Anyway, thats not what bugged me. What DID bug me was when the file would refuse to change anything when I tried to make any changes, how a huge clustereff of dots appeared around every point and the fact that since nothing would work, even when Dave took a look at it, I had to start the whole thing from scratch. To say I was miffed was kind of an understatement.
However, I try not to stay in a fit of McDonalds fueled sadness for long (seriously, that McDonalds was good) and decided to look at the positive. I hadn't liked my model at all, thinking it was too bulky and not the cartoonesque skinny Frodo that I often doodled. The legs and arms in particular had bugged me for this reason. So now this was my chance to try and recreate that.
I tried other methods this time. Rather than use the extrude tool, I tended to give the cubes I used segments to try and give the character shape when need be, especially the back and waist.
The arms and legs are on their way to getting thinner and more cartoon like. I even managed to add in the tail this time and separated the ears further from the head so that I'll be able to make them flap during movement. The snout looks much better as well. However, I still had some issues with this version of the puppet, such as the body shape. It makes him look like he is slouching and thats not what I want for his character. He's more energetic and confident so I needed to modify his stance. I also didn't like how thick his neck was. It seemed out of proportion with the rest of the body.
Today, I have made better progress although again I needed a lot of help. Hands and feet are now added. The body has been seen in the hyperNurb setting and looks great. Originally, it looked like a starving animal, ribcage included. There was a lot of bother with the body, getting everything to be smooth. Even Dave was having trouble and both of us spent the majority of an hour scratching our heads over it. It was EVENTUALLY sorted after a lot of trial and error on Dave's part (Thanks again!)
He also started me off on the dog's face, advising me to redo it in a dot-to-dot method to avoid having to join a lot of cubes together. I might need to get more help on it tomorrow as I'm having some trouble with it but as you can see, I put the two files together to see how they would look and I see it as a HUGE improvement from the original file. Some bits still need tweaking but I'll be a wagon wheel if it doesn't at least look a bit better than it did originally.
I think Frodo's been coming along great, no matter how much you put yourself down.
ReplyDeleteI do think you should give your HyperNURBS a bit more love, though. It can help... just when you look at your model in horror, and think all is lost... slap the HyperNURBS on and do a quick render, and it helps to restore your faith! Check it with HyperNURBS super-regularly, it really does help to get a preview as you progress. :)
The head looks okay, but I agree with Dave, it might be a bit easier to get it to look like your original concept using the dot-to-dot method. Short of that, you can use the knife tool in loop mode and (or line mode for more control) and just select whole lines of points, drag them out a little, sort of round off the face and get rid of that blockiness.
(Also, semi-random: I don't like the welding tool, I find it's easy to end up with surprise triangles when using it. Maybe lift the seperate cubes away from one another, use the knife in line mode to make sure they have the same number of points at the edges to be joined, then use the create polygon tool to merge the two halves. Long winded, but works better in my experience. But shhh. Don't tell Dave I dissed the welding tool. ;) )
Otherwise it's looking fantastic! Can't wait to see him when he's finished! :)