The largest project I have done to date. I have created a functioning rig of the character Tahu from Bionicle. This has taken over a year to complete, and has been a massive undertaking, with me working completely on my own aside from help by tutorial and references.
The full write-up for the project will be coming soon. Stay tuned for more!
Over many weeks this year, I have put a lot of time and effort into making video game-style animations with some of my custom character rigs.
My latest project has been modeling a helmet for a friend's original concept for Super Sentai/Power Rangers. This here is the helmet of the red ranger. My goal was realizing the art and idea in 3D. This was a very fun and brief challenge that I thought would be a great way to test how far my skills (in Blender) have come.
I have not been keeping up with updated here on the blog., but this had been a big focus for the past month. For all of the progress pictures, be sure to check out my Twitter @Nickocng. I am currently finishing up the texturing and final renders, so stay tuned.
For the full write-up where I go in-depth about every step of the journey, please check out the project's landing page.
https://thenicholasng.blogspot.com/p/knightranger-red-helmet-full-project.html
As a followup to the completion of the Dimitrescu sisters rigs, I had an idea to test them out in animation. Here I wanted to invoke the same style as the source material, where the character flies into the scene. While not based on any one particular scene, it felt fitting to have them take this almost swimming-like motion through the air to approach the viewer.
So far, I've only done a few passes, and the result is still a bit rough. I hope to finish this out and eventually add in some scenery and perhaps even the swarming flies that accompany the character.
Now that I have finished (for now) the rigs for the Hagah characters last year, I had to take the next step and try out some animations with the gang. Over the past few months, I have been posting my progress on video game-esque sequences and more for each of the characters. Very experimental, but also a fun way to stress-test the work I've basically made from scratch.
For all of the progress reports, check out my Twitter @Nickocng.
I set out to make a set of 10 animation sequences: walk, run, jump, idle, attack, block, counter, dash, elemental, and stun. Additionally, I made a few establishing animations portraying the use of mask powers, which were structured more like cinematics. It was particularly challenging to think of how each of these six individuals would look doing the same actions. They need to have some sense of uniformity, but also need some personality of their own, otherwise they might as well all use the same animation. Some move faster or slower than the rest. Some have more flair and finesse in their movements, while others are toned down and move with fluidity. All of this was really interesting to consider throughout the entire process. I had some sense of how they should act, but there was also a far few gaps to fill in with my own concepts of how they should act.
I am currently taking a break from this project, so stay tuned.
After the first rigged low-poly models, I wanted to branch out and make more from other franchises and media. Next up is a character from the game Detroit: Become Human: Connor RK800. The android with a mission to hunt down deviants is another of my favorites, and they have a very distinct and iconic design. Using the same methods as the previous projects, I modeled out, rigged, and rendered some cool shots with a fairly functional final product. I set out to make these first three renders, with more to come. The first depicts the character under two lights representing the choice of what path to go down, and the two others depict each path taken.
This project has been in development for a while, and while still not done entirely, I feel like this is a good point to step off and regroup. I fully intend on returning for more. As a result, I can only recall the more recent developments (I'll hopefully do a full write-up later on). This portion, which includes the rigging, weight-painting, shading, and posing/rendering) took only a few sessions of work, ranging 10-12 hours spread across two weeks. Everything aside from the watermarks was composited in the main Blender file.
Contrasting the Daughters Dimitrescu, this character is much more conservative and clean-cut in silhouette. As a result, I was faced with different challenges such as forming hair, ears, and a formal suit and tie. The defining adornments for the character are very sleek and integrated. Everything fits together, so nothing hangs out or lays on its own. This project also helped me learn about lighting and emission shaders, which I made good use of for the armband and LED on the forehead.
I plan to return to this project with more renders and animations. For now I am happy to reach something of a goal point since I was struggling to get back into things. I would certainly like to test the boundaries of a low-poly model like this, and perhaps recreate some scenes from the source material with my own added flare.
Until next time.
