Blog Archive

Monday 26 December 2016

Dress UV update

Having some issues with the stretching of uvs across the bottom half of the skirt.


Issues resolved with the new smooth tool with the 2016 update of Maya. Unfolding UV's allows for the checkers to become more uniform, not stretching the textures. The relax option of this tool, allows for the UV projection to become more 'relaxed' and in my experience, looks more like the object which I'm about to paint. It is a dilema as to whether to keep the mesh uniform in checker boards, while losing recognisability of the original mesh, or to keep it an exampel of the dress. In my case, I will keep it as close as possible to the orignal; dress as I have a lot of detail to paint in. 

Sunday 25 December 2016

Dress UV Mesh


Seem runs under hair which is fine for a non moving character but may have some issue in rigging the character, for example hair billowing in wind. Since it is a singular colour dress,, it should be easy enough to match up in photoshop.

Glove UVs.


Created using the camera based UVs in the UV editor.

Difficulties facing - tool bar has become unusable so now having to use the space bar interface. I have heard other youtubers say they prefer this method as they become faster and more effective in using it, however I have found my workflow thrown.

These uv's were made easier by making cuts where the folds were to unwrap this glove.



I went back and recut into my UV mapping as I was having some issues with the UVs distorting on in the viewfinder, the checkered boards were becoming stretched and non-square. 

http://pixelstains.deviantart.com/art/5-Photoshop-Brushes-for-Painting-Leather-522517740

Wednesday 21 December 2016

Making Eyes
















I followed a few different eyeball tutorials in order to create this texture. The eyes I have created are relatively realistic. If I wanted to improve this at all, I would look at rendering some eyelashes along the eyelid as well as perhaps the single hairs along the eyebrows, but since I am keeping this model simple, the painted textures will suffice.

The iris plane is pulled back from the sphere and I have used a ramp to create a gradient of pink to pale yellow to orange. The texture / bump map used is a noise effect. By mapping different sections of the iris I was able to get a harsh ring around the eye. This was created by extruding and pulling back once more. 

As of now, I am very pleased with my model and find that the eyes give far more depth to the character than any of the other elements. I did experiment with a painted texture but found that I struggled to keep the eyeball texture from stretching across the surface of the sphere. Perhaps this is poor UV mapping? The glossy surface of a phong made transparent over the top of the eye has given it a real glassy effect. 

Monday 19 December 2016

UV Mapping and Texture Mapping Face








Using Outliner, Layers and the NameSpace Editor


Keeping the workspace clean is part of a professional workflow in the industry. I was renaming my layers while working with the UV editor, as I was 'hiding' using the show-hide option, some the hair while detaching the ear in my UVs as I was unable to see the head with the hair in the way. While trying to rename hair, I had an issue where each rename added a new name to the end of my layers. For example, 'hair' became 'hair'01' and so on. I also had this issue on renaming imports as one of my later head edits was called 'mouthbag', as I had added a mouth bag, recommended by Jaime since this prevents issues in viewers accidentally seeing missing geometry when rigging speech or light hitting the insides of the mouth.The issues in renaming appeared to be in imports as well as grouping and originally titling something in the first instances of modelling.

This was a rather embarrassing title for me to have for my work, I couldn't possibly hand in something even if the title was obvious: "mouthbag01:head" so I had to find a way around this. I googled the issue and found that others had the same issue and it was all rooted in both outliner and Namespace editor which can be found in Window - General Editors. Renaming in outliner, did not always work, and as a result I found the solution to the problem was indeed in the Namespace editor. To resolve this issue, Delete the name in the Namespace Editor and click the Merge with Parent option. This then allows you freedom the rename your objects as you please. While doing this, I also deleted the unknown objects and geometry within my work which Harley pointed out before.

http://blog.gameartworkbook.com/dcc-tools-autodesk-maya/how-to-rename-an-imported-model-in-autodesk-maya/

This is the blogpost I used to solve my issue. I quite often use blog posts, google my issue and learn quickly from others' own experiences.

To avoid further future issues, I should keep a close eye on my namespace editor, as well as outliner keeping an organised workspace as I work. It is easy to get confused when their is a lot of clutter in the outliner. Fortunately, it is easy to rearrange as you click on them they are highlighted in the viewfinders. If this wasn't an option, I don't think I would have been able to organise my work, at least not as quickly as I did.

Saturday 17 December 2016



Changed bag width to accommodate leg and dress.

















I followed this tutorial in texturing hair as it was extremely successful in creating a full body of hair for this realistic character in maya. For the moment, I feel that this style does not work for my character, although I won't be able to tell without a full body of. I feel this technique and method may be more forgiving for the placement of the polygons. I am unsure however whether this method will work well for long hair, as well as whether this technique would work only for game characters. 

Friday 16 December 2016















I modelled a leaf as an accessory for Almond's hair. It was relatively simple to make. I made the surface shape and then reflected to create a new shape. Of course, I realise I could have extruded the shape but I was able to see the function of the poly vertices merge which will come in very useful. What has worked really well here is the texture painting in conjunction with the bump mapping. I experienced with different levels of black and white contrast from the painting to create depth to the object. I went with a light contrast as I found the harsher the blacks on the map, the dirtier it made my leaf appear.