Maya for 3D Printing - Rapid Prototyping
In this course we're going to look at something a little different, creating technically accurate 3D printed parts.
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25-09-2012
, 06:31 PM
Senior Animator - Sumo Digital
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Great progress.
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https://tonyjacksonart.blogspot.com/
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26-09-2012
, 09:38 AM
The thin red line
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18
26-09-2012
, 03:20 PM
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That was probably the nicest comment I've recieved in a quite a long time regarding anything...let alone my Maya WIP ...um...work.
But seriously, I was actually a little nervous truth be told at opening your comment. High regard and all that mate. Means heaps.
Dave, I'll upload that tonight...PLEASE...take your time. i'm in no rush and appreciater even the gesture. i'll also upload a Ma file of the current model for you to have a look at and will point out the issues I had issues with. Thanks mate.
Anyway,
did a little work this morning. maya had her first total unrecoverable crash last night since I've been using her on my new comp. Luckily, i saved all my files to flash drive and did a re-instal. Yeah, the freak out was that bad on her part.
So, this morning I started working on the thigh and Calv shapes and volumes and will be playnint with the balance on those this evening to find the happy medium, but this is sort of where I'm going to give them a little girth and some basic shape away from the stock rods. Thigh is just about there. I have a few versions of these saved (thick to thin and in between) I'll look at and make the balance choice on later.
As it stands though, they are bulkier than I'll be going in the end. I don't want to loose the spider-limbs totally, so I'm tying down the basic silhouettes and will play with the scale accordingly to bring them back down when I'm happy with the flow.
But the surface detail is pretty much done. Nothing crazy Just a few seam bands and general muscle shaping. I think though, looking at it now, I'm going to give the tops of the thighs a horizontal planed segment at about the third seam down (like looking at the rim of a cup or a bowl/ disc). Like a piston rather than a stretched tear drop.
Hm. We'll see where this goes.
Also started the mid-section ribbon spline detail. Also very basic, but we'll see what I decide to incorporate to keep the theme going.
See you guys later. I have to cruise the rest of the forum tonight a bit to see what's been going on in the couple of weeks I've been MIA. Looking forward to seeing all your fantastic work everybody.
You are all a great inspiration to me.
Trav
Last edited by TravisCowsill; 26-09-2012 at 03:33 PM.
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04-10-2012
, 05:22 PM
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Long update (though not as long as the last one) with a couple of messages to some of our esteemed members (and my mentors)...
Dave rave, I am going to PM you with the physical .Ma file this evening. I forgot to bring it on my flash drive to have a look at, but I've posted the two ref views form the original decade old design directly below to have a go at dissecting. Thanks man. I really, you know, appreciate it. Especially since I did my first two days of UV unwrapping tuts over the weekend and now realize even more how important clean low polys are.
ROBOT UPDATE...
So here's what's going in in the images below and in the next post. Over the last week, 10 hours a night, I've gotten allot more comfortable and confident in shaping my geometries, and less afraid to push those boundaries. Maya is becoming more of a tool to me now than a task. So the Robot project, while a very real early learning assignment for me, is starting to give way to a bit more of a fluid take on things. I'm starting to be able to really emulate a more stylized (while still subtle in these baby steps) approach.
First 4 images_
Robot's color scheme is all worked out in Mia X. All base geometries and volumes/ratios/widths/balance set. Base Backpack geometry is present.
Robot is ready here for final modeling of all geometries, adding of all final detail and surface features and first round of texture experimentation.
Next set of images-
I spent two days learning about shaders and UV unfolding. The unfolding is still not quite there in my head yet in terms of confidence. It's very tricky and I may ask for assist on one key aspect because it seems I am not doing it entirely correctly, but the result is almost exactly what I wanted regardless of that fact. I'll explain another time. Needless to say, I'll spend a bit more time studying that procedure before I actually go in and texture him in final.
However, the shader I am quite proud of. It took me a dozen times until I figured out how to balance all the settings to have full control, and then I took to it (the concept/process)very well.
I was able to create my first "from scratch" shader/ shader-tree; photo-realistic antiqued/polished brass. I did it completely on my own. No tutorials. Hoorah!
This was just a test run to see how it would turn out as I wanted to start thinking of Robot's character history traveling the universe with Glemdark-7 as his unwitting servant and second in command of the intergalactic Space Hopper, and how much and what kind of wear he might have from their misadventures.
Robot is a little fond of himself, so while there will be wear and tear, he will go to great lengths to maintain a "polished" appearance. So I didn't go for the total beaten down metal look.
Anyway, here are the results of the shader for his brass shoulders and trim.Ornate, antiqued and polished. I included the base texture uv I started with in photoshop throught he progression.
Finally then, in the last few images, now that the geomoetries are set in their relative volumes and such, I'm going in to make him work. He has click-ball femur attachment joints in his underpants' wells, and I'm starting the modeling of a functioning (still cartoony) shoulder rig. Otherwise, he just won't animate the way I want him too, and it would look "cheated" with just the ball stuck in the socket-band, considering how much work is now going into this process.
I'm going through a couple of robotic engineering tuts to figure out how it's going to work, while still, as always, adhering as close as I can to the original simple cartoon shoulder ball concept.
Oh, final note, I finally, ten years later, got around to designing the insignia for "Nefarious Space Command", to which both Glemdark and Robot are affiliated (or rather, were, affiliated anyway, up until Glemdark accidentally destroyed his entire galaxy and every living thing within 5 galactic parsecs, before then commandeering the planet's only remaining ship and it's hapless Robot, escaping to the milky way through an unintended hyper hump and crashing in the Arizona dessert).
It's sitting on his breast plate.
Thanks for looking everyone. Your comments and critiques are always invaluable.
TC.
IMAGES TO FOLLOW
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04-10-2012
, 05:26 PM
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Those were posted out of order. The new shoulder joints were posted above, here's the brass shader on the old shoulder
It has a 0.05 fractal bump.
Last edited by TravisCowsill; 04-10-2012 at 05:30 PM.
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04-10-2012
, 05:39 PM
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Just check your PM's later on or tomorrow. no rush.
Cheers!
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05-10-2012
, 03:43 PM
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These are more or less the pinning points guys. I have to fashion the hardware, but you get where it's going methinks.
Daverave, I'm trepidatious about sending these in a pm for fear of it not going through as an attachment. So here is the original 10 year old ref front view, as well as the .Ma file. You can use the 3/4 view I opened this thread with for the other reference as it's what I did. Thanks heaps. Below are the new images from this morning's work after the ref image... which again, is a terrible terrible drawing...
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05-10-2012
, 07:59 PM
The Nurb Herd
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05-10-2012
, 10:45 PM
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06-10-2012
, 12:06 AM
Technical Director
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Why do you need caustics? Nothing in there really would warrant them. No light is passing through an object, and casting onto another. Refraction, sure, but I don't think there would be any visible different with caustics on or off. Plus it will speed up your render.
The elbow shader looks way too shiny. The brass looks to me like a really polished bowling ball. You should also texture the spec map so it doesn't look like a perfect mirror. You should also take a look into gamma correcting your file textures. Since all renderers expect things to be in linear color space, and most images we see on our screens are in sRGB space, you need to convert them. You can do this through Maya's color space workflow. Look up "linear workflow with maya" for more.
The glow looks way too strong. Glow is usually added in post, and not in your 3d render, as it's faster to tweak. The quality is usually better as well.
It's looking nice otherwise, nice job.
Imagination is more important than knowledge.
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27
06-10-2012
, 07:18 PM
The thin red line
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