Anime Figure (Sort of)

[Montanto]

Hi all

 

Once again I dived in the deep end and decided to take another crack at character modeling. This time, partially for an overly ambitious idea for advertising my webcomic on youtube, I started playing with one of my newer characters a cute, perky and petite goth punk from Devonshire: P. Blossom Hannaford.

anyway as per usual i whipped up a rotoscope and got to work. So far it's coming along nicely so far. For what it's worth, I think it's much more successful than my previous attempts Mainly because this time I worked a lot smaller so the computer isn't choking on it yet and since this is a cartoon figure I went in with the Kiss principle in mind which gives me the luxury to add more splines if I have to. as the arrows indicate their are a few creases I haven't been able to correct just yet. (Yes I'm aware of the one bellow the lower lip but I know what I did on that) I also am having a little trouble smoothing it out completely. I don't know if this is a side affect of working too small or that this will be corrected in the render. Anyway as always all comments and nitpicks are welcome and appreciated.

 

Thanks in advance.

 

Bill

[Master chief]

well considring that im pretty new my self id say your doing ok , one bit of advise that i found make making models good is get the base down, which you have done then pick one part and slowly but surely work out from there , i my self get moders block when working all the time as i like big robots and such and want to put 15 gagilion things in , its at this time my brain crashes and i fall into a coma so dont do it that way

[Montanto]

Just dusted this one off after a long hiatus. I've found a couple of tutorials about how to fix creases so i've cleaned up the ones I was complaining about the last time. Though as you can see in the picture, I still have a few bits on the forehead and the area between the nose and the lips that at the moment seem immune to any adujstments. Also I've been having some problems with where the nose starts right after the eye around the tear duct. (the yellow arrow) I've managed to simplefy it a bit and get rid of a five point spline but it is still being problematic.

I suppose if I were less stubborn I would chalk this up as experience and start again from scratch.

 

On another note, out of a little bit of impatience in the process, I occasionally try to make the whole face after saving the session and get this recurring problem.

 

As you can see a few of the splines didn't attach along the seam and I usually find on the back side several splines have attached in unusual ways ( for example a line from the top of the head to the lip. (you can see it right behind the nose, apologies for not labeling it) deleting them usually causes a mess.

[Meowx]

When you do copy/flip/attach, there's two things to watch out for - making sure everything is aligned (which is probably the case in the nose/forehead) and not using hooks (which is the case in the area above the lips and (I think) the chin.)

 

Select the entire edge and use the properties window to scale X to zero. (Transform > Scale > X > 0%)

 

When you've got a hook along the edge, it will try to find something to hook onto when you copy it. This will always end up bad, make sure all the points on the edge are CPs.

[robcat2075]

Welcome back to A:M!

 

The spline at the bridge of the nose that bulges over the center line is very odd. Probably a sign that it is not properly connected or that it has an unnecessary bias on it's CPs.

 

Without seeing the mesh i'm going to guess the same reason for the crease above the mouth.

[Montanto]

Okay I think I fixed all of the crease problems. And I managed to take nearly all of the hooks off. There were two remaining points that refused to take but at least there weren't anymore hooks that were stretching across the models so I made the last two attachments manually. Now if there are any suggestions on a good way to "sand" the object that don't involve blowing an after noon tweaking it..

 

On another note I'm having two technical dificulties the first big one is that the processing time is beginning to pick up. Fortunatly it's mostly just in the front view but still some times it get's to the point where I get the pinwheel every time I so much as touch a spline. I originally thought this problem was caused by making my models too big, but this one's barely ten centemeters across.

 

The other problem is I've been unable to select the entire object. This is the reason I didn't regroup and fix all of the white patches along the seam.

[Gerry]

The physical dimensions of the model shouldn't affect rendering or screen re-draw. On the Mac you might try closing all other programs, and even closing any A:M windows besides the modeling window.

 

Someone else here may be able to tell you more about this but such a simple model shouldn't be bogging down your machine. Can you tell us your system specs?

 

EDIT: Also make sure you don't have mirror mode on! The "unable to select the entire object" sounds like it is.

[TheSpleen]

shouldn't goth lipstick be black?

[Montanto]

EDIT: Also make sure you don't have mirror mode on! The "unable to select the entire object" sounds like it is.

 

That worked. The embarrassing thing is I know that's come up before in past attempts. I should have remembered it, thanks.

[Gerry]

Don't worry about it. I still forget.

[HomeSlice]

a good way to "sand" the object that don't involve blowing an after noon tweaking it.

You can try using the porcelain material as a cheap/fast solution, but good models take tweaking. Good splinemanship takes practice.

[Montanto]

Someone else here may be able to tell you more about this but such a simple model shouldn't be bogging down your machine. Can you tell us your system specs?

 

Hardware Overview:

 

Machine Name: iMac G5

Machine Model: PowerMac12,1

CPU Type: PowerPC G5 (3.1)

Number Of CPUs: 1

CPU Speed: 1.9 GHz

L2 Cache (per CPU): 512 KB

Memory: 1.5 GB

Bus Speed: 633 MHz

[largento]

Hmmm. Not sure why you'd have the slowdown with so few patches in your model. Is your rotoscope a really large resolution?

[Montanto]

Hmmm. Not sure why you'd have the slowdown with so few patches in your model. Is your rotoscope a really large resolution?

 

Not sure, it's 250*358 at 86KB which I am guessing is too high since a gif for a black and white sketch at that size would be in the twenties tops. Just to be on the safe side, I deleted the front rotoscope. (I'd just been eyeballing it for a while anyway) It's still being uncooperative on the front top and back views (though the front view is the worst offender) Sides and bird's eye are behaving just fine though.

[largento]

At that size, it doesn't sound like it's the roto's fault. Still a mystery then. And very strange that you are seeing the slow down just in certain views.

[jimd]

Someone else here may be able to tell you more about this but such a simple model shouldn't be bogging down your machine. Can you tell us your system specs?

 

Hardware Overview:

 

Machine Name: iMac G5

Machine Model: PowerMac12,1

CPU Type: PowerPC G5 (3.1)

Number Of CPUs: 1

CPU Speed: 1.9 GHz

L2 Cache (per CPU): 512 KB

Memory: 1.5 GB

Bus Speed: 633 MHz

 

Hi have you tried repairing your permissions

sometimes that helps so try that and do a restart

 

j

[robcat2075]

Now if there are any suggestions on a good way to "sand" the object that don't involve blowing an after noon tweaking it..

 

a mere afternoon to make a fine model would be a small price.

 

The good news about the smoothing and respining is you only have to do it to one side, then you can CFA the other.