Brenden's first visit from Santa

These are some recent pictures of Brenden, and tonight when Santa came by to visit him. As you can tell from the photos Brenden was so happy and excited to see him.

Bug final project finished

The first three images are test runs that I did to see my character in his environment and how the background and lighting would affect him. I liked how the color of the greenish brown background is reflected off of everything giving it another degree of depth and color accenting the edges of the beetles.

The beetle glowing blue was an idea someone gave me to distinguish between the two beetles. I didn't like the difference and can explain them fighting because they are an aggressive species.

The close up one was good except hard to distinguish one from the other at points.

So, the last three images are what I am using for my final project to turn in. I only needed one image, but liked showing the beetles from a few different poses. I changed the ground from a sandy texture to just a neutral silvery red color because I felt there was too much texture and that a nice break from bumpy grainy texture in the ground would balance everything out nicely.

Bug progress

These are some rough images of the progress I've made on my final project. I did some playing around with an inner glow, and tested out some lighting and shadows. It's starting to look better, but I still have a bit more to tweak to make it look exactly the way I want it to. Hopefully I will have it done by this weekend so I can study more for my other class finals.

That's What Moms Do finaly finished!!!!

I finally finished these illustrations for the short story children's book I was given. I spent a lot of time on a few of them, and rushed through some towards the end because they needed to be done by tomorrow. All in all I think I did ok, just wish I had another week or two to make them even better.

Michael Finch wrote:

Title: That's What Moms Do (rough draft, but basically the story)

Scene1: Kitchen

Little Girl's mommy was in the kitchen. She was making breakfast ... scrambled eggs. Crack! Crack! She opened the eggs into the pan. "Why did you do that, Mommy?" asked Little Girl. "To make some breakfast for you," she smiled. "Why do you make breakfast?" asked Little Girl. And her mom said,"Because that's what moms do."

Scene 2: Hallway

Little Girl heard a swish! swish! down the hall. She peeked around the corner and saw her mommy sweeping the floor with a broom.

"Why are you doing that, Mommy?" asked Little Girl. "To get the dirt off the floor to keep our house clean." Little Girl asked, "Why do you clean the house?" "Because that's what moms do," and her mom swished down the hall.

Scene 3: Backyard

Little Girl's mommy was outside with the laundry. She hung the wet clothes up high on the clothesline. The clothes were cold and the sun was warm. "Why do you do that?" asked Little Girl. Mommy answered, "To get our clean clothes nice and dry." "Why, Mommy?" asked Little Girl. "Because that's what moms do."

Scene 4: Kitchen

Later, Little Girl's mommy came inside with some brown bags. Little Girl tried to pick one up, but the bags were heavy. Little Girl asked, "Why do you have those bags?" Her mommy said, "So I can carry food home from the grocery store." "Why do you go to the store?" Little Girl asked. "Because that's what moms do," said Mommy.

Scene 5: Bathroom

During bath time, Little Girl splashed in the warm water. The shampoo smelled like cherries as Mommy washed her hair.

Little Girl asked, "Why do you use shampoo?" Mommy said, "To wash your hair." "Why do you wash my hair?" And Mommy said, "Because that's what moms do."

Scene 6: Bedroom

At bedtime, Little Girl had on her jammies and climbed into bed. She snuggled under her soft, fluffy blanket. Little Girl asked, "Why do I have to go to bed?" Mommy said, "So I can hug you and give you a goodnight kiss." Little Girl asked, "Why do you give me a hug and a kiss?" And Mommy said, turning out the light, "Because I love you ... and that's what moms do."

Got Bookshelves?

This is an another update for the bookshelf. I didn't like how dark the wood underneath and around the edges were, so I lightened them, and also applied a different layer in maya for the particle board underneath the laminate to cause all of the bumps and cracks to be raised or sunk in and not affect the laminate itself. I put even more dirt around the bases and corners of each shelf, and caused sections of the laminate to have ripped off of the third shelf and look like it was broken off where the shelf used to be attached. And finally I applied dings around the edges and scratches to be applied to all sides where there appears to be worn surfaces. Hopefully this does it. I will be glad to be able and move on to something else soon.

Bug Model and Bookshelf update

This is my bookshelf with less saturated color, more dirt, and some particle board wood underneath where the laminate has peeled and cracked off. I also finished my model for my final project of an alien beetle. It took me a lot of time this week on Tuesday, and several hours today, but i finally finished it on schedule for my one week deadline I gave myself. Now I have another week or so to lay out my UV maps to apply the color and texture that I want, with another week and a half left after that to apply the lights, shadow, and matte painting for the background that I'm going to try out. I'm happy with how the model turned out and even added some more details that weren't part of my original drawing as I modeled it.
The last painting is the kitchen scene I did over the course of two days when the lab was closed for Thanks giving. I played around with different color schemes and decided on blue and orange since they're complimentary colors. I still have to add in a few props here and there to show that they're cooking, and to make it a little more lively, but overall I think it turned out well. I intentionally drew a few crooked lines here and there to give it an imperfect look. I have the characters just about done, and only 5 more scenes left, so hopefully within the next week, the story will be completely illustrated.

New project and stuff

These are some images of some drawings I did for my final project. I am deciding to go with the humanoid beetle warrior. I found some images of beetles and will use them to reference some color and possibly texture as well. Last night at class we presented our different ideas, and everyone liked my drawings and alien beetle warrior idea the best. His skirt design is made of all of his enemies wings that he clipped, so when he fights and wins, he doesn't kill them, but takes their wings instead.
The other idea was an exoskeleton as well, only robotic. I pictured a tiny alien inside much like in Independence day, only robotic instead of organic suits.
We learned how to put a skeleton inside of our models for the final project in case we want to build the model in a static pose, then build a skeleton and model it the way we want, so we can make a complex pose much easier and faster without having to model it that way. So in class after we learned how to do that, we were given this model of a macaroni man, built a skeleton to attach, and then pose it however we wanted to. I exaggerated his arms really long so that he uses his arms to walk since he has no legs and put him in an action pose of pulling himself across the floor. The original model was just a straight up and down gray noodle, so I colored it yellow, and posed its head and back to coordinate with his actions really easy with the tools we learned about. So now I can model my bug warrior just standing up straight, then pose him much faster with a skeleton attached later on. I am already having a lot of fun with this project, and plan on doing some concept paintings for what my composition will look like over the weekend.