Sable0411

Don't know anything about that. Interesting I suppose, but I have made some significant modifications. Completely redid the hair from scratch, using the overall shape and size only as a guide. I tried a few different techniques on how to sculpt it, one of which was setting up blocks, cutting out the overall shape, cutting those apart to try and shape them, and recombined them. And that was a bad idea that seemed good at one point. So I went back to another technique I had seen elsewhere, using curves to make the hair. I had tried it previously, but I didn't pursue it because I was annoyed I think that I couldn't move the entire curve all at once, so it seemed limiting to me. The next time went a whole lot better.

Yeah seems that way. And as I right now am learning and prefer Houdini, basically makes this completely useless to me. Not to mention, I did set it up last night, and really didn't like it. For one, the install process is really obtuse, not to mention lacking a true installer in the first place, it installs when you extract it, which is kind of weird. Then loading it was a bit counterintuitive, with having to manually activate a number of features you even want available, including the editor, and starting the editor the first time took forever, though it did go faster on subsequent attempts. But messing around with Ghepetto, which is their system for importing and setting up characters with skeletons, yeah it is highly limited.

This is something. I'm going to tinker around with it tomorrow, see how it's set up. Does anyone know what all it's compatible with yet? There is information on importing from Maya and 3DS Max, but not any other programs.

Next project, I decided I'm going human again, and starting off with working on the head. This time, I'm just straight up doing a Self-Portrait, as I can get pictures of myself easily enough, obviously. My intention is to stylize, but for now, it's keeping it's realistic proportions. And the hair is a mess, but I was mostly going for the roughing, based on various tips and tutorials I've seen, I intend to more or less reconstruct it out of preshaped pieces.

Worth noting, and I'm not surprised by this, but that license has actually expired at this point, so just using maya 2013 for any length of time isn't too much of an option either. However, I will do some tests with it compared to what I've done so far in Houdini.

Okay, good to know. At least the aftereffects and photoshop I have down, though I don't actually have Aftereffects on hand unfortunately, that wasn't part of the suite I could get in school. I'll check out those other 3, Mari, Fusion, and Substance designer just to read up on them at some point. And yeah, you are right, and I've seen someone try and make that argument before, but doesn't matter if Autodesk won't let it happen

Well, I'm not a student anymore, so I wouldn't be able to get a hold of those at this point. And I just double checked, their policy is is pretty set on being a student, vs where you can be a hobbyist and still get the education level for 3DC. Well, actually, doublechecking it, as I had downloaded something back from them when I was in school, one of which was Mudbox I remember, and turns out I did download the 2013 version of Maya back in the day, actually. At the time, it was in the middle of school, and I didn't actually have any 3D Classes, so I was simply trying to learn it myself, as I am now, but had less success and school work prevented me from focusing on it. So, I could use that if I need to for awhile, I suppose, but any more recent versions, I can't get those.

Pro would be the ideal, though admittedly I'm completely not in the realm of that right now. But, yeah, if that's the case, learning the ones that would apply later one would probably be best. As of right now, due to it having a proper trial version I don't have to pre-setup for a subscription, I'm trying out Houdini first. And I like what I've been seeing so far, especially coming from blender. Also has plenty of tutorials to draw from, I'm signed up with pluralsight, so I can use their Tutorials as well, though some of it I've been figuring out on my own, which I like, means the tools aren't completely unintuitive. Though, getting my UVs applied properly did take a bit, but I did figure it out in the end. Right now I'm brushing up on all the facets of how they handle bones, probably will do that for the rest of the day, but it definitely looks hopeful. I still would maybe want to look at the others, but for that price, and looking at the features, seems you get access to a lot more for the Houdini Indie vs Maya LT. At least from what I can tell without being super well versed in everything.

So, as I think I said when I first joined, I got into 3D Modeling for the eventual end goal to do something with it. 3DC thus far has proven to be a great choice for getting started in my learning, and for any actual modeling I need to do, I doubt I will need much else, probably. I could always move up to ZBrush, but at the moment to really do that. However, despite this, 3DC is built for modeling and texturing, and that alone. To use it further, I have to add a 3D Animation program to my repertoire. However, this seems to be proving a whole lot harder to figure out what to go with. I've been trying out Blender, and I know if I worked with it long enough, it would become second hand. But I am also still in a learning phase for this part of the pipeline, as it were, so I don't have a predisposition toward anything, so it would be better to have a selected program I can learn from the start and not have it conflict with preconceptions of how other programs work. It's just really hard to figure out what is a good starting point. First is obviously a price range, as I'm sure you know is that animation programs are vastly more expensive, which I shouldn't just be buying something outright anyways, I did try 3DC before I bought it, if to a very basic level, before I even started out at the education price before moving up to the Pro once I was sure. And admittedly there are free trial periods, it's just when faced with what comes after, I'm a bit cautious of trying something if I'm not going to be able to get it afterward. The ones I have tried were Shade3D, which I was turned off of immediately as there are practically no tutorials and those that are there cover only modeling, with the animation and rigging, particularly advanced methods not covered, or possible not even covered. I looked at Lightwave, but it's setup looks somewhat obtrusive like blender a bit, but at least it has plenty of documentation. Though, I also have heard rumors about Lightwave being on the out, and not as good as it used to be. Then there are the big guns in Maya and 3DS Max. But, at this point, those are also subscription based products, and I have my issues with jumping into that, even if the full program would be vastly too expensive regardless, so a subscription is kind of the only way I could use it for any length of time. Either way, I'm just looking for what anyone else might be using, suggestions, recommendations, and what not. Edit: I guess to add a bit of specification, I will note that going into games is the end goal as a consideration. Though, I intend to do some simple animations to EXTREMELY short cartoons to brush up skills along the way.

And one final update. I added the strap going off of how I best thought it should work, took a pill primitive, flattened it out, and using pose I wrapped it around the shape. I also whipped up a hook for the end as well, maybe not the right type, but I had a good reference picture for one. Also, I set it up that if done correctly, this thing should be able to work, as I made it into separate pieces so it should in theory be able to have the locking mechanism slide back and forth, and the main hook swivel around. May not have needed to go that detailed, but I felt like it would be good practice.

Man, these are really great designs, they have a lot of character to make them pop, even though most of them would never be able to change expressions. Capturing very much what I would consider a pixar-like quality, congrats.

Wasn't expecting to have this ready so soon, but here is an updated sculpt that should be the final version, recreating all the features of the original design. I am extremely pleased overall how this turned out, and I did clean up the back stuff. I ended up separating the problem areas with Vox-Hide and Object-ify, so I could be more thorough. Really love that feature. Btw, I also did this design all with my tablet, and it worked rather well, so I think I'm converted on the method. I'm also including my original sprite work as well, at least the front, the side was a rush job to just get the width right, as a comparison. I was a pretty big spriter in the past, I'm interested in trying to translate my sprite designs to 3D, there might be something there. Though, that won't be my next project. Also, I won't be able to mess with this again until later tonight, so I have a question. That bit at the top is meant to have a kind of carrying strap/lanyard on it, and I was wondering what would be the best method for setting that up. I figure I could just have a thin piece extending out that I mold an opening to place around it, but if I were to take this somewhere else, I was wondering if that was the best method, or are there any other options.

This week got busy for one reason or another, so I decided when I hopped back on 3D Coat, I wanted to take a step back, again, and make something basic, a small item. Basically to try and reinforce some techniques I had seen, and the basics. Did it on a Digivice design I made years ago. Yes, I'm a nerd. I still haven't gotten proper hard surfaces down. Well, somewhat, it looks pretty good on the grip there, but I spent a while on the top rounded area. Basic texture colors applied to give an idea what the finished product will look like. And after this, I need to go to bed, ended up starting this at about 8:30 or so and hadn't stopped since. *Also, taking a step back and looking at the side view, I see some areas where it doesn't go straight down, so I'll have to correct that later*

Hm. I'll give it a shot. Admittedly, I did readjust my set up and tried just using it earlier, and it went well enough I suppose, though I still need to work on my setup as I can't maintain it as effortlessly as I can with a mouse for an extended period of time.

Ugee UG1910 full color monitor drawing tablet. For actual drawing I have no problem with it, it works perfect. However, I'm not getting the feel for it yet with 3D Coat. To be fair, I've never been great at getting pressure settings perfect for me, which might be some of my problem. Also might just be my general set up, I have a good desk for working at the computer and using this tablet, but using it in quick tandem with my keyboard isn't all that practical as of yet, and that's something I really require, as a lot of my work and learning so far have been careful manipulation of things using shortcuts and what not. Maybe with some rearranging, I can fix that, but just my experiences so far.

I have been switching between it for this one, and I've tried to get the main base set up as much as possible with voxels and getting these sharper details in surface. Seems like that is what I should be going for at least. However, what I need to do is start getting the feel for setting up more textures and that sort of thing.

I have a question to throw out about this, just in terms of, I do have a tablet, and on my current project I tried using it a bit, but it didn't actually feel all that good. Is it a thing that you only use for finer points and detailing, or all the way through? At best I know there are some lines I could probably get a lot steadier using a pen, but otherwise I personally prefer working with a mouse at this point.

I decided to back off from the previous project, not sure I'm ready for armor overlaying a body yet, so I'm going for something that, comparatively, is simpler in setting up, but I'm going to force myself try and be very detailed. And it's looking like it's going to be big. The head alone is 2 and a half million triangles or whatever at this point. I trued to bring it down, but I lost almost all of my detail and just to redo it. I will probably need to keep it separate from the body, as that is where the degradation occurred

Alright, starting the next project. As I previously said, I am going to do a human-type character this time, so I started from scratch again for the base, and decided to complete the base to maybe use for future work. And I am very happy with how this model has come out, especially compared to my first effort. I will say right now that my workflow is shaping up using primitives to build up the overall shape, so I can control placement with precision, and then smoothing and otherwise making it come together with sculpt tools. I also prefer to set things into separate layers, so the arms and legs were all modeled separately before I combined them with the main body. I'd actually like to keep the more separate in the first place so they are more easily modified, but I haven't found out a way to get around the creases.

Well, I'm done with the Deino Model. I have rigged it in Blender, but I think I messed that up a bit due to the way the feet are, and frankly, while I think it is generally pretty good, I know there are errors and oversights with this Model, so really working further with it probably isn't that great of an idea. I'll just try redoing in the future if I choose to use it for something, otherwise it was a good learning experience on learning how all the main features work, and getting it into Blender to work on it for animation. I will probably start a new project tomorrow morning, this time aiming for a humanoid figure.

Ah, okay... I wonder how I did that, I don't recall ever making such a change. Guess I'll just poke around until I can switch it back, heh. Thanks for the replies, I'll keep all of this in mind for future projects.

Well... I might have simply used the wrong word, but the kind of red curve that is visible to indicate the strength of the brush. That was upside down, for whatever reason. And definitely still is. When I increase the strength, it flips back to the right side, but then it promptly turns back around. It isn't affecting my work honestly, but it is something of a graphical error of some kind in the interface. As far as the other thing, that probably was it, but I must of hit the right thing to shut it off as I can now switch between brushes without any problems.