Jan/Feb - Norm - T1ckL35
 

Hi all,

I'm thinking of modelling a polar bears head (reminds me of the dissertation I wrote on them at uni).
I'm going to start with the base skull to get a generic head shape and then model over it with the skin/muscle layer.
If anybody finds any good top/front ortho photos/drawings of a polar bear skull then post the link up (I already have the side and a poor top shot) :D

The biggest challenge will be the fur and the final lighting/rendering shots so here's hoping 2 months is long enough ;)

Good luck all!

Best of luck, Mr.Tickle - will be good to be sparring polygons with you again on this challenge.

Out of interest, which degree did you do to end up doing a dissertation on polar bears?

Good luck to you too fallenswordsman :beer:

I did biological imaging at uni (half art, half hardcore biology). A bit bizarre but it was good to have a varied course and it was never boring.
The final dissertation went alongside a macromedia director program on bear evolution (which I no longer have :( ) hence the interest in 3D'ing a bear :)

started on the skull this morning that will sit in the head. It's not going to be complicated or detailed, just as a placeholder so I know how the head shapes and where the teeth will go.

Last bit to add to it will be the jaw :)

http://www.flash-fx.net/3D/images/polarbear/skull1a.jpg

http://www.flash-fx.net/3D/images/polarbear/skull1b.jpg

oh and a couple of reference pics of the animal in question ;)

http://www.flash-fx.net/3D/images/polarbear/ref1.jpg

http://www.flash-fx.net/3D/images/polarbear/ref2.jpg

Man I can't see your pictures again :confused: Why don't you set up a web site with Sitesled.com its free.

Cheers
Paul

There shouldnt be any problems with this host (I use it at work for a very high bandwidth usage website with no problems)

Can you see http://www.flash-fx.net BMS?

fraid I'm not seeing them either. I can go to that link you posted, however.

looks like a good start.. I can see your images fine btw..

peace,

mayafreak3

:beer:

just removed a .htaccess file from the folder with the images (just in case it was restricting access) but other than that I have no idea why the images would show for some and not for others. I also use IE and Firefox and it works in both for me.

Anyways, just a quick update, a slight modification to the skull and the addition of a basic jaw. Think I'm going to work up the teeth to a high level straight away and then I can move on to modelling the overall head shape :)

p.s, if you wonder why I'm modelling the skull first then its because I wanted the head proportions to be right and didnt want reference shots to obscure the shape with too much fur ;)

http://www.flash-fx.net/3D/images/polarbear/skull2a.jpg

http://www.flash-fx.net/3D/images/polarbear/skull2b.jpg

can see them now. :) Looking forward to seeing how it goes.

bit more detail on the jaw and I'm going to start adding the teeth in now.

I think the final pose will be with the mouth open (a snarl or something) so you can see the teeth clearly.

http://www.flash-fx.net/3D/images/polarbear/skull3a.gif

http://www.flash-fx.net/3D/images/polarbear/skull3b.jpg

yo
 

yo all wos just wondering how is the compatition judged?
Im a noob to maya and obviously some of these guys arnt but is it based on skill used or just how cool the final render looks?
So say if i picked a really cool animal but made the final render really cool but there wosnt neccessarily that much skill used e.g. no fur or complex textures etc, would i get marked down for it.
Thanks

Hi JHubbard,
Have a look at the rules in the challenge rules and guidelines thread in this forum (sticky at the top of these threads).
Ask some questions in that thread and you may get some help but as with most competitions - you dont know what each judge wants. You can try and second guess but learning new skills is the main goal (and $400 would be a nice extra ;) ).
Good luck if you enter :)

I CAN SEE THEM NOW :attn:

Great progress man.

All the tricks of the trade! I learnd something new today
:beer:

cheers BMS :)

not really a trick Tiago2 just an experiment to see if it'll help (I hope!) ;)

Added a few teeth in, just the front teeth at the bottom to do and then onto the top teeth.

http://www.flash-fx.net/3D/images/polarbear/skull4a.gif

I really like what you have done so far. I look forward to seeing how you will build the skin around the skull.

cheers arran, I thought with 2 months to work on it then I can add a lot of detail in the mouth area :)

Are you shure you want to waste time on a skull just to get the proportions right? I cant see a polar bear head being that hard to model.

Of course this is just my personal opinion.

Like you say THX1138, a polar bear head isn't really hard to model a shape for. Whether the shape is correct is a different matter ;)
Instead of finishing the modelling in a week and then having 7 weeks of texturing/shading I thought I'd push my modelling skills over 2 to 3 weeks, give the texturing a week or two and leave the last few weeks to finishing the shading and learning paintFX stuff

Whether it goes as smoothly as that is yet to be seen ;)

Looking good by now.
I've already seen some guys modeling a dragon using this strategy. They made the skeleton, then the muscles and finally skin and details. You could see this on
http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?t=290488 maybe it could be hepful to you.
This approach will never work with me, I don't have enough patience. I always avoid this kind of "zen" work. ;)

t1ck135!! You are a MADMAN! Nice job so far. Are you working on this one while riding the train? That must be one looong train ride!

Dave

I like this idea of modeling!

Yeah T1ck is really constructing a bear, not modeling it.
:attn:


I like the approach also. Great job.

Cheers jramauri, that link is definately useful and helped me think about searching for other reference material including generalised carnivore jaw muscles. The main reason I'm having a go this way is because I like the idea of learning about the inner workings while doing the modelling (crazy I know ;) )

Hehe, yep Dave quite a bit of it is done on the train (the morning one doesnt bounce around too badly (40mins) but the evening one is a nightmare (1hr). Gonna try and get some done in the evenings this week so I dont get left behind by everybody else.
Looking forward to see another winner by yourself!

Thanks Pyrus, though I have a limited amount of head muscle information at present so it might end up being a bit of a guess job in some areas :D

More (minor) updates tonight

Nice work T1ckl35! :attn:
You do have a great eye for proportions. I think this will turn out awesome.

:beer:

thanks mayafreak :)
I just try and get good reference shots so I dont have to second guess as much ;)

Not going to get a chance to finish the top teeth tonight so heres a little shot with the bottom teeth modelled. I plan to detail them a little more and make the mirrored teeth all unique at some point.
Just for ref, the front incisors are from both polar bear and brown bear references.

Fact of the day: Brown and polar bears can still mate and produce viable offspring as there is only about 100,000 years of evolution between them.

http://www.flash-fx.net/3D/images/polarbear/skull5a.gif

look good ;)

really cooking on Gas now Tick..great work !

Yeah, looking really good T1ck135. I will be keeping a close eye on your project. And thanks for the bear fact of the day. Good to know.

thanks vim, jsprogg and arran, much appreciated :)

not quite finished the teeth and upper jaw but here's some quick 'progress so far' shots.
Nearly onto basic muscle masses.

http://www.flash-fx.net/3D/images/polarbear/skull6a.gif

http://www.flash-fx.net/3D/images/polarbear/skull6b.jpg

http://www.flash-fx.net/3D/images/polarbear/skull6c.jpg

Very impressive. I can't wait to see how he'll look with muscles over the bones. Very good job, dude.

I have a bone texturing tut if your intrested in texturing your skull.

Not bad. I'll be watching this thread closed. Keep it up !

Cheers jramauri :) I'm onto blocking in basic muscle groups now so hopefully will have something to show soon.

THX1138 - yes please, that would be cool (I'll probably texture the skull after the challenge as time might be an issue)

Thanks Tiago2, I'm watching your thread too :)

are you going to build only the skelleton or the whole body?

The whole head Legolas_hv :) though some of the muscle may have 'creative licence' as I'm having real difficulties getting muscle reference material. I might just end up having the major muscles defined and then go straight onto the skin layer.

Well the experiment of 'inside out' wont really work as I've not found good enough muscle reference material.
I've decided to move onto the skin layer and just work the detail and required edgeloops in and catch up with everybody else.
The one thing I'm confident of is that the head shape will be fairly accurate to that of a polar bear. Fingers x'ed it develops ok ;)

http://www.flash-fx.net/3D/images/polarbear/skull7a.jpg

http://www.flash-fx.net/3D/images/polarbear/skull7b.jpg

I've started playing with edgeloops around the head/mouth now. Not final but I'm enjoying geting them flowing with the muscle structures :)

http://www.flash-fx.net/3D/images/polarbear/skull8a.gif