Here’s a start on the texturing, and a little test compositing some passes…
I also rigged him up partially, that’s why his head is turned upwards a bit. His legs and body are animatable to a degree too.
I want to try out another camera view, where one ant is standing somewhere high up (like a cliff for him) and peering down onto the rest of the landscape, which in time will have lots of little ant holes and millions of ants pouring out of them down below.
I like you idea, but alike what Nomad said - perhap something more as just ants? Someone flooding the nests :)?
(hehe, yes, guilty of that, but only once)
I really like your concept Alex, maybe some kind of cross section shot would be cool so you see the ant activity below ground in the nest as well as on the surface. Many natural history documentaries use this to great effect.
The Parrot, lmao! Thats pretty funny man 
Will think about it, I’ll draw up another concept with your ideas.
handlebar, thanks! cool idea. Time for some sketches to see how this will work…
Here’s another concept sketch, just playing with that flooding idea 
I made a bucket on the ground spilling into the ant hole, causing ants to flee like crazy.
And here is yet another concept, this time showing the cross section in the ground, so you can see whats going on down below… I kind of like this camera angle better, looks to be more dramatic/interesting…
Your thoughts? Which one do you like better?
Good Idea, I will have to agree that a little more needs to take place though. how about showing how this ant coloney is defending its home from a speices of ants that has not been discovered yet. A speices that may have come from a remote part of our rain forests. ants that are more fearce and odd looking from the regular ant. maybe a little ant and a little beatle half bread. = Just a tought.
Here’s an updates concept #3. I agree that the scene needed something, so I added a huge army of invading ants/other species from the other side, so its gonna be a big war scene about to erupt 
(LOTR, 'cept with ants lol)
Comments, anyone?
Here I started texturing the back shells of the ant, and starting shading him, to see how he would look without the bland ol’ blinn shader.
This image composited, not the raw render out of 3ds max. I also added some subtle fur to the ant. Can you spot it? heh
Here’s my little ant rig. He is now fully skinned and rigged. So now I can pose him/her however I want And make biggg armies
Comments anyone?
Ok, heres a little previz according to my latest concept sketch. The red guys are the friends, and the blue guys are invading. The two ants at the front are at the lookout, and spot the huge army coming, so all the soldiers come out from the holes to meet them in battle! hehe.
Why no one comments on my stuff? You don’t like?
Here’s where I’m at for the foreground for now… I’ll post more info tommorow, if anyone cares…
Which do you guys prefer more?
the “before” one looks more appealing just because of color variety. i would try to avoid that monochromatic look.
hi uiron, thanks for the input. I’ll consider that.
The layer manager for 3ds max I’m using is Blur’s TheOnion script. It may or may not be better, it used to be heaps better, but now its a bit out of date – although it is still quite cool. Its free, so have a play and find out for yourself.
Note that its not 100% bug free on max7, but they do tell you “use at your own risk”.
bugs are what i fear using this 5.0 max plugin on 7.0. well, as by description it adds nothing i would need that much, standart layer manager will be enough for me.
nice work so far- really good modelling and texturing on the ant. I think I like the first shot the best- the colours are more lush. nice one!
thanks for the feedback [b]shakes
[/b]Im also thinking maybe making the background a desert scene, with sand dunes…
Or for a more drastic change, maybe have the ants human sized, so that way the sand dunes will be more to scale then, and you can see the beautiful sky as well, otherwise if we are looking low into the ground then there’s no sky room.
what you think?
Definately like the before render best, great progress, will be curious to see how you handle the invadeing army.
Here’s an update.
Ok, there’s too much stuff new to document really – basically, I made a new desert for the BG, added the ant army (not final), changed the shaders for the ants (added SSS), added some GI, and re-comped everything, this time in Photoshop just for a quick test.
What you think about anything?
