WIP - Polar Bear - 3DAllusions

Secoh2000 · #1 (**permalink**) 05-13-2004, 04:51 AM

Yup It's me again,

It's been months since i've been able to sit down and model (with college gradation and all

), however; I've finally started a new porject: The Polar Bear. Yes you guessed it I decided to do a Polar Bear (What happened to the kangaroo you may ask... ran out of time/this appeals more to me at the moment than the kangaroo). I just started it tonight, think theres a total of about 1.5hrs in it so far. I hope to make this one semi-realistic (using maya fur and all). I actually decided to do a 3D model of a polar bear, after i completed my last art project for college. You can view it here:

http://flamedramons.tripod.com/Image...hernLights.jpg

I should have removed the background image before rendering

I've been using several shots of polar bears to help with the accuracy. I just need to find some good front and side images.... and some others which show the claws/paws of the polar bear.

I'd go to the zoo to get some good refrence shots of a polar bear... except the nearest zoo with polar bears is a several hour trip

Well thats all for now, this will be a very slow project (need to spend lots of time looking for a job). I'll be sure to post major updates as I get them done.

TheAllusionist · #2 (**permalink**) 05-13-2004, 05:05 AM

Looking good so far, is that image of a Subdivided mesh? Looks like a lot of geometry for this early in the game, unless it is a SubD test. Looks good, just thought I would ask the question. Great to have you back!

Secoh2000 · #3 (**permalink**) 05-13-2004, 02:53 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TheAllusionist

Looking good so far, is that image of a Subdivided mesh? Looks like a lot of geometry for this early in the game, unless it is a SubD test. Looks good, just thought I would ask the question. Great to have you back!

Yeah... should have specified that, it is a SubD test. I like to switch back from norm to SubD, allows me to get a better view of what the finished product will look like.

TheAllusionist · #4 (**permalink**) 05-13-2004, 08:12 PM

So far so good! I figured it was Sub-D due to the uniformity of the quads, but you could have quad divided your model or something. In any case, I would love to see your original control mesh as your work proceeds, I like to see how people model their initial cages, you can learn a lot that way, or I can anyways!

TheAllusionist · #5 (**permalink**) 05-14-2004, 03:58 AM

I tried to view your latest art project, but nothing but the Tripod logo came up. So I can't comment on it at this time!

Secoh2000 · #6 (**permalink**) 05-14-2004, 04:19 AM

total hours: 2 and 1/2

Just keeping a running check of my progress. I'm actually quite happy with how it is turning out. It would usually take me hours to get to that point... because i would start out and aim for perfection. This time i'm laying the ground work and it is saving me a LOAD of time.

this update just shows the beginnings of the rear legs, mostly posted so that you can see the control cages. Now i'm not a %100 sure if that is the proper way to building the cages, but from trial and error, I found this to be the easiest (as in building half the model then mirroring it, works great... for animals anyway).

Oh one more thing, before i forget. Does anyone happen to know where i can find diagrams/images of polar bears/bears? I'd like to see if i can find a muscular diagram of the Polar Bear. I'd like to use the diagrams/images as refrences.

Oh and TheAllusionist I forgot to mention, to view images on a tripod site, you have to copy and paste the link into a new window. I could have posted the image it here (3dallusions.com) but i wanted to keep the image clutter down.

TheAllusionist · #7 (**permalink**) 05-14-2004, 05:27 AM

Thanks for showing the control cage, I tend to get to much detail prior to running a sub-D routine, curse of using poly modeling in years past, it is amazing what little you have to do once you know where you have to have the detail when using Sub-D.

Your art piece looks good, is that pastels?

Secoh2000 · #8 (**permalink**) 05-19-2004, 05:20 AM

Total Hours To Date: 16hrs 30min

Been working on the body, and after a billion changes, I think i got the body style correct (really wanted to get the body hammered out). It doesn't need to be perfect since the skin will be covered with fur, however; I wanted to make sure that I had some bone/muscle detail visible on the model. I'll probably touch up the main body some more once i get the legs done, however; at the moment i'm happy with it.

Below is three images, the first one is an image of the mesh "smoothed" out, and the other two is the control cage. If i'm posting to many images, just let me know, and i'll cut it down.

Also, TheAllusionist, that piece is a pastel piece

TheAllusionist · #9 (**permalink**) 05-19-2004, 05:38 AM

Comming Along Nicely! What program are you using again? I think you are right in that the body doesn't have to be perfect, the face is what people will really focus on and then the paws I imagine. Schedule time to do the parts that provide the most impact and don't get burned out on the project.

At this early stage of the game, there is not enough activity on our site to make your image posting a problem, but we should come up with a plan to establish some rules for the future, we do hope the site will become active! LOL I would suggest creating a work in progress post that you update and when this format is to constricting feel free to post additional images to get across your point. We aren't hardcore rule makers here we want it to be a place where people can show off there work and get some feed back, go with what your concsious tells you, I am sure that will be fine.

Do you have a built in hair and fur module or are you going to use an add on plugin, or is it going to be a texture/shader? Keep us posted on your progress.

Secoh2000 · #10 (**permalink**) 05-19-2004, 03:40 PM

yeah your right the face is what gets the most attention. I just want this to be one of my better models to date, so I'm concentrating on how the entire bear is affected by it's skeleton, and i'm trying to make some detail in showing the "inner" workins of the bears sekeleton. I plan on spending equal amounts of time on each section of the bear... hopefully i can hammer out a semi-realistic polar bear.

What program am I using?

At the moment i am using Maya Unlimited 5.0.1 - Such a nice pogram, has it's own built in fur/short hair generator. Actually Maya 6.0 was just released, and it can now also do long hair (that would be nice to have).

What is nice about Maya Unlimited is that it comes with some fur presets, and Polar Bear is one of them (didn't realize that till after i started this project). So below is an image of the fur i'm going to use.