Grand Space Opera 3D Entry: Geoffrey White

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1102975320_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1102975320_large.jpg)

I'm just getting started, this is a really basic male body picture. In the next few posts I will add more detail. I plan to make three different male models. One will be a soldier the other two will be the protagonist and the antagonist of my story. If I have time I will model a space ship as well. I haven't decided on what the exact composition of my picture will be, but once I get a few models done I will figure it out.

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1103002777_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1103002777_large.jpg)

I just spent today modeling the hands. There a little fat in the fingers, but I'll fix it eventually.

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1103079620_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1103079620_large.jpg)

I applied a smoothing operation to the body, and created a basic head.

[jammin]

cool man, whatcha got goin for a concept?


good luck n happy modellng

ben

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1103101957_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1103101957_large.jpg)

Well I put more detail into the face and head.

[gwhite206]

I'm thinking of having a futuristic fight scene between two characters, who will be surrounded by futuristic soldiers. The soldiers will be genetically enhanced humans who are stronger than normal humans. The Protagonist in the scene is about to fight the leader of the genetically enhanced humans and the picture will depict the moment right before the fight. The setting for the fight will be in some sort of futuristic hanger with spaceships in the backround. In the backround I plan to have a combination of rock and earthern elements combined with futuristic buildings and structures. I want the tone of the scene to be very ominous. The fight between the Protagonist and Antagonist will be fought with vibroblades, which each character will be holding. I want to make this scene be the equivilent of Luke Skywalker about to fight Darth Vader.

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1103145895_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1103145895_large.jpg)

More face detail.

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1103168573_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1103168573_large.jpg)

Well I spent this afternoon working on the ears and on futher refinements to the body. The biggist thing I got done was making a good texture map for the eyes.

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1103180051_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1103180051_large.jpg)

I added a basic texture map to his face using cylindrical mapping, and I played around with the proportions in his face a little. Now he just looks a little weird to me. Since he now has color I will also have to work with the lighting a little to get it to look good. Also added some basic cloths to his body.

[Aethyrprime]

I love the eyes on this guy. They really stand out. The clothing also has a nice textured feel to it. Very nice start. I look forward to more.

[gwhite206]

Thanks for the support, I like how his eyes are coming too, he still needs lots of proportional work on his face though. Good luck on the challange.

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1103263643_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1103263643_large.jpg)

More proportional work done on the face, hopefully soon I'll get his face right and then I can get to putting more detail into his body.

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1103398105_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1103398105_large.jpg)

Today I got a lot of work done. I got his face mostly right now and I spent some time texturing him. Also applied bump maps.

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1104255590_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1104255590_large.jpg)

Well I've been on vacation for the past week, wothout internet access. I got a lot of work done on the soldiers armor, in both tesxture mapping and modeling. All I have to do is finish the helmot I'm working on and he will be done.

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1104446983_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1104446983_large.jpg)

I finally finished his helmet and added bones. All that I have to do to the soldier model is make a gun.

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1104628848_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1104628848_large.jpg)

After spending a long time working on the soldier model, I decided to narrow the scope of my picture, because there was no way I would be able to finish it. Originally I was going to have a scene where my protagonist is about to face off against his arch enemy, and they would be surounded by soldiers. Also I wanted to have dropships in the backround and some of the supporting charactera of my space opera in the scene. Since to do this I would need at least another month, I'm narrowing the scope of the scene to focus more on the soldiers and their dropships. This is a rendering and composition test. Ill give more info on my story soon.

[Aethyrprime]

Great updates. Coming along nicely. Keep at it. Happy New Year!

[gwhite206]

Thanks for the encouragement, good luck on the project.

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1104815162_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1104815162_large.jpg)

This is a concept sketch for the dropships in the backround.

Time for a little backstory, this story takes place in the future, in the after math of a massive war between the human race and an advanced alien race who used mind control as a devestating weapon on man kind. We couldn\\\\\\\'t even fight them because as soon as a battle would start our soldiers would be mind controled into attacking each other, and each battle ended in disaster. To save the human race a desperate plan was hatched. To destroy the gates that connected us to the human colonies which were under attack by the aliens. After this the war was over but it was calculated that the aliens would reach human space in fifty years. In the time period when my story takes place man kind is getting ready for the next inevitable war. It is believed that if we could resist the alien mind control attacks we would be able to fight them on even terms and eventually wipe them out of existance. When our scientists try to find a way to make normal humans resist mind control they find that it is impossible. So they choose to genetically alter the human genome to make a new breed of humans who are immune to mind control. They also enhance many other aspects of these humans to make them smarter, stronger and faster. They then get the name super humans. After the super humans are created two factions emerge one who wants to keep our genome the same and use technology like robotic suits to fight the aliens with. And the other which wants to breed the ultimate soldier and kill all normal humans who will still be alive when the aliens come . When my story starts it takes place in the time period right before the war errupts between the two factions. The main character of the story is a young boy who is on the side of the regular humans, and who mysteriously has the ability to mind control his enemies. He doesn\\\\\\\'t know it but he was a top secret experiment from the super humans who was intended to be the apex in genetic enhancement experiments. He was intented to be the commander of the super humans but he was lost at birth and was raised by normal humans, he is also the only super human who has mind control ability. The antagonist of this story is the current commander of the super humans. He discovers the protagonist of the story and tricks him into using his mind control ability on the normal human capital planet. The protagonist causes the workers to make one of the antimater reacters on the planet to go critical. The entire planet is destroyed along with it\\\\\\\'s sourounding fleet. The protagonist feels guilt for what he has inadvertintly done and the rest of the story is about him seeking revenge on the antagonist, the war between the super humans and the normal humans, the main character growing up and changing from a weak person to the ultimate warrior, and about the end of war.

My picture was originally going to show the protagonist about to fight the antagonist where they would be surounded by super human soldiers. I came to the conclusion that I would never be able to model all the characters in time so I decided to narrow the scope of the picture to only focus on the super human soldiers. My scene will basically show the super humans attacking a normal human colony and killing normal humans.

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1104905571_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1104905571_large.jpg)

This is the initial model for the dropship. Tommarow I'm going to add some small machinery detail and a texture map.

[Claireabella]

Hi Geoffrey. So little time left........... we all seem to be adapting our original ideas to fit how much we have to do to try and achieve them! Your modeling is great and I really like the lighting effects you have got so far. Good story line too! Good luck in getting it completed. :thumbsup: Claireabella

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1105000469_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1105000469_large.jpg)

Well I got more texturing and modeling done on the dropship. Tomarow I'm going to try and completely finish it, though we all know how hard it is to stick with our schedules.

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1105085133_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1105085133_large.jpg)

Well I did a lot more work on this dropship today. I feel like its missing something but I'm not sure what. Hopefully I'll figure out what when I work on it tommarow.

[blakbird]

Infact it seems not much original but both strong and detailed design work. Congartulations.
And what about adding some more color over the scene?
You must think of that.

And if you have time please look at my page. I need comments.
http://www.cgtalk.com/showthread.php?threadid=197505

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1105143887_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1105143887_large.jpg)

I added some color to the ship and a little light on the side I think it improved the look a little.

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1105173127_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1105173127_large.jpg)

I did a little presentation work on the dropship to show it off a little better.

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1105173216_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1105173216_large.jpg)

Heres the real image

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1105173415_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1105173415_large.jpg)

Heres a composition test with the new dropship model, I feel a little disopointed with the piece as a whole, I think I'm going to redew the scene and try to get a little better composition. Any comments or suggestions would be well appreciated. Thanks

[Kaksht]

Hi Geoffrey!

Actualy its quite nice (the whole scene i mean).
Just add some variations to the horizon line, something like a denser amd closer fog or smth, just not the straight line :)

[Matroskin]

Well,
In general your composition looks pretty good, it has mood and atmosphere, a sort of mystery.
But I as a spectator I'd like to get more feelings - soldiers are approaching me... Maybe I should be afraid of them. But there still not enough movement. They are too calm, too relaxed. As a soldiers they need to move faster, look in every directions searching an enemy while others still jumping out the ship. Guy in left is shooting but as for me he doesn't feel anything. Instead his pose should express something like "die you m#%^fu**r, aaargh!"
Maybe also camera can be moved closer to the ground (for example, I have fallen, I'm afraid and I don't feel legs...)

Continue in that graphic style!

my Space Opera page>> (http://www.cgtalk.com/showthread.php?postid=1779103#post1779103)

[gwhite206]

Hey guys/gals thanks for the suggestions, It really helps me when I get second opinions from people. I've been looking at the picture throughout the day and I think what it's missing is something to make it more grand more cosmic. I need the viewer to feel like they are looking through a window into another world and to really believe in that world. The first thing I plan to do is make some people in the backround the soldiers are fighting. Their faces and expressions will be visable. To increase the sense of scale I will put a city in the backround which is being attacked, and some huge structures that seem massive. Also on the moon I'm going to add lights on the dark side representing cities. Lastly I think I'm going to reformat the frame and make it vertical instead of horizontal, that way the viewer will be able to see all that is going on in space like planets and space battles.

[BikiniBottom]

i love the ship... what can i say. maybe you should put the chars in a more dramatic pose. keep it up

[neble]

Nice image, def with a Star Wars influence. The only thing is they all look so stiff and lifeless, and most with too similar of a pose. Can't bend....armor ..too ...thick..... :)jk

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1105516733_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1105516733_large.jpg)

I spent most of today posing the character in more dramatic poses. I also added in some colonist who are being attacked by the Genetically Enhanced Soldiers. Sorry the image is so small, I\'ve been rendering all this time on a laptop computer, and it \'s starting to reach it\'s limits. To render that small picture took 30 minates!
Normally I wouldn\'t photoshop it so much but if I didn\'t it would take forever to get the lighting just right. Maybe one of my friends with an uber computer will let me use their\'s for a few days. Any ways thanks for the suggestions I really appreciate them. If anyone has any more Ideas I could really use them. At this point I don\'t really know what else to do except clean up the texture maps a little, and mostly minor stuff. I still feel disapointed in the picture as a whole, it\'s been getting better, but I still feel like it just needs somthing else in the composition. Thanks for the help everyone.

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1105517136_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1105517136_large.jpg)

I decided to put a lone pic of the scene in so it would be easier to look at for comparison sake.

[melkao]

hey nice picture you have un this ecene....but who aer they attacing?

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1105672773_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1105672773_large.jpg)

Heres a bigger version of the picture I was working with.

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1106003073_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1106003073_large.jpg)

Well Heres my final Image, I\\\'m glad to be done after all this time. I added up the amount of time spent on this and it ended up being around 200 hours. I wish I could have gotten the models a little cleaner but I just ran out of time, after a little break I\\\'m going to go back to my soldier/human models and rework them to be higher quality. Even though the competitions over I still want to get better so I\\\'m not going to quit. Once I get the quality where I want I\\\'m going to make a female model as well. My intention is to make all the models and make a picture using them that will show off the larger project I\\\'m working on which is to make an animation that will be a grand space opera. The picture I have now doesn\\\'t show my grand space opera off like I want. My original intention was to show all the main characters in this one picture that would in one image sum up my concept. Unfortinatly my idea still needs several months before it will be where I want it to be. I\\\'ve enjoyed working on this contest and I appreciate all the critics I\\\'ve recieved from everyone. I intend to remain am active member of this community because it has really helped me see ways I can improve my art.

For anyone wanting to know what my story was here is a paste for earlier.

Time for a little backstory, this story takes place in the future, in the after math of a massive war between the human race and an advanced alien race who used mind control as a devestating weapon on man kind. We couldn\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\'t even fight them because as soon as a battle would start our soldiers would be mind controled into attacking each other, and each battle ended in disaster. To save the human race a desperate plan was hatched. To destroy the gates that connected us to the human colonies which were under attack by the aliens. After this the war was over but it was calculated that the aliens would reach human space in fifty years. In the time period when my story takes place man kind is getting ready for the next inevitable war. It is believed that if we could resist the alien mind control attacks we would be able to fight them on even terms and eventually wipe them out of existance. When our scientists try to find a way to make normal humans resist mind control they find that it is impossible. So they choose to genetically alter the human genome to make a new breed of humans who are immune to mind control. They also enhance many other aspects of these humans to make them smarter, stronger and faster. They then get the name super humans. After the super humans are created two factions emerge one who wants to keep our genome the same and use technology like robotic suits to fight the aliens with. And the other which wants to breed the ultimate soldier and kill all normal humans who will still be alive when the aliens come . When my story starts it takes place in the time period right before the war errupts between the two factions. The main character of the story is a young boy who is on the side of the regular humans, and who mysteriously has the ability to mind control his enemies. He doesn\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\'t know it but he was a top secret experiment from the super humans who was intended to be the apex in genetic enhancement experiments. He was intented to be the commander of the super humans but he was lost at birth and was raised by normal humans, he is also the only super human who has mind control ability. The antagonist of this story is the current commander of the super humans. He discovers the protagonist of the story and tricks him into using his mind control ability on the normal human capital planet. The protagonist causes the workers to make one of the antimater reacters on the planet to go critical. The entire planet is destroyed along with it\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\'s sourounding fleet. The protagonist feels guilt for what he has inadvertintly done and the rest of the story is about him seeking revenge on the antagonist, the war between the super humans and the normal humans, the main character growing up and changing from a weak person to the ultimate warrior, and about the end of war.

My picture was originally going to show the protagonist about to fight the antagonist where they would be surounded by super human soldiers. I came to the conclusion that I would never be able to model all the characters in time so I decided to narrow the scope of the picture to only focus on the super human soldiers. My scene will basically show the super human soldiers attacking a normal human colony in the opening battle of the war.

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1106003733_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1106003733_large.jpg)

heres my lighting wip

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1106004155_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1106004155_large.jpg)

Heres my final image

[pseudonympending]

Hey man,


Browsing through the finished images this one definately required closer inspection. I think you've done a great job and created a really atmospheric image.

I have to point one thing out though (and you are going to hate this, so apologies in advance).You've made a pretty big grammatical error in the title. I'm assumming that you mean to say 'They are coming for you' therefore you should abbreviate 'they are' to they're and not 'there'.

It's probably no big deal but it's a shame to divert attention from a quality piece of work with a spelling mistake. Dunno if you'll get the chance to change it (there was a limited tweaking period available at the end of the last competition, but i'm not sure if there will be one this time around).

Nevertheless, good work and good luck.
Dave.

[melkao]

hey nice invasion and i hope that they don't coming for me.
good look:scream:

[mmoir]

Hey Geoffry,

Your image is very nice, I think the composition of objects in the scene work very well. My first thought was that that the aliens were too rigid. But your Title sort of makes the image work.
Good job and good luck .
Mike

[Claireabella]

Congratulations on a great final piece. I love the effect of most of the lighting coming off the lasers. Great work and good luck! :thumbsup: Claireabella

[gwhite206]

http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1106090622_medium.jpg (http://www.cgnetworks.com/challenge/entries/7/5483/5483_1106090622_large.jpg)

Well I found out that my image was only at 72 dpi so I upped the resolution. Also added a little more color hope everyone likes it. It\'s been an honor to be in this competition. Thanks for the support everyone.

[ArtisticVisions]

Well I found out that my image was only at 72 dpi so I upped the resolution. Also added a little more color hope everyone likes it. It\'s been an honor to be in this competition. Thanks for the support everyone.
You mean, you upsampled your original image?

[vrf]

Congrats on finishing. I agree the the colors make it a stronger image. I'd get rid of the text pasted on the image, though. Looks a bit tacky. But, if you decide to leave it, you really should spell the words correctly. I know this was mentioned already, but I can't believe you've chosen to ignore that advice. Of course, it may be too late now.

Nice work overall, though!

[arturro]

My congratulaitons! great entry, with an unique mood and spirit. Great improvements made from the first version. I only would prefere that they came for me with some space beer:)

[gwhite206]

Hey everyone thanks for the advice. Just so everyone knows I realize that I made a gramatical error in the title on the bottom. I worked all christmas break on it for a total of 200 hours, so you will have to forgive me for making that mistake I was half asleep when I did it :). Once I realized what I had done it was to late to submit any new updates. Also I agree with vrf on the wording below not looking so good. The problem I dealt with in deciding to put wording on the bottom of the picture was I wanted something to explain the scene a little without forcing people to read my whole long drawn out story. In the end I liked the wording but I didn't like the fonts I had to pick from for the caption. I tried to pick the one that was the least intrusive, but I still don't feel that it serves the image best. If I had more time for the contest I definately would have fixed the caption to make it look a little more professional. Also to artisticvisions you were wondering if I upsampled my image, and since I'm rather new to printing my work out and how dpi works. All I can tell you is I looked through Maya to try and find the setting to increase the dpi and I couldn't find one, I then looked through my Maya book and I couldn't find anything in there about increasing the dpi either. After that I looked through photoshop and I created a new file with dpi set to 300 and copied the image into that file. I don't know if thats what I was supposed to do but I"m taking a digital art class this semester so hopefully I'll learn in there. To any judges, If that isn't what I was supposed to do please email me and tell me how to increase the dpi and I'll send you a new image. Thanks again everyone for the suggestions and the support If anyone has any other ideas on how I could have done better please tell me I greatly appreciate your input. Thanks again everyone.

[ArtisticVisions]

Also to artisticvisions you were wondering if I upsampled my image, and since I'm rather new to printing my work out and how dpi works. All I can tell you is I looked through Maya to try and find the setting to increase the dpi and I couldn't find one, I then looked through my Maya book and I couldn't find anything in there about increasing the dpi either. After that I looked through photoshop and I created a new file with dpi set to 300 and copied the image into that file. I don't know if thats what I was supposed to do but I"m taking a digital art class this semester so hopefully I'll learn in there. To any judges, If that isn't what I was supposed to do please email me and tell me how to increase the dpi and I'll send you a new image. Thanks again everyone for the suggestions and the support If anyone has any other ideas on how I could have done better please tell me I greatly appreciate your input. Thanks again everyone.
Ok, what was the ppi (pixels per inch) and the resolution for both the original and the 300 "dpi" version? (BTW, dpi stands for "dots per inch" and is actually a printing term; however, a lot of people interchange the two terms when using PS, for some reason)

Did you cut and paste the images of the original into the new file or did you go to Image, Image Size and increased the resolution from 72 to 300? (I'm assuming that it was 72 originally since most, in not all, 3D apps. render at this resolution)

After I now these things, I can better help you understand them. :)

[gwhite206]

Well I'm not at my house today where I have the original image, but I do know that after it rendered it I photoshoped it by using mostly the brush tool, and after I got done I saved it as a new image which was 72 dpi. I went into image size and tried to increase the resolution but the option was not available. So then what I did was create a new image and I set it's resolution to 300 pixals per inch. Also just so you know the render size was 3636 pixals wide and about half that size tall, I don't know exactly since I'm not at home right now if you need more information I'll be there tomorrow .

[Versiden]

heya...

your entry really turned out well.. good job! I really like the mist and depth it creates

good luck

[sandu22]

very good ideea for the final illumination, I like that "night attack".good luck

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