Crow

[Sacman]

So far only a foot. I spent hours today trying to clean up the area where the 3 'toes' join the leg. I learned a lot that I had missed in my attempts at inorganic. The biggest problem I ran into that I finally figured out is how the areas that I joined using splines weren't joining correctly. I tried many different ways to get it to correct but I would have one axis of the CP curving like it was supposed to and the other axis was not. So I tried to delete/break splines and replace them. I have been under the impression that the direction that your attachment spline is going is critical. However, this did not appear to be the case. What I finally had to do was disconnect the CP's for each of the four splines coming into the cp until I got the two that were not curving. Once I connected them together I could connect the 2 sets of 2 easily and everything worked out great. Had I known an easy way to ask the question I probably could have gotten an answer here and saved myself a ton of time. Either way here is a rear 3/4 view with a simple texture so that it would not be boring. I am using another's model for rotoscoping.

[Sacman]

That being said I am till having some problems with part of the top of the foot. I have several areas where I have 5 splines going to one cp. This is not good and leads to some ugliness. I have not rendered a wire frame yet but i will in the morning. I am thinking this is a good time for hooks but i have never used them and I am hoping for some help. Here is a shaded view of the problem area. I will post a wire frame in the A.M.

[KenH]

Just a screen shot in Wire shaded will give us a better idea of what's going on.

[Sacman]

Ignore anything that looks bad at the bottom of the foot. I know how to fix that and just haven't. The problem areas circled in green are the ones giving me fits. I figure my two options are to add geometry or use hooks. I have not the faintest idea how to use hooks so I am leaning towards adding geometry. The problem with that is that it is at a crucial bending point in the model. I am going to look for a way to add the 5 point higher up on the leg and let 4 points cary to the foot so that I can avoid 5 point patches at the bend point. Any direction or advice would be nice.

 

Thanks in advance

 

Wade

[KenH]

It looks like all the green dots are of the one spline(on each side). You might have to break it up. Ideally you want the splines to flow around each toe in rings....rather than do it for most of the spline and then break off to run up the toe. That's what the splines further up do.

 

Hmm...not sure that explanation will do it. Try just tweaking the control handles first.

Edited May 22, 2004 by KenH

[Parlo]

I'd rebuild with the basic 5 point patch finger method (see below)... then work from there. 5 pointers are far more versatile than they used to be, and will give you a much smoother mesh than having more than 2 splines connecting at a control point..

 

Nice foot by the way!

[Iham Wrong]

This took a few minutes, but might give you another approach to modeling and rigging this thing. The way I look at feet is as if the were a hand. I suppose a birds foot is like a hand also.

Here's project file that is rigged with TSM to work like a hand. It uses FK-IK controls that would allow it to be used like a leg-foot system as well. Check the action out. It has the claw animated to show how the controls work.

bird_foot.zip

[heyvern]

Also keep in mind how wrinkly and bumpy a crows foot is. That will hide a lot of patch problems. Unless you plan some super closeups of just the foot most likely no one will see many of the things you as the artist will see when you are zoomed in 1600%.

 

p.s. I have to keep telling myself this constantly while modeling.....

 

"It's a toaster prop in the background of one 3 second scene! No one is going to see the pop-out crumb tray!"

 

Vernon "Lost my hair to perfectionism!" Zehr

[Sacman]

Thanks for everyone's help. I finally got it down to just a few 5 point patches and only two creases. As Vern said the creases should be hidden in the texture/decal. I had to add some geometry both on the leg and the front three toes. Instead of leaving 5 point patches there however, I continued the spline to the top of the leg and to the end of the toes. It adds extra patches but ultimately I think it worked well. I believe what I am going to do is use this as a higher detail close up. when needed but do a much lower patch count model for more streamlined rendering on shots where this detail is not needed. This all relates to the post I made in the Main discussion forum here:

 

Digital Elevation Maps.

 

Now my computer crapped out on me. I have everything backed up on CD thank goodness. So I am posting at work. I do not have a finished foot to show. I will wait till I have more done.

[modernhorse]

Frank -

Wonderful .prf and thanks.

 

I'm studying this and the whole thread for my Robin model.

 

Best of luck with your crow Sacman.

 

Doug