Some Newby questions about mudbox

#21

Hi cineartist,

I have had a breakthrough today. I have been studying ears, but I didn’t just want to copy an ear I studied it and did my own variation on it. I have a kind of elfin ear, fit for an alien female. It doesn’t look as good from the front, but I think it looks great from the side.

I have used hair and fur in 3ds max so I could do hair that way, but I think I will try the moulded hair instead, like they use in games. Think I will started it off in max and import that in though.

By the way I see from your drawing board that you actually do sketching too. I used to draw all the time at school, but I am really rusty at it now.

What I need now is a flipping huge hard drive, as these mudbox files are huge LOL.

Asimov

#22

Better.

May I suggest scrapping any stylized looks for now? Just concentrate on duplicating the human anatomy as best as you can.

It will pay off huge when you go to do more alien, creature or other simi-human forms.

Believe me, doing only realistic human is hard enough.

So lets look at some other artists for some examples:

Notice how even this sea-man creature maintains the elements of human form. Can you tell this artist understands anatomy? It is very clear.

And this one:

On this one notice the clear brow bone, cheek bone, jaw, the position and proportion of the ear to the nose and eyebrows.

When you study these things it is easy to see where the artist draws his influence.

And another:

Again you can see the remnants of human anatomy present in this creation.

And again:

I can not stress enough how important it is to first get the basics down before you venture off into space.

Your designs will look much better.

#23

Hi ciniartist,

I totally agree, and when I have finished this I will be doing that. I want to take this one to the end and have a litle practice doing hair and skin, and then I am going to go back and practice human anatomy.

Now I have watched a few tutorials on getting the anatomy right, but I am worried I am not going to remember it all.

I have photos of the muscles and stuff, and I want to learn this, but I have a terrible memory.
I know where the cheek bones are, and I know that there is a circle of muscles around the eyes and around the mouth.

I know it will take time. I am happy at the moment to make something that looks human, and then I will take it from there.

I tell you what I tend to do. I tend to over enthasise parts. eg getting the nose too big. Or making the forehead ridge too heavy, and stuff like that.

Thanks for all the help. I have to be honest I have had the graphics tablet about a year, and I could never get on with it, but only recently I am starting to use it to it’s full potential. I have never needed to use a graphics tablet in 3ds max. I did a little sketching in autodesk sketchbook too, but I am only good enough to do cartoon characters heh heh.

Asimov

#24

Good I hope you have some fun digging into this.

Don’t be hesitant to go from a reference. That is basically a sound technique that many artists use. You don’t have to have it to memory. If that happens great and a lot of things will stick the more you do it. But you don’t have to rely on memory.

#25

Hi cineartist,

Because I work full time I can’t always fit in some practice, and so when I do get back to practicing everything goes up the wall. You won’t believe this, but I plugged my graphics tablet in, and the driver screwed up. Then it said reboot to get the driver working. That didn’t work and so I had to re-install the driver. Then I rebooted, and then I got hit by 25 updates. It seems the god of the anti artist was against me today. Took me an hour to get it working, and I didn’t feel like much after that.

I know it looks like I have spent ages on this, but really this is the first time in a few days I have had the time. At the weekend I created a terrific moonscape, complete with an old model I made in max. Mudbox is great for creating environments.

Anyway I have made the eyes bigger and I realise why they didn’t look right before. I watched a tutorial and it suggested that the skin around the eyes is thicker than you realise, and it is true. I do know if I was making a human the eyes would be too big, but for an alien they look about right.

The trouble I am having now is the neck. I have been watching everybody elses models, and they always seem to enthasize the muscles coming down the neck on either side, and very often a dip in the middle. Now I always see this on models, but I have been watching people in real life and I find it hard to pick out these muscles. It seems they only show up when you look at 3D necks. So I had a go, and I found it hard to make them look subtle and not like a body builder, but I found it harder than it looks.

Don’t worry I am going back to humans anatomy after this, but I just want to complete one humanoid head first heh heh. I do notice that there isn’t many tutorials on doing hair in mudbox. I also tried to pull out the ears a little, but I think I have them a little too fat at the part where they join. I am being careful to do subtle grabs so that I don’t ruin what I have done already.

Asimov

#26

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