Butterfly Dragon Series - WIP

[Nalrac]

Hi Everyone. It's been a while since I have posted but I have been very busy. My skill level has improved drastically thanks to this furum. I've really been trying to practice on developing convincing materials and textures.

My next project is going to be compiled of three seperate images. It is going to be a visual documentary on a creature that I created a while back called a butterfly dragon. The butterfly dragons have three stages in their lives that are very similar to the stages of a butterfly. First, egg. Second, pupae (or caterpilar). Third, adult. It changes from pupae to adult by use of a leathery cocoon. The butterfly dragon lives only in mountains near Xi'an, China.

I am going to be writing a kind of zooligical report about it. Kind of like what you would find in national geographic. I will eventually offer this at a set of prints on my website. I'm going for realism, so tell me what you think, please.

AND A BIG THANKS to everyone who contributed to the awesome thread (http://www.pixolator.com/zbc-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=1&t=010026&p=) that MTB started about Sub Surface Scattering. That helped tremendously.

Here is the pupae stage. The worm is about six to seven inches long. So, it's a big one. the scene for all three images will be the forest, on the same branch of a tree This guy will be eating a leaf.

http://www2.zbrushcentral.com/uploaded_from_zbc/200401/user_image-1073939100vue.jpg

[Jimking]

are you sure this is not bug from new zbrush and that's why they haven't been able to released it yet? Looks relly nice.

[rtyer]

Impressive undertaking.
Be careful noone steps on him.

[Neogobius]

Very nice model. But to br honest butterflies have four, not three ontogenetical stages: ovo (egg), larva (caterpilar), pupa (pupa) and imago (adult). So butterly dragon from Xi'an differs from butterflies we know. Moreover, butterly dragon is not an insect, because insects larvae have three pairs of appendices in anterior part of the body, and there is no segmentation on the animal body. And...

Ok, ok... :D ;) :D Thera are many interesting things in China still to discover... :D

I'm waiting for next pictures to write some more critical words ;) :cool:

[Nalrac]

Im pretty sure this isn't the bug. But if it is they have some serious trouble.

If you did step on him rtyer. It would be a mess. Plus it has a REALLY NASTY BITE <Ouch>

You know what Neo, Shutup! :p No really, I thought that the caterpilar stage might be different from the pupa. I guess that the the cocoon is the pupa then. So it has four stages I guess.

ATTENTION - The butterly dragon actually has four stages egg, larva, pupa, and adult. :D

Thanks for the correction. That picture above is the larva then. OK. ;)

By the way, the butterfly dragon is a closer relation to a reptile with properties of an amphibian. But, because of the FOUR ontogenetical stage, it gains its reference to the butterfly. Plus, the adult looks very similar to a butterfly, minus the legs. The adult does not have legs but an prehensial tail with small grip pads near the end of its tail, used for taking hold of the stems of flowers to feed on their nectar. The pads look very similar to the back legs on the larva.

[Frenchy Pilou]

Hi Nalrac
There is another Zbrusher specialist at Zbc : Flycatcher :)
His Web site (http://flycatcher.250free.com/) without butterfly :rolleyes:
No present for a while :(

Very good specimen : seems very realistic!
Zbrush is a perfect tools for this sort of work : organic form and realist aspect!
All natural museum should be have it :)
Have happy Zbrushing!
Pilou
ps From that you said I can understand if it's an existant species or a fictive species ?
Pss I suppose of course that your model is a true 3d models ? For an animation for example :)
Zbrush has not yet animation but with the final object and the script you can make any animation in Zbrush
(just record multi rotations and movments in space ;)

[Nalrac]

Yeah Pilou. It's 100% 3D...No 2.5D whatsoever. So it could be animated. Great idea! I might plan on doing that after the series is over.

:tu: :tu: :tu: :tu: :tu:

PS - It's a fictitous species.....as far an I know. ;)

[Frenchy Pilou]

Thx Nelrac
I am appeased now else
both solutions were plausible :)
Have happy natural simulating!
Pilou

[aminuts]

On my way to other things I ran into this cool site with excellent insect pics...spiders and such and thought of this thread.

In case anyone needs some reference pics.....
Interests in natural History and Photography (http://math.uc.edu/~chalklr/Natural%20History/Introduction.htm)

[Frenchy Pilou]

Hi Animuts
Cools site and very good definition of the zoom photos :cool:
Pilou

[aminuts]

yeah awesome isn't it?

I must confess I thought of you as well when I found this site and prayed that the Master of Informative, Fun, Learning links...had not previously posted it.

There are a few I think when I am Zsphere ready, I shall model....at least one fantasticaly photographed grasshopper for sure!

Dang I miss my macro zoom.

Glad ya liked it.

[Nalrac]

Thanks aminuts! That site is awesome!

I appreciate you thinking about this thread. It's an honor.

That site will definately help me out with the realism part, I guarantee. :tu: :tu: :tu: :tu: :tu:

[Nalrac]

Ok everyone. First, I'm sorry for not posting individual renderings of my models here. The compositsion just kind of jumped into place. If you would like to see anything, however, let me know.

The is my first draft but it is approaching the final pretty quickly.

Things that are missing? Well for starters, the leaf will have a little eaten off of it. Second, I will do some 2.5D work on the leaves to help them look a little less similar. I am also going to work on the moss and bark details a little bit more.

PLEASE LET ME KNOW WHAT YOU THINK. If any of you masters out there have any suggestions I'm all ears. I would love any feedback that you can give.

Oh. And one more thing - ZBRUSH ROCKS!!!

http://www2.zbrushcentral.com/uploaded_from_zbc/200401/user_image-1074492118ikp.jpg

[50'sKID]

That is sooo neat, Nalrac! Caterpillars look like really fun creatures to model. I love the way you did the moss, and those leaves are really nice. Good work! 50.

[Frenchy Pilou]

Hi Nalrac
Just 2 remarks :)
Your tree seems "too clean"
Your creature seems fly and don't have not shadows on the tree trunck
Except that nice image :cool:
Pilou
Ps and Yes Zbrush rocks :cool:

[Nalrac]

Ok. I'm not going to say a whole lot here. I think I will just let the little guy speak for himself. :) Enjoy.

1 down. 2 more to go. (For the series that is)

http://www2.zbrushcentral.com/uploaded_from_zbc/200401/user_image-1074548669kie.jpg

[juandel]

love the leaves and bg/tree in general - powerful bugger, too, the one thing that came to my mind was that its looking too "dry" :)

- juandel

[filament9]

Your modelling, and materials/colors are outstanding. Excellent job on this!

[wenna]

Really outstanding work! Did you make those leaves in zbrush? They look sooo real!

[Fouad B.]

wow Narlac !!!

realistic pic
congratulations!! :tu: :tu:

[Nalrac]

Thanks for the comments.

Wenna, yes, This image is 100% ZBrush. I made a very simple leave alpha and created a 3D model from the alpha. Then I made a composite image in Photoshop then applied that to the alpha in texture master. I'll post the alpha here if you like. I don't know if anyone would want it, though. It is extremely basic.

I'm going to post a slightly corrected version here on the final image. Per jaundel's comments above I thought he did look a little dry. So I fixed it. I also fixed the specular on his eye.

http://www2.zbrushcentral.com/uploaded_from_zbc/200401/user_image-1074609939zlu.jpg

[andreseloy]

JUST BEUTIFUL NALRAC¡¡¡
OUTSTANDING¡¡
Andreseloy

[Sleeperservice]

That's a seriously good picture. The tree looks much better now, I can't wait to see the next stage in your creatures development!


Sleeper

[matvara]

Splendid rendering! :tu:

[mestela]

nice, i like the macro photography feel with the depth of field.

Something that would sell the effect better would be translucency; a creature that small would have a lot of light bleeding through it, making it really glow. Damned if I know how to accomplish this though. :p If its possible to be painted in, you could really sell the idea of an internal structure. Could be cool. Tried to find some zbrush links, here's what I found:
http://www.pixolator.com/zbc-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=1&t=005890 http://www.pixolator.com/zbc-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=1&t=006184 http://www.pixolator.com/zbc-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=1&t=009473

And some other links, both 3d renders and photos:
http://www.nikclark.com/BRAZIL/2002/summer/seahorse.jpg http://www.3drender.com/jbirn/ea/Ant.html http://www.dimijianimages.com/CostaRica-page4/spiny-caterpillar.jpg http://math.uc.edu/~chalklr/Natural%20History/Introduction.htm http://cordially.narod.ru/photo/1024x768/green-catepillar.jpg

-matt

[Fouad B.]

mestela thx for these very cool link !! :)

[Nalrac]

Yeah mestela, I had an issue with that very early into the planning. It's called sub-surface scattering and I posted a link to a great thread by MTB in the very first post in the this thread. Check it out. :tu:

The issue that I had was this. I wanted to portray this "caterpilar" as a butterfly-like reptile not the other way around. I was originally planning on doing something like what you suggested and was able to create a very convincing effect using the ColorizerTriShader material created by Pixolator. After doing so it looked very small and fragile, which it is not (being somewhere around 6 inches long). And it looked like an insect, which it is not. I decided that I wanted it to be more solid. I did however, use a lot of what I learned to make his stinger/tail seem more translucent. He still has a little bit of SSS but not much. I may messwith it some more now that you mention it. I appreciate the productive criticism. ;)

C-ya

[Nalrac]

THIS IS THE FINAL!! Finally :D

I'm sure that everyone here is ready for me to move on. Plus, the difference between the last three images have been so minute that it is hard to tell them apart. I am simply going to post this here for the sake of posting it. I want to have the true FINAL version here for you to view (and for me to show my friends here as well :) ).

I just made some minor mods to the caterpiler material to aid in the SSS around the legs and on his little stinger/tail. Plus I lightened up the shadow in the background.

I was hoping this one would make it to the blessed "top row". Oh well, maybe next time, eh?

And one more thing, ZBRUSH ROCKS!!

C-ya,

Adam

http://www2.zbrushcentral.com/uploaded_from_zbc/200401/user_image-1074717191kbp.jpg

[Frenchy Pilou]

You are a perfectionist :)
Pilou

[Fouad B.]

very nice pict Narlac, not in the top row in the forum, but in my personnal classement... yes!! :D

really impressiv pic :tu: :tu: :tu:

[Nalrac]

Frenchy, Yes I am. :D

Fouad B. - Wow, thank you very much! That's an honor comming from you. :cool:

[Nalrac]

NEXT- I am skipping the image of the cocoon for now. I will return to it as soon as I figure out what it will look like.

I've moved straight to the meat. The dragon itself. I had drawings of an older version but I decided that I wanted to go a different route. The model that I am posting right now is still in preview mode. It is, as of now, fully posable. I will, however, be skinning, deviding, and smoothing for further detailing. I will tie it together with the caterpilar a little more as I get closer to texturing.

Any feedback is greatly appreciated. Thanks.

Adam

http://www2.zbrushcentral.com/uploaded_from_zbc/200401/user_image-1075144749gkw.jpg

[Frenchy Pilou]

A butterbly with a beak bird ?
Is it reasonable ? :D
Cool creature :cool:
Have good pipe dreaming! (?? in french "chimere")
Pilou

[Fouad B.]

nice creature! I like it :tu: :tu: