Yay! I got the card done and posted before my original target date, and even by my adjusted target date. That felt good. In case you missed it this year’s Holiday Card is completed and posted on my Zazzle store for your viewing and purchasing pleasure. Please
feel free to share the link (http://www.zazzle.com/tis_the_season_holiday_card-137090960428303745?rf=238732301778050521) and information with friends, family, co-workers, enemies, frenemies and anyone else you think might like it. As a reminder, here is what it looks like.
I was amazed at the amount of time it took to get everything in place for the card. I didn’t quite expect it to take longer to decorate a virtual tree and place the presents than it takes me to put up my artificial tree. And yes, I do have to decorate it, I don’t just put a bag over it and set it in the storage closet. So the fact that placing the ornaments on the tree for the card and then placing the presents, took several hours, well it is saying something. I did end up using instances for the ornaments, though I’m not sure how much of a file size difference it ultimately makes. I didn’t do any testing of a file with copies of them to
compare this file with the instances. Another time. I also made only minor adjustments to some of the materials for a few of the presents. Of course I had to do some work on the Snowman.
All in all, I’m really please with the way this year’s Holiday Card turned out. And I’ve learned a bit about it’s appeal versus the one from last year. And with this one done, it’s time to consider the next Holiday to create a card for. I think that’s going to be
Valentine’s Day. Hmm… Not usually on my radar. I’ll have to work on that one. I don’t have much time though. Then there is Easter. Also, not usually on my radar, and could take a bit more UV work. Yes, it’s only December. But considering I started on this one in Mid-October to have it ready by December 1, I’m thinking I might want to start working up ideas.
I was on vacation from the day job all last week which was great. My primary focus was getting the Holiday Card completed so I didn’t get a lot else worked on. Because of that I don’t have any more work in progress pictures to share. I do have a couple of sketches or doodles that I did while at the day job so I thought I would share them. I’m rather fond of the robot.
I really had hoped that I would get right to working on something else, like rigging Sticks, as soon as I finished the card. However, I found that I was a bit spent afterwards and didn’t really have quite the concentration or creative energy available to get right into anything. So I didn’t get started back to Sticks until yesterday. And I haven’t gotten back to Greezbly yet. This experience did surprise me. Equally surprising, though very pleasantly so, is that in spite of that, it was a very productive week off from the day job. Which makes me very happy.
It’s back to the day job today. And while I am a bit disappointed, I am extremely thankful to have a day job that allows me to have the resources to do this blog and the art that I post on it.
Now, with it being the Winter Holiday season here in North America there are bound to be plenty of distractions for me to run chasing after and keep me from getting much art completed. But I will try. I’m about to the point of needing to do more work on Sticks. I’ve finished viewing the facial controls section and next up is to start on the arms. So there is a good chance you’ll be seeing more bone pictures soon. I have started another personal project, some would argue they all are. It’s meant to be a model of a game character. However, I am not very far along and I have no idea how it’s going to turn out. I’m using 3ds Max for this and it’s likely to be the most complicated thing I’ve done in it so we’ll see how that goes. I could be doing this one in fits and starts.
In addition to Sticks, and the new personal project, I would like to finish up Greezbly really nice so I’ll be getting back to that one as well. I have seen through Twitter over the weekend that Pixologic is starting or working on an Ask Zbrush feature. There have been a lot of really good questions so far. I’ll have to go find where that is to check it out as they get the questions answered. Besides those items, it would seem I now need to come up with something for a Valentine’s Card. Those are the things currently in my sights.
Check out the card at my Zazzle Store and check back here again to find out what kind of mischief I manage to get into next.