ways may be rubbing off on me....or maybe not.

So I decided that this is sculpt #1 of 100 sculpts in 100 days. Wanna see what I can get done by around mid may. Lets see how many I can actually get done in that time. Should be quite a fun challenge for myself. Get my mudbox skills rocking, and and a nice portfolio of work. Maybe even inspire a couple fools along the way.