This pic was done for a Santa themed project where we had to make a Xmas card that would be given out. I struggled to get a few things I wanted on it done in time and actually plan to take it further, adding textures, the feet, numbering.etc.
I actually decided to use photoshop for this one, and tried to use a square brush. Its a start in a different direction, and one I want to see where I can take it.

A small selection of personal work I have been working on.

For this week's assignment we were given the task to create either a 2d or 3d image of something surreal.

From my research I found there was many many ways to go with this, as the concept of surrealism literally opens up millions of windows of opportunity for the wierd and wonderful. I decided to try two ideas. One a more simple style, like a newspaper cartoon, and another in the more traditional painted style.

I did a quick, if slightly crude drawing of a magpie stealing jewels with a thick brush, like a large ink pen. I then used a marker brush to get in basic colours and shading.

For my second piece, I decided to think of a wierd way of transport. I hit on the idea of driving a foot.

I had a bit of trouble trying to get the skin tones right with this one, and still think there could be a little more work with the reflections on the windows too. Yet Im pleased with the overall wierd concept.

For this newest project, we were told to create either a 2D or 3D image of a creepy halloween creature. I decided its finally time to bring one of my nightmares to life.

In terms of research, there wasnt much to be done, as it was quite a vivid nightmare. The main concept for him is a living stone man, with light shining from the eyes and mouth. I had a few looks at things like the weeping angels in Doctor Who, and also more at enviroments he would be in, like the tunnels of the london underground.

I began by doing a quick doodle to get my idea on paper. It wasnt super cohesive, but got the general image across.

I then went into mudbox and grabbed the huan form msh, and began to play around with it, seeing if I could maybe bulk him out or pose him differently. I also attempted to paint him with a stone texture, yet the effect was very underwhelming, making look more like he had measles.

I then took the mesh into 3DS Max and began creating an enviroment for him.

The main focus of the render was to get the lighting spot on. I ddnt want to have much in the way of lighing behind him, just enough to give him an outline. I used two Area lights with a slight decay to get the effect.

I also created 3 spotlights out of his eyes and mouth, pointing directly at the viewer, to shine across the walls.I rendered out an image of the creature by itself with the area lights, and the enviroment by itself with only the spotlights.

I then took the renders into photoshop and began working on the final lighting and texturing. I added a brickwork texture to the walls, after adjusting the levels for the creature and tunnel. The creature still looked a little too dark, so I added small lense flare behind him. I painted on his eyes and mouth in pure white, to have the light effect, and added a strong lens flare over it in a lighten layer. I started playing around with a few other things after this, such as adding in a cracked stone texture to the view, although very lightly, to show that the viewer has been slightly turned to stone already by the creature. All in all Im pretty happy with the way it came out, although it would have been nice to get the creature looking a little more stonework like.

Starship

For this assignment we were told to create a ship design. The term was very loose, and we were given pretty much free reign to design any kind of ship, be it starship, airship, sea vessel .etc. I decided to go with a starship/atmospheric cargo carrier. I pulled a few resources from other pieces of concept work for large star craft, the space shuttle (the first ever cargo spaceship) and also fighter jets. There were a miriad different design styles, from more generic starships, like the Daedalus from Stargate, and Serenity from Firefly, all the way to very unconventional designs such as the Battletech Union dropship.

This gave me free reign to kinda play with multiple designs and design styles. I even did a slightly 'classic' design too.

I wanted this one to be more like a smuggler ship, with four cargo pods to provide a sort of contingency, if one gets shot off .etc. It is also slightly more streamlined, with heavy engines.

This is a slightly similar one, yet I decided half way I wanted to make these ships fit into a mech universe I am writing at the moment. I added a catapult deck on the top, to launch the mechs from the cargo bay. A bit bulky however.

This one was inspired slighly by the Halo frigate design, with a slightly truck like feel to it. This one also has a rotating cargo bay to raise different holds up to a catapult deck on the top. The movement ideas I have for this are kind of like this: http://youtu.be/LZpfNLsnYYI

This one is more in the style of the mechs I have been designing, with an embedded catapult on the top. This kinda was slightly inspired by a train, yet I bulked out the rear to become super bulky.

In terms of the final design, I am probably going to combine designs 3 and 4, similar shape and such of the 3rd, with some styling of the 4th, maybe adding wings from 1 or 2.

The model was made in as little spereate objects as I possibly could. The main hull was one, with the cylinder, reactor, front thrusters, armour plates and the 5 part mech bay all being other objects. I tried to make it as simple as I can, yet also with enough detail to give a distincitive shape under lighting. I gave it some basic materials too for colour purposes, and lit areas, such as the thrusters and the windows.

I also added for lighting purposes, an area light in each of the thrusters, to give it the idea of it is active. To help show this lighting, and scale, I put in some small simple blocky 'trucks' and buildings in the distance, to help give it a small enviroment.

 

'The ‘Wild Moon’ bulk cargo carrier. Heavily modified to remove the cetre mounted cargo pod and replacing it with a rotating quad mech bay, capable of storing 4 Valkarie class mechs and all related equipment and weaponry. It also features a dorsal catapult deck, for launching the machines for combat, or for salvage operations. The twin frontal cargo holds are more than spacious enough to carry the remaining cargo to the destination. Suprisingly nimble for a craft it’s size, it is also able to hover close to a planet’s surface (10 metre clearance) to travel along the super highways connecting cities, such as the famous SH-502 between Olympus and New Seoul on Mars.'

The render came out pretty well, but didnt have as much pop as I thought it would. I took it into photoshop and PaintTool SAI, giving the edges a slight line, almost as if to show the metal panelling. I also added in some small people to help with the scale, along with its name 'Wild Moon'.

I think it could have had a slightly better and more detailed background, as this looks rather basic, although the focus is definately the starship. I think I could texture it better too, and make this a much prettier machine. I am hoping to take it further and actually finish it comepletely, with animated parts and a full texturing.

For this assignment we had to box model a minotaur, following a tutorial by Glen Southern. I started from a simple cube, slicing off a face and instance-mirroring it to help us model it in better proportion. Using edge loops and exturding, with a bit of polygon adjustments, I got the main body shape sorted easily. It was only by the thired video that I was getting confused, yet through the tutorial I learned a lot about fixing geometry, and adding more geometry without resorting to multiple edge loops which would create uneeded geometry. It was a really good tutorial on effcient box modelling.

For this brief we were asked to design an underwater creature. This could be any sort, be it squid, fish, balloon fish... I already had one small idea, from the top left most creature. Yet I wanted to try and make it look more similar to a real fish. I started looking at squid and lamprey for inspiration, ending up with two designs I really liked.

I also had a go at an almost reptile-like mer-person, trying to give it a more aggressive look. This design wasnt exactly my favourite, and it was scrapped.

After a bit of thinking, I decided on the top left design, of the squid-fish. It was simple, yet was not exactly.. normal in a sense. I started out by making a 3D sculpt of the fish, to get its shadows and basic structure done right.

The mouth was designed like a lamprey's, and would have sharp teeth along the edges (I had issues trying to get the teeth working right in the sculpt). I also shortened the tentacles, and removed most of the fins (which I felt looked a bit out of place).

I then did a simple paintover of it in the program, almost shark like in colours.

This then was taken into PaintTool SAI and used on a Lumi-shade layer to provide an extra layer of shading after I painted the fish underneath.

Im pretty happy with the final result, yet I believe I could have added a bit more detail with things such as textures, and maybe a bit stronger lighting. Yet Im happy with the overall design of the creature.

A short two second test from a 30 second animation test I am working on to make sure this mecha model works well as a rig. Its a bit short, and the camera is a little too fast, but its not too bad at the moment.

Only concerns I have right now are there is a small pop on the right knee, along with the render coming out too dark.

Muscle anatomy studies. I used a simple front and rear reference that labelled the muscle groups. I did a full body study, showing the more major areas where the muscles are showing. I believe on this drawing I could have worked better on how well porportioned the figure was, as his chest is rather flat, and his legs could have been better porportioned to his body.

I do think the side profile picture I did of the head went well, with enough detail to show more major muscle groups. I also did a side profile of a tensed up arm, showing a slightly bulging bicep, and the tricep more stretched out.

For this task we were asked to retexture a model and give it a simple animation after skinning it to a biped. I decided to do only a simple retexturing, and changed the colour of the jacket from green to red, adding stripes and logos. I added a bit of embossing to the logo, which was a bit tricky, as the lighting on it was not consistent either side until I played about with it a little.

The skin was a bit of a pain to implement, with the skin occasionally tearing a bit, or popping into wierd angles. It took some fiddling with the envelopes, but eventually I used a technique that creates the envelopes via vertices. This fixed a decent few of the problems I had, and made the model look organic when in motion.

I then gave the model a mocap file to animate from, and added camera movements to make it seem a bit more slick.

3D gun turret test animation done for Robin's Maya lessons. I had a bit of trouble with the normal mapping in this, where the normal maps wouldnt bake onto the model. I finally got it to work, however it wasnt what I wanted exactly. I decided to press on and finish the UV mapping, and get it all laid out basically and ready for it to recieve a texture, which was simple enough to implement. The render was the hardest bit for me, as I couldnt find how to render a video for a long while, only finding out via trial and error.

For this we had to fit a skeleton over the top of a picture of an athelete, to help get us to understand how skeletal structure works in motion. I decided to simplify the skeleton a little to help me get the positioning .etc right.

I think the closest legs and hips could maybe have been done better, along with more detailing on the feet .etc.

Painted over the sketch I did of the mecha. I think mostly, the background and lighting values in it need the most work, as well as the fact the mech is shaded very organically. I think I need to go practise shading metal in cel shading and full painting...

Sketch of a mecha based on a friend's design for bionics. I decided to just doodle out a design I can colour up later.

Anatomy excercise. We were given the task over the week to come up with 3 illustrations of the human skeleton. I first did the drawing on the top left, referencing directly to the source material we were given (Atlas of Human Anatomy - Stephens Rogers Peck). This one looked a little clunky and out of balance, so I decided to do a similar pose, but with a simplified skeleton base 'puppet' to get the posing right. This one looked alot more natural and real, even though I didnt go into as much detail.
I also used this opportunity to practise my hands a little, first drawing a larger version of the simplified skeleton hand I used on the second drawing before adding some simple bones in the right areas. This made it look alot less broken than some of my previous attempts at hands...

Porportion work for homework. I unfortunately didnt get to have the human finished due to some personal issues. For the dwarf, I tried to keep the stockiness, and a bit of the slightly 'heroic scale' with his design, with slightly larger hands and head than then would be if perfectly realstic, adding a slight stylisation to the image. I think I could have done alot more in terms of the armour painting wise, maybe giving it more gleam and better shading.
The elf was a bit of a pain to be honest, the actual concept of the design was hard to come up with. When sketching out his porportions, I did have a bit of trouble with his facial features, so much so that I couldnt nail it whatever I tried, and ended up covering it. I think I could have once again worked better on the shading, especially on the armour.