Please excuse him, he has turrets.

Been out exploring the world, shooting guns, and going deaf for a whole day. Figured I would just try the quieter approach to firing weapons.

New Animation Reel

Comp of the most recent animation I've been doing. Still chugging along with others, though. :D

Kickflip

Your basic kickflip. It's all in how you master control over the board. The subtle pop of the board, then a kiss of the foot to send it spiraling to a stop, a full rotation in, and back down to earth. Touchdown. Go Tribe!

Sword Pull

Quick blocking last night, just need to put tweens and polish a smidgen more.

Portrait Process - Zsphere to PolyMesh

I wanted to show the process of a current little project of a portrait bust via zspheres.

-Left is the initial zsphere setup. A large mass in the lower center to represent the chest, with 2 smaller protrusions for arms, and a slightly smaller mass, which becomes the lower sternum and pectorals. There is 1 extension for the neck, that holds the head, made out of 2 similar sized spheres. The top is a smidgen larger than that lower, that represents the slight inclination from the cranium to the mandible.
-Center model is the adaptive skin with groups that are the major changes in geometry.
-Right image is after changing the adaptive skin into a PolyMesh. The poly group wasn't as divided as I liked so I extended the top part[Center Purple], 1 face lower[Right Green]. The rest is shaped with the Move tool to better simulate the proper anatomy or close to it, since subdivisions will be used to further transform the plain geometry, into a polished piece.

Jump to Pull Up

Felt like doing some animation to keep up the skills and decided on a jumping exercise crossed with a pick/pull up one. Using the Eleven rig courtesy of the 11 second club.

Smaugshot

Eh? Smaugshot! Like mug-sho...ah, nevermind.
So now he's identifiable. It's a little on the basic side, dragon-wise, but I feel it's stronger than the one on the DOS trailer. I can't help but think, "boomerang" when I see the other guy's jaw. :shutters:

Smaug the Sort of Getting There Slowly, But Surely

Hot Dogs! Or sausage fingers!

I might change his hands up, as they're a little more on the humanoid side. :/ I just noticed his diaphragm needs to be inflated at eh bottom part of the ribs and I was having second thoughts about the head so I just planed it out for now.
And I know he has wings, I've just not gotten to them yet. You can't build a castle without its foundation. I have know idea if that can relate to this scenario. Baby steps! That's a better one. Baby steps.

Smaug the Unfinished

Having seen The Hobbit, I was redonkulously excited about how Smaug would look.

(SPOILER ALERT for peeps who've not seen the Hobbit in the next sentence)

In the end when the camera rolls through the cave and all that gold booty is piled up on a hill, but something moves from underneath it and BAM! dragon eye! 

I was thoroughly set for the next one or whenever they would reveal Smaug's design. Then rolls the Desolation of Smaug trailer and much disappointment. :( His jaw looked thin and curved awkwardly. I was hoping for something similar to the design of the The Hobbit animated movie from the 70s or 80s, it's an oldie.
This design will look similar to THAT Smaug.

Also feels good to be back in Zbrush.

Out of the shadows

Once again!
I've been super swamped, but not without production! Been rendering, lighting, and re-rendering out my thesis, which took hours and days, which led to a months. Reeeally want to get back into Zbrush! D:
Anyways, here's what I was up to.