WIPs

So now that all the models are modelled and unwrapped I've been busy texturing my Alien and Spaceship.
They've been taking a lot longer than they should have because as a Director these 2 models aren't the only things I need to spend my days working on, so most days I don't even get to do my own work ... but at least it's getting there and the film is looking real nice! :)

Here are some WIP images for the 2 models starting with my favourite, the Big Alien:

• Alien only has a basic Diffuse Map with Ambient Occlusion
• Only the Body has been textured so far, not the Hooks or Bracelet
• Been working on Normal Maps with xNormal, really nice programme but still need some tweaks to the Maps, so they haven't been included in these images
  

And then the beast of a Spaceship:

• Only Diffuse Maps again for the spaceship
• Ambient Occlusion doesn't work nicely while projecting onto the UV unwrap so it will be added later on as a separate render pass
• Some textures are only there as placeholders at the moment, like the objects below the spaceship
• The giant rock mountain looks pretty gross right now! ... I've had trouble unwrapping it because it's so high poly and I should have unwrapped it while it was still a box (silly me) but at least I know for next time now, so I've been trying a procedural map, and failing at the moment, so the rock texture will definitely be changed!!
  

GROUP BLOG!!!

Everyone check out our group blog!!
If you guys are interested in seeing how our project is going then check it out!!
You get to see what everyone has been up to on our side and the Motion Design side so it's worth a look!

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http://3dmotionatrium.tumblr.com/

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Also, we've been thinking of a name for our film and we've come up with "DAY 83" so it gives an idea of how long the invasion has been going on for ... what do you guys think? Any feedback would be greatly appreciated! :)

Update!!

Haven't blogged in a while due to organization and filming etc. ... so I thought the best thing I could do was explain to you guys what's been going on

Soooo FILMING ... We managed to film our main shots in Treorchy the other day, the footage looks AMAZING! and I'm very excited to get the footage out to everyone so everything can come together!
We still need to film some shots in the other location but it's great we've finally filmed so we can properly get going on making this VFX project

Me and Joe made an edit of the film so we have some stuff we can show you guys, but maybe just a sneak peak because we don't want to spoil everything for you ;)

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The BIG ALIEN ... I finished everything in Mudbox. To finish it off I added a lot more detail in the mesh including veins and patches of hard skin so the hard and the smooth blend together a lot nicer.
I also added a stretch to the skin where the hooks are so they look like they are actually attached to his body:


After the Mudboxin I retopologized the mesh in TopoGun so it's a nicer, cleaner mesh to work with.
Taking the mesh straight from Mudbox didn't work because I lost a lot of detail when going down the levels, and the poly count was massive, so I had no choice really but to retopologize.
It was very tricky trying to get my head around all the software restrictions and bugs, but it turned out for the better because the mesh looks reeeeaaaal nice!


So I made a little video comparing my old mesh that I made in 3DsMax then put into Mudbox, and the new one which was retopologized in TopoGun:

Untitled from Aled Matthews on Vimeo.

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The SPACESHIP ... I'm in the middle of texturing this bad boy! It's a beast of a ship so it took me forever to Unwrap everything but it's finally done!! :D So now I'm in the process of texturing and it's looking good so far! Haven't got much to show at the moment so when I have a bit more I'll start putting some WIPs up on the blog, but for now here's some Close-Ups of the ship to show you guys all the little details ... Enjoy!

Mudboxin' WIP

I've spent a few days working on the big alien in Mudbox, along with unwrapping the spaceship and writing my dissertation! (FUN!)

Here's some snaps of the Mudbox work so far ...


I started off with the muscle tone for the alien. He's a big muscly thing, like the Hulk, so I wanted to give him lots of muscle definition to make him look like he'd be hard to shoot down ... you wouldn't want to mess with him! (ignore the handcuff as it's there for reference so it won't look that smooth in the end)


After the muscle tone and definition I modelled the hard deformed skin around his body and his boulder hand. Also I chipped away at his nails on his feet and hand so he looks like they've been damaged doing some digging. There's still some work to be done on his back, the spikes and the hooks, but the Mudbox work should be finished pretty soon!

Mothership

I finished modelling the Mothership a couple of days ago and it's turned out pretty nice :)
I put the rock mountain into Mudbox to give it a bit more shape and created a few craters so it looks like the mountain has been dug into for resources by the aliens

There's a cool free plug-in for 3Ds Max called Greeble. From the website: http://max.klanky.com/plugins.htm it says "A fun modifier plug-in useful for generating random detail for spaceship models, cityscapes, Death Stars..." ... so yeah, works really nice and I used it for the cityscape (which I then modified) and for random detail around the spaceship model

Here's some WIP stills of the Spaceship:

Basic Spaceship Model
Basic Ring and Energy Weapon
Added more detail to Weapon
Basic shape of Mountain
Developed shape of Mountain
Added Props to the bottom of the Ship
Added the Mine Wheel to the Rock Mountain
Added the Buildings to the Mountain (we joked that the mountain looked like a giant turd so I coloured the buildings green and yellow for shits and giggles!!)
Modelled the Tubes with Splines
Modelled the Floating Rocks
Added detail to the Mothership's Main Body
Created the Cityscape using Greeble, then modified
Reshaped the Mountain in Mudbox
Finished the model off by Reshaping some things and adding extra detail to the Ship's body using Greeble Plug-In

Here are some stills of the finished model to get a better look of all the detail: