Spaceman – is it working?

[Levitateme]

i think he could have fuller colors, or it sjust the lighting you using 3ds? i would just give more color to the scene, could be neat for animation.

[fabmedia]

Well, consider all said and done so far, I figured that right now I'm not going to worry too much about the lighting. I'm just wanting to get the mesh down. More is coming.

I've included a mesh of him.

A

[fabmedia]

here's an update. Belt and teeth. Not sure if I should add more items on the belt. Infact. I'm not too sure how I should work the belt when animating him. Should I keep it in with the mesh, or seperate and use dynamics or bones. If bones, how would I set this up.

So many questions, so little time.

A

[fabmedia]

Oh boy. Okay. I've added my bone structure and I'm having trouble with the deformation of the mesh. The head I can fix easily enough with a weight map, but the hip I'm not too sure about. Any suggestions? I am using Lightwave, but I'm sure any solution will work but at this point there are no weight maps just a straight bone system that should work on any mesh. I'm not too sure if it's from a lack or detail in that area, but I don't have that problem with the elbows.

HELP!!!

A

[CARTOONSNIPER]

Cool character.

[fabmedia]

I was thinking of creating a skin texture and some "spots" on him that would cover the space around his eyes, eyelids, and fingers. Not too sure if this is a good idea because you see a lot of this stuff on "aliens", but I guess it couldn't hurt to do so. I initially thought I would just keep him like he is, but now I'm sure he can do with some material textures, logos and such on his jump suit and the pads on his body, arms, gloves and boots. Not too sure how to handle the textures for these items.

Any suggestions would be great!

A

[KolbyJukes]

The character is quite expressive, however, I think the renders look quite bland, try adding some color, he's practically B+W. A smidge of color would really liven up the character IMO.

:wavey: Kol.

EDIT: What app are you using? What is this character for - commercials? games? TV?

[fabmedia]

I think your right when it comes to colour. I'm thinking of making his base suit colour more of a deep blue, the pads and boots more of a "silver-esk" colour (not too sure about reflections), and a semi-brownish/orange spots on his skin. ALSO there will be stitching on his jumpsuit, logos, and other things too. I have a list but have managed to misplace him.

Spaceman Zot has a cool looking ship called the SpaceJet viewable here...
The character is the mascot for my http://www.fabmedia.com/fabvision/vol04/index.html

homebased graphic design studio. I've had him in my head for quite sometime (I think since 1997) and did an initial ugly version using Infini-D and implemented his head into my studio logo. Then I saw Inspire3D and thought that that would be a cool way to get him going. But never used the package because it looked "too-hard" to do anything. Then I noticed a deal I couldn't refuse with an upgrade from Inspire to Lightwave 6.0 and thought that I might as well make the jump. I bought the package and didn't use it for 1.5 years. Then one day I opened it and started to learn. So off and on I've been getting 3D illustration jobs and I enjoy it.

So it's Lightwave 7.5 that I'm using and still trying to figure out how to tap into it's awsome capabilities. I've started to storyboard a childrens short simply for the fact of doing something cool for my 2 sons. They think he's nifty.

A

[CARTOONSNIPER]

I think your right when it comes to colour. I'm thinking of making his base suit colour more of a deep blue, the pads and boots more of a "silver-esk" colour (not too sure about reflections), and a semi-brownish/orange spots on his skin. ALSO there will be stitching on his jumpsuit, logos, and other things too. I have a list but have managed to misplace him.

cool

[fabmedia]

wow. I can't believe it. I managed to misplace him.... ha ha ha. What I meant is I managed to misplace my list....

Mind, eye, and finger coordination is not my forte.

A

[fabmedia]

I'm at another impass right now. I managed to fix a problem with the rigging and deformation. BUT the big problem right now is the belt and extra distortion with the boots and such. I'm trying to control the belt with weight maps, but I'm still getting squashing and stretching with the movement of the bones (check the image). Any suggestions? I'm just trying to limit the amount of deformations. I heard of something before on a list (can't find it) about using a separate bone system attached to the character that would be animated separately along with the character.

Does this make sense? Any suggestions?

[mattmos]

I'm not a rigging guru by any means but you could try creating a ring of bones, parented under the hips, around the character's waist which the belt is then enveloped to. The stetching is occurring because the points of the mesh which make the belt are enveloped to more than 1 bone, so that is the other suggestion - just envelope those points to one bone perhaps?

[fabmedia]

I had already parented the belt and it's under parts to the Hip. But just checking right now, I noticed that it was also mapped to the lower spine. Here's what it looks like now...

A

[fabmedia]

Well I think I've managed to finally get my little guy to do what I want. Just wondering now about what you think?

Arlen

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