I had a few of choices for the title of this week’s post. I considered something like ‘Duh Moments’ or ‘I Am Not a Colorist’ as well as ‘What Should I Call This’ and ‘This is Why We Read About Things’ there were even a few more. They are all relative to how the week went and I couldn’t decide so I just went with the stand in I was using. It has turned out to be a productive and fairly successful week in the art department around here. I did have something of a ‘duh moment’ this week, that I acted on, I have come to the conclusion that I might not make a good colorist, I have gotten a pretty good bit of work done, a nice bit of slacking off done, and learned something. That’s a full week I think. And now to figure out where to start.
Let’s start with the ‘duh moment’. I subscribe to a couple of 3D art related magazines, 3D Artist and 3D World. Though I am woefully behind on my reading of both of these magazines, when I remember to read them I find them enjoyable and informative. I was
reading one this week and came across an article about making balloon like letters in Cinema 4D. Even though I don’t have or use Cinema 4D at this time, the article was covering a problem I have been dealing with so I thought it worth a quick scan. A few weeks ago when I was working on puffing out the letters for the Birthday Card project, I remember thinking how much I wish 3DS Max had an inflate tool like ZBrush does. Of course, at the time I could have exported the letters to Zbrush and worked on them there and all, but for some reason, that just didn’t click. So this week, I’m reading the magazine article about creating balloon letters in Cinema 4D and the author tells how they start with the letters they want in Cinema 4D, chamfer the edges and then move them to ZBrush to use the Inflate brush, and a few others, and then take the sculpted letter(s) back to Cinema 4D. I didn’t read all the details of any of this, just those highlights which included that they did one letter at a time. Since I had thought about it a few weeks ago, and now had read about someone doing something similar, I decided to try it.
Instead of just taking the letters I have been working on and sending one or more letters to ZBrush, I started with a blank scene and modeled an ‘H’. I thought I’d try Mudbox first though, since I have it and haven’t been using it. But that didn’t work out well. I got a message about a problem with the UV’s and then I couldn’t get it to show up so I could work on it. I tried sending it to ZBrush using the GoZ plugin. That worked. Mostly. I had a little trouble because of how big I made the model in 3DS Max but I was able to tell that the idea was going to work. At least the part of getting it to ZBrush and the sculpting part.
So I decided to create a new scene for the card and model the letters with basic boxes all over again. This time though I made my boxes much smaller so my letters were smaller. I also modeled the letters a little differently. I defined the shapes better to start with so my work in ZBrush would really only be smoothing and inflating. I didn’t want to have to define or refine the shapes themselves them very much. Though I did have to do a little refining with the bump type letters. Still, I was able to keep that to a minimum and limited to the use of the Smooth and the Inflate brushes. Here’s what the starting letters looked like.
One of the other things I read in the article for Cinema 4D was that before sending the letters to ZBrush the author chamfered all the corners. I think this helps ZBrush keep from making those hard edges that would take more work to smooth out. So I made a point to chamfer the corners as well. I had some trouble with the interior ones and ended up only chamfering the vertical interior edges. That turned out to be enough for ZBrush. Once I got the letters into ZBrush, before I started smoothing and inflating, I hit them with ZRemesher once or twice. This worked out any hard corners and helped with the smoothing. I didn’t do this on the first letter or two. Though I did ZRemesh the letters, it was after I had done some smoothing and inflating. After working on a few letters, I figured out that I was better off to start with the ZRemesher. I also note that I did not add any subdivision levels in ZBrush. I think, because of a setting for ZRemesher that I didn’t check or bother to look at, or something in the process of using GoZ back and forth I ended up with all the letters having a lot more faces, edges and vertices when they got back to 3DS Max. And this what all the letters looked like with the chamfer and before I sent them to ZBrush.
Once I finished inflating a letter and smoothing it back out I then was able to send it right back to 3DS Max. I didn’t even have to tell it to go to 3DS Max, the plugin remembers where it came from and sends it back there. At least if you are working on all of it in the same session. I didn’t test what would happen if I saved the ZBrush project or tool and came back to it later. Once I sent a letter to ZBrush I finished it and sent it back to 3DS Max before I stopped my session. Using ZBrush to do the inflating after creating the letters in 3DS Max turned out to work so much better that I was able to get all the letters created and inflated and back to 3DS Max in just a few days instead of the weeks I’ve been working on the other letters. I feel a little odd about the new letters, that maybe I’ve sacrificed some design idea with regards to how
balloony I was trying to make them. However, I think they look nicer, less clunky and awkward so I think I will be going with these new letters. Have a look.
Now that I have letters all ballooned out, it’s time to think about the next steps. For starters, I’m thinking of creating a plastic plug sort of thing instead of a knot for the part where the air would be added, and to hold the string. I’m hoping it will be fairly easy to model because I think the hard part may be incorporating it into the balloons, especially with them now having so many faces and edges. I’m also thinking of creating a background image for the sky. A nice blue sky with some gentle spring type of light clouds. I will likely do that in Photoshop and then add it as a material to the background plate in 3DS Max. I’ve not done that before so that will be a new trick. I may need to look at some of the other images that might be part of 3DS Max to see if I can find some information on resolution or dimensions. Then again, I may just have to experiment. Those are the next steps for the card. I have to say, I feel much better about the Birthday Card project for the moment.
For all the work that I did on the Birthday Card project, believe it or not, it wasn’t the only thing I worked on this week. Once I had all the letters ballooned I decided to take a break from that project and go back to working on Sticks for a bit. One of the things I’ve been needing to do with my Sticks scene is to work on the color scheme. I want it to read well at a glance, and be easy to see Sticks. And while I like the colors I started with they can make it difficult to distinguish the floor from the wall unless I use a more distinct material for the floor or the wall or both. I do have a couple of materials I like for the floor but for a
basic header image I think it might be too much. Then again, since it’s meant to look like a stage production, a bit reminiscent of the variety shows from say the 1960’s and 1970’s, they might work out just fine. At least for the animation, if not for the logo. I spent several hours trying out different combinations. Though it was recommended to try some things that would really be outside what I would expect, I found that really difficult to do. This is where I decided, I am probably not going to be a colorist. Or, maybe I just have such a set
idea in my head that I can’t get past it. Still, the wildest thing I could come up with was a lime green wall with a grey floor. The wall glows though, and it lights the scene. Here are a few of the combos I tried. If one really strikes you as a cool combination let me know.
I worked on the Studio sign for a little bit this weekend. I was still wanting to do stuff but too tired to concentrate on the screen so I put dots on paper for about half an hour. I don’t have a picture of it right now. I’m still working on filling out the background with the second layer and color. I might have about 20 percent done so not too exciting yet.
A while ago I mentioned that I would work on posting something about why I think I need to learn to use Maya and some of the differences between it and 3DS Max. I haven’t gotten to that post yet however, the situation with the letters may be a good example. With the 2016 release of Maya Autodesk incorporated some of the Mudbox sculpting tools into Maya. The idea being, I think, that you are less likely to need to leave Maya to work on your mesh. I expect it would save time and make it easier to use the sculpting tools from an interface you might already be familiar with. It’s a good idea. And if I were more comfortable in Maya then it could have been the best tool for the job with regards to the Birthday Card project. So, there is one of the reasons to learn to use Maya. Although, I haven’t investigated, to verify if it would have worked in this specific situation.
I am really pleased with everything I was able to work on this past week. I feel a lot better about the Birthday Card and I think that will help to keep my enthusiasm for it. As I said, the next steps on the card are, I think, creating the air plug and the background. Once the plug is modeled and copy attached to each of the letters I will need to figure out the tether for them. I’m thinking of the flat ribbon, but maybe not. It may depend on how easy it is to create. I think I know what I will need to do to create it but I haven’t even attempted it before so it could be interesting. I don’t expect I will get to that in a week, but who
knows. I could end up with another really productive week. Of course, I am interested in working on the Sticks animation. And that could limit how much I get done on the Birthday Card. You’ll have to check back to find out what I actually get done.