Massive Attack #2

For my next act, I completed the texture for my warjack. He's a Cygnar Hunter (check out privateer press for more awesome stuff).

I also did the geometry for Mummy Dearest. I totally forgot about her when I said I was done with the tower defense characters last time. She is the last one. Scott wanted some revisions on there, so I made those, but I didn't get a turn around sheet (I was working from a color comp here) so I was mostly just guessing on proportions and stuff. Hopefully the texture will cove up any major flaws there. We shall see.

My plan is to texture Mummy, model and texture another warjack (at a much lower tri-count) by Thursday, work on an automatic rigging script, and study for my finals (they're on Friday and Monday).

Massive Attack #1

Ok, so we're in crunch time in the Pipe. I made this is for my room-mates bunny breading game. I'm not sure what it's all about, but it's got a bunny and it came out far more adorable than anticipated. Beware, if you have a low cute threshold, don't watch these. They could injure you.

Let the finals commence

So here's the last character (Reggie) all textured up. There's talk that we might be getting a Max expert to do the rigs for these guys. That'd be cool, but I think I'm going to take a stab at it anyway just to get back into the Max groove. So hopefully, the next thing I post will be an amazing fully posed group shot. Or perhaps, realistically, individual posed models. Regardless, there will be much (more) awesomeness coming soon.

Actually, I'll finish my warjack texture first since my students have a tabletop miniature (warmachine, warhammer, battletech, etc.) character model and texture for their final project. I want to inspire them, or at least give them the impression I still know what I'm talking about.

Minor Works

I managed to get some work done tonight. Here's an updated texture for Sue. I was just supposed to do the front based on a painting, but I liked the result so I did the whole thing.

Also, here's the base geometry for the last character, Reggie Roots. It's overall shape is pretty bland, but I'm hoping the rock and lava texture will add a lot to the overall design.

On an unrelated note, I had an interview with Google last week. I thought it went pretty well and I got to pimp this blog a little. So if any Google-folk get this far, welcome to the show!

Playing catch up

Thanksgiving was great, but I'm a little behind now. Heading out of town tonight too, but I'll be back on Friday so it should put me less behind. Here's the latest character for Sprunk, Sickly Suzie Smith. I've got one last character to do and it should be easy since he's mostly a rock. Then fun to the Max begins.

It's gettin hot in here

Seriously though, they've turned off the ac for the night and its 83 degrees in here.

While I'm waiting on the turn-arounds for the last few Spurpunk characters I decided to make some more progress on my warmachine army (I seem to be having a hard time maintaining my usual level of unproductivity lately). This Cygnar hunter is the second one in the series (the first one is on polycount somewhere). I don't think I posted this one anywhere yet, but tonight I completed the initial UV layout, and as silly as it seems in hindsight, parented all the geometry so I could pose it without rigging it yet. Whatever, man, I was having a good time.

I'm trying to convince as many people as I can to make this into a PC game. Scott wants to make it into a shockwave 3d game, and while I like the idea of distribution on that level, I haven't really enjoyed my shockwave experience thus far. Both projects (spurpunk and tabletop miniatures for the pc) are still in the earliest phases though. I'd have to cut these characters down by about 50% (this one's 1454 tris) to get them into shockwave and I can't bring myself to give these guys the hatchet yet. So for now, I'm going to think of them as going into an Ogre game and see what develops from there. I'm also eager to see what my students come up with for their final (a week to model and texture a tabletop miniature game character). When I get the Unreal 3 engine editor that comes with Gears of War, maybe I'll make some normal maps and try dropping these guys in there.

It's one of those nights...

Time is passing very quickly, yet I don't seem to have much to show for it. Here's the updated zombie. I know, it doesn't look like I actually changed anything, but I got rid of the alpha mapping and saved 4 tris (328 tris now) all in one update. In fact it's taken me longer to do this post than it did to do the update. I'm just that good...

Minor critical errors

It seems shockwave 3d can't handle alpha maps on animated characters. Hence bumping up the count to a chunky 303 tris apiece. I think a few tweaks to the guitar too. I'll have to revisit the zombie as well to get fix the tatters on the legs and arms. Oh well, such is life.

That voodoo that you do

Super fly weight 283 tris. Someone else had originally done this model, but the design changed a little so I took a shot. Oddly the png texture format seems to crash maya if I use the texture shaded viewport so I'm not totally sure how these look from all angles. Oh well. What's your favorite?

Weird Science was a great movie

A light weight at 332 tris, Tommy should be the easiest character to animate. I'm not totally satisfied with the propeller texture, but I redid it 2 or 3 times and now I feel like I've just been looking at it too long. It looks like I'm going to be doing the rigging in Max, which I haven't used in years. Hopefully it won't be too bad. I compiled a list of characters and I'm 55.6% done (only 4 more to go).

Blinded with science

No homework this weekend so a little thesis work and completed the mesh and UVs on Blind Tommy Science. Hopefully the texture will be done by tomorrow. Good times.

The gang's all here

I decided to put all my characters into a scene together to check that they all work together. I'm pretty happy overall, but I think the zombie (civil war skeleton dude) might be a little off.

Double Trouble

So I pulled an all-nighter and cranked finished two more. I think I've got 2 more left, but I'm secretly hoping for better concepts before I start.
Here's the previously mentioned Riverboat Gambler Vampire, now in technicolor



And good old Frankensteam

Never gamble with Vampire Mic Jagger

Just trying out the video posting with my Wednesday night model.
It's a Riverboat Gambler Vampire for Scott's sprunk game. I'm pretty sure the reference was based on Mic Jagger. Good times.

More non-updates

I've been working on some characters and buildings for Scott's new tower defense game. It's going to have an old west-steam-punk theme. Or as I like to call it, Sprunk. Here be the 3rd character I've worked on, the zombie. Maybe I'll try posting the others. Probably not.

Inagural Post

Mostly I just want to see if this will work as a page to post what I'm working on. So without further ado, I give you Metal Slug: