pirate monkey ninjas

[FernandoLujan]

Pirates, monkeys, and ninjas. Possibly the greatest things on earth to this moment. Hail to you, for putting these three things together into a huge pile of pleasure for us. The concept looks great, and what you have in 3d also looks great. However, it's still early in the progress, so I can imagine you'll be adding more detail. Awesome job!

[hoodedpython]

Nice start i really like the idea cant wait to see an update.

[stabbington]

hehe, thanks fernando :bounce: put a big smile on my face with that :D

i'll probably be working in a 'bit' more detail but i won't be making these too poly heavy sadly, experience has taught me that my pc's can't handle too many super detailed models at the same time when it comes to animating scenes : /

cheers hoodedpython! here's a bit of an update...

this is the finished 'base mesh' for this one, going to start working on the non-symmetrical parts now - cloth creases, the hand and the hook et al... might fiddle with the shoes some more too..
http://img73.imageshack.us/img73/6760/pmnwip1kq0.jpg


keep 'em comin' : D

[stabbington]

urgh, horribly slow on the updates....just moved to london and didn't have much time for work... but i'm back at it now. just spent the last two days working out how in blazes to use zbrush and finally got it sussed! god that program is a headache to fathom at first...

here's a little zupdate
http://img88.imageshack.us/img88/1184/pmn1ee6.jpg

might tone down the zbrushing though, not sure if it works all that well... but hey, see what you think?

[IanV]

I really like your concept! Its so unique and funny :bounce: This group of characters look perfect together with all their very own distinct personalities.

Love to see how this project works out!



Keep it coming :thumbsup:

[mp5]

great toon shading, dude!

[graphacks]

The only issue I have is that pirates and ninjas are mortal enemies, so they can't possible exist as one being. :)


Otherwise looking good!

[liquid-dark]

well your modelling is ok but the idea seems kind (how can i say this without being rude) kameric (had to look that one up definition: made up of other ideas) and if i was going to make a monkey i wouldnt use so much personification (id make him look smaller and more monkey like).

[stabbington]

IanV - thanks! glad you like so far!

mp5 - hehe, got some plans for the toon shader, not using it as yet though ; )

graphacks - only the genes of a gibbon could possibly contain both terrifying aspects. i'm hoping the combined power will come in handy against any voodoo robot zombies they might encounter :eek:

well, i scrapped the zbrush pass, mainly because it didn't really look all that great and because some fellows on another forum didn't like it either : ) so i've gone back to trying to hand crease things, which is always a massive pain when you didn't plan for them in your original mesh, so these ones are.. um.. minimal.. to say the least.

nearly ready to unwrap. woo : /

full frontal monkey...

http://img200.imageshack.us/img200/2419/pmn1ip6.jpg



monkey rump...

http://img382.imageshack.us/img382/4821/pmn2yn0.jpg

crits and comments as welcome as always :)

[Bogged]

looks great, but I think that you should lower the bottom of the pant so that it's just slightly hanging over the top of the boot. Just my opinion...

Cheers
Gerd

[bbob]

Very neat work..

[stabbington]

bogged - good idea, i'll have a fiddle with that next and see how it looks. thanks!

bbob - thankyou :D

i'm guesstimating that i'm about three quarters of the way through texturing now, got some shader tweakery to perfrom on a few areas to get the materials looking better... but the diffuse is pretty much together now. hurrah!

modelling this seasons new look...
http://img115.imageshack.us/img115/70/pmn3ab4.jpg


and a close-up
http://img484.imageshack.us/img484/7276/pmn4hw6.jpg


thanks for looking!

[stabbington]

update time : )

got stuck trying to learn the vile pig that is biped (i'm sure it's good really) joyously stressing out over why it's so complicated to add supplementary bone structures and extraneous geometry once physiques been applied. seems that biped likes to misbehave a lot but i'm sure i'll suss out why it keeps flipping normals, forgetting vertex weights et al... sigh...

less rant, more monkey...
http://img206.imageshack.us/img206/6161/hookboy2nq4.jpg


got more material tweaks to make, only done a few of the morph targets so far as well but the end is near for this little chap : D

[unknowngod430]

LOL

looking awesome, have you tried using skin instead of physique, physique is usually very tempermental what what i've used. also why are you using the Biped? I used to use it but I ran into so many issues with weighting it wasn't funny. I just got the lynda riggin tutorial not that long ago and they teach you about bones. and after watching the first few videos I'm thinking it would be alot easier to use bones.

KEEP UP THE WORK!


looking forward to seeing more

[stabbington]

unknowngod430 - hehe, thanks : )

to be honest i'm starting to regret using biped at all now, maybe i just don't know what i'm doing with it properly yet though. i normally rig with bones and skin but figured it would be nice to try out footsteps and have all the nice automation biped has built in... looks like i should just avoid the lazy route and go back to what i know... thanks for the advice, glad it's not just me that has issues with it ; )

[stabbington]

yup, dropped the biped rig entirely now. a very, very talented rigger i know is going to rerig the first model and hopefully the rest of the pirates (if he has time) so i've been saved a ton of heartache and hassle :D

anywho, not much of an update... this is the start of the old feller, my usual compadre, ulven, is hard at work on the big gorrilla as we speak as i've turned this over to the rest of useful slug finally.... this chap is lacking his beard and demented facial morphs but they'll kick in soon ;)

woo!
http://img176.imageshack.us/img176/8086/capnas4.jpg

bit early in the process but crits are as welcome as always :)

[stabbington]

here's an update on the old chap, still no beard though. i've been fighting tooth and nail with max hair/fur over this to no avail, sadly... seems to behave quite badly with my attempts at making 'white' hair so it looks like i'll be polymodelling it now... still a lot of detailing to be put in but the base is kinda there now : )
http://img150.imageshack.us/img150/5980/captaingj9.jpg


anywho, crits and comments as welcome as always!

[Geta-Ve]

Sweet work man, I love it!

[stabbington]

Geta-Ve - thanks a lot :D

sorry about the slow update, been away gigging for the past few days but back on the case now, ready for unwrapping now unless anyone can see any changes that need making : )
http://img79.imageshack.us/img79/5711/captainoc9.jpg

some wires...
http://img113.imageshack.us/img113/2862/captainwirepp9.jpg

crit ho y'all

[IanV]

Hey there seven_spaces!

I still follow your thread! this second model is just as great as the first!:) The crew is starting to come together now :bounce:

One small detail though, Where is the old monkey's (didn't know the character name) asian-like cap? Like displayed as concept? Your skipping it?

Anyways you keep working and I'll keep visiting this thread :thumbsup:

[Ulven]

Just the other useful slug chiming in here. I've done the preliminary model for the big guy. He's still on schedule for quite a bit of tweaking though.
Voila!
http://img177.imageshack.us/img177/663/test1ym7.jpg

[Naseem]

pirate monkey ninjas, its a catchy name and funny too :) looks gr8 so far

[Ulven]

The start of the ship. It looks a bit boring now but we have some great plans for this one :) Wait and see.

http://img242.imageshack.us/img242/3854/ship1nv4.jpg

[MVDB]

Nice modeling so far! Love the boot..
The monkey chars look very powerfull (personality).
Keep us updated..

[Rafa-el]

wow loved the concept
i want to see that pirate ninja girl :D

looking good so far

keep up

[stabbington]

IanV - wow, thanks for keeping track of us, glad you like it so far! the hat will be on its way soon hopefully, i've got a big cone primitive as a placeholder for now so i'll have to model something properly when the time comes ;)

martok - thanks a lot! :)

MVDB - cheers! glad they're coming across well, the eternal worry of this sort of thing is that the characters don't come across with much personality!

Rafa-el - thanks a lot! she's next on my list... ;)

so... update time i guess!

most of the base maps are in place now...
http://img114.imageshack.us/img114/7783/neo4.jpg

still lots to do, the skin maps are only half done (liver spots and more veins to come) some wisps of hair will be added to his hands and head, the beard will be reworked so that it's closer to the concept and the hands need some lovin' too. anything anyone else can spot and i'll throw in some fixes http://www.spinquad.com/forums/images/smilies/wink.gif

thanks for watching!

[stabbington]

well, i'm almost done with this feller now, like i say it's all just miniscule tweaks from now on - skin shader needs an overhaul cos my fake sss shadow falloff is killing the diffuse map details so that'll be first up and then just general fixes... like the beard...

again..

sigh...
http://img394.imageshack.us/img394/1220/noe2.jpg

anything else to fix? i'm going to start on the next one now and then try and make the fixes on this guy tomorrow.

thanks for all the comments so far ; )

[PenguinVisuals]

they are turning out really great. I like the first monkey's facial expression a lot, really cut eyes especially.

do you have fur on the big black monkey's ninja out fit too? how did you get that fluffy look?

[stabbington]

PenguinVisuals - thanks a lot! i presume ulven will have done it the same way as me, it's not too hard to get the same look but it's a little dependant on the software you're using. in max i do it with a falloff map in the materials diffuse slot.

for that particular chap it would be a flat black colour in the first falloff slot fading to a white noise map in the second falloff slot. then i'd set the falloff type to perpendicular/parralel or towards/away. should get the effect going nicely. although in lightwave, for example, this would be controlled by a gradient on an incidence angle although i'm not sure of the specifics of how that works :)

so.. finally got a bit tired of my relentless tweaks on the old feller (they will be done though, i still need to put his teeth in yet amongst all your suggested changes) but i'll get back to him eventually : )

today i've mainly been wrestling with the last of the apes, here's where i'm at so far..
http://img439.imageshack.us/img439/559/girlax9.jpg

and some wires...
http://img160.imageshack.us/img160/8858/girlwireyn9.jpg

not that happy with her yet but she's coming along i guess...
crits, as always, are more than welcome! http://www.spinquad.com/forums/images/smilies/cool.gif

[stabbington]

hokay then, another update : ) base mesh pretty much done, next on the list is the 'loincloth' thingy, leg straps, refine the hands, cloth strips on the headband and belt and the usual creasing malarkey for the clothing..
http://img169.imageshack.us/img169/2613/girlda4.jpg

keep 'em coming ; )

[Kenetor]

um this is like totally awesome! lol

cant wait to see some animations with these guys

Kenetor

[stabbington]

kenetor - hehe, thanks a lot!

sorry for the slow down on updates, had a loss in the family and couldn't concentrate on the job properly but, hey... the show must go on! http://www.spinquad.com/forums/images/smilies/cool.gif

so, not done much this week - started the creasing, always a fun job that one. need to perform some fixes on this one too, face looks a bit odd on the 45's and the ease from the thumb to the wrist is too severe. still got the two cloth strips to add to the belt and then the hair...

http://img134.imageshack.us/img134/7901/girlcv5.jpg

crits and the usual malarkey as welcome as ever!

[holy]

I like it very much. The moldeing and the character design are very good to me.
The old monkey with wood legs is specially captivating.

[DaddyMack]

WOW these are all great seven_spaces the unique character that you've given each of them while still staying true to the overall styling is sweet! I have no real crit at this point, you seem to know what you're doin;)

Where you planning to go with these guys?

[stabbington]

holy - thanks a lot! think he's my favourite so far too but i'm tempted to do a second pass on the behooked fellow to bring him up to par wth the others :)

DaddyMack - cheers! good to hear i've managed to pull that off :D so hard to crit my own work objectively like that so that's made me a lot happier with things! oh and can't wait to see more of your own monkey :thumbsup: looie's looking great so far!

as for where it's going... good question! it's a pretty huge project in scope, for now they're being prepped for demo reel purpose (animation tests, simple scenes) but eventually we're musing over whether it might be worth turning into a little pilot episode and try and pitch it...
still, easier said than done i suppose. for now i'll just say that in 6 months time this thread should still hopefully still be filling up with new things ;)

[jesterjoker]

You have managed to bring three of my favorite things together into one giant mass of awesomeness. It's so awesome, that I'm featuring it on tonights "The 3DBuzz's the Daily News" Sept 15 edition.

Keep it up, I cannot wait to see it fully textured.

Man thats to much cool to comprehend!

[stabbington]

jesterjoker - wow! i'm honoured! loved the show and thanks so much for putting us on there :D glad you like it so far!


so... here's where i'm up to on the textures, most of the base diffuse down (headband, hands and the cloth strips at the back left) then just shader tweaks, spec map and the joy of the hair and fur to go! probably won't be able to update til late next week now so this is all you get for a while ; )

http://img245.imageshack.us/img245/5142/girl2if5.jpg

thinking about thinning those arms down more, plus i really need to suss out a better way of making the gold shader, seems to only look good in certain lighting setups : /

anyway, let me know what you think http://boomerlabs.com/boomerforum/images/smiles/icon_smile.gif

[M31]

Wow, these are really cool! :thumbsup: I hope you do an animation with these characters!

[Tripdragon]

I hate to be picky.. But monkeys are really wirey .. The rigs so far look to stiff even for the default divinchi pose. maybe a different camera perspective will help. They just look to human so far. Otherwise gret textureing and modeling

[stabbington]

M31 - thanks a lot! i hope i get to that too :D

Youngcat - no, no picky is good - it's the only way i'll learn! they were intenionally a little 'human' in design, i wanted to get away from a common monkey 'style' of super wirey with huge hands and feet and ground them more as ape/human crossovers....

but yeah, the current poses are pretty stiff, bad habit of mine unfortunately. and although i've modelled in arms down and relaxed poses before i often seem to automatically go into rigid t-poses without thinking. i've got professional riggers working on them as we speak though, so they'll be nicely squash-n-stretchy with muscle defs which will make them more fluid and elastic than they currently appear capable of... well, i hope anyway :)

but i'll try to make sure i remember to not pose them so rigidly when i'm modelling in future, guess i was just waiting for someone to notice to shame me out of the bad habits! ; )

[FernandoLujan]

Wow! This just get's better and better! As I said before I'm a HUGE fan of what you're doing. My 3 favorite things in the whole world combine. It's simply orgasmic seeing your work. The only thing that doesn't look absolutely fantastic is the skin shader. I think it could use a little more work. You need to be trying to get all shaders to look as realistic as possible, while still keeping everything modelling wise because it looks great. But seriously, only the skin looks not that awesome. The clothing all looks great.

Keep up the good work!

[Ulven]

Thanks for all the comments so far guys. Here's the start of their ship:

Ship model:
http://img80.imageshack.us/img80/5589/shiptestrender10rs0.jpg

Basic colour texture applied:
http://img80.imageshack.us/img80/714/shiptestrender9fe6.jpg

And a little classic close-up:
http://img90.imageshack.us/img90/1470/shiptestrender13copyly6.jpg

Still have to do a lot of minor details (lanterns, statues +++) and set up the surfaces properly (now it's almost all at the LW default + colour texture).

[M31]

I'm really liking that ship! :thumbsup:

[TheBladeRoden]

Best idea in forever!

[stabbington]

hallo everyone! big long post from the dead time : )

i've been without internet for quite some time now thanks to british telecom being a bunch of witless goons but my connection has finally been fixed...

i've got a few updates so i'll try and take my time over them. it's not as much as might seem as i've been doing a little more freelance work and trying not to work myself to death on 18 hour days like i have been recently. so first off, work on my robot was halted - he's fully modelled and semi-textured but i realised i have to focus on getting the monkeys done and leave him as an occassional side project along with some other bits and bobs.

so... all the main characters are completely modelled now as well as the ship. all of them have at least a basic, quick n' dirty rig skinned but two very awesome riggers (the genius that is marktsang for the body rigs and peter thomas is making bone/muscle facial rigs in messiah) are redoing them from scratch for me as we speak for the first batch of full animation tests.

so here's the last two monkeys (girl unposed with old hair)...
http://img102.imageshack.us/img102/4513/girlmunkyjm2.jpg
http://img79.imageshack.us/img79/7981/gorfixgf4.jpg

the little old captain's platypus is also done but i might as well finish his textures and fur maps before posting him up.

the past few weeks i've been trying to get to grips with learning mr 3.5, which i now adore and plan on finally giving up most of my scanline ways for. problem is is that nearly all the materials screw up really badly in area lights/fg (falloff maps on multi sub objects and shellacs for example) so i'm going to have to wade through redoing nearly all the shaders from scratch and finding alternate methods for 'cloth style' shaders without falloff. sigh.

anyway, i'll save any other updates til later for this and the other threads for fear of spamming the board
; )

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