Maybe that will help. At least I hope so. I don’t think I will question the why of how this works out. I will just be happy if it gets results. As I expected, the week was taken up with disaster recovery testing at the day job. It was a bit trying and took a little time to get shifted back into creating art. I finally gave up and decided to play a game. The first one wasn’t especially satisfying. So I decided to finally install the game that has been sitting on my desk for over a month. I thought it would be fairly easy. Then I saw it was 4 discs. Ugh. Still I didn’t think it would be that bad. However. Things really didn’t work nicely and in my frustration I got a bit annoyed and pissed at the whole process. As it turns out, it might have been just what I needed. A bit of a kick in the pants to get a little fire lit for myself. I guess I should have installed that game sooner.
Yes, I have been thinking that I needed to take a bit of time and goof off and play. But, I haven’t done it yet. I mean really, how serious can I be about trying to get art and cards created if I’m going to be playing video games, it’s reckless enough that I take time off to go see a movie. But I think maybe I need to make more of an effort to strike that balance. It might help me get some of these projects worked on. I know it’s counter-intuitive. Still, I can’t help but think that if I’d taken some play time a little sooner, I might have made better progress over the weekend. All is not lost though. I did make some progress.
I worked on the ‘B’ more. I’m not anywhere close to calling it done. This one has been trickier than the letters I’ve already worked on. I suppose I could skip to one of the other letters that still needs to be puffed out, and come back to this one after that. Oh. That’s worth thinking about. Anyway. After I created the one bar in between the bumps instead of the two I still didn’t like the look. It was too thick and the area that was the split between the bars was inset and it looked weird. So I puffed that out a bit to match the rows of faces above and below it and I compressed that area a bit. I seem to recall that I just selected the edge loops in the area and adjusted some up and some down but I probably could have used the scale option and scaled it in the z axis. Sometimes I get in a rut with how I work and I don’t always think of a better way to do things.
I had some trouble getting the shape of the bumps just right. I had to get a little drastic with the bottom portion of the bottom bump. And then had to be almost as harsh with the top bump. That’s been a bit frustrating. And they may still need more refinement. It reminds me a little of my frustration when trying to draw a bottle or a guitar. The sides never match. It’s what I love about the mirror tool in 3D art programs. Or even the lathe (I think that’s what it’s called) tool. Where you can draw a line shape and then rotate it around a center point and make it a 3D object. I know at some point that is going to make me so very happy when I get to use it.
But back to the ‘B’. As you can see it is coming along. I’ve got the front side cleaned up pretty good. I’ve started on the back. Here’s a picture so you can see how much more work it needs. And I need to make it more puffy all over. So, that is to come as well.
In addition to maybe working on the letters for the card out of order, I’ve been thinking I may start on another card. I’ve also come up with an idea for the Sticks animation that I think is going to work out a better than my original idea, so I may start working on that. I have a feeling that it will take a while. I’ve got to get his walk cycle worked out for starters. And then there’s the physics of interacting with objects and… Yeah. More bits and pieces to consider. I think I would have more fun if I had a little more to work on besides just these balloon letters. And I think you all might enjoy a little more variety in the pictures, as well as, the variety of topics that come up with trying different things. Like animating.
One of the first things I think I will be trying with the Sticks project is to move the pivot point of each of the letters in the scene so that it’s at the bottom of each letter to make it a little easier to make sure things are at matching elevations. I think I did this without intending to, to one of the letters in the Birthday Card that I’m working on. And it seems to me it was covered in one of the tutorials I was watching so I should be able to figure this one out.
I’m a bit short on pictures this week but I’m planning on having a few more for the next update. Remember to check back to see how much progress I make on the things I’ve mentioned. Oh, and I’m considering coming up with some new names for the Alien and
posting a poll. Opinions? Ideas for names?