Better late than never - Scarab model

[Tantramancer]

http://www2.zbrushcentral.com/uploaded_from_zbc/200407/user_image-1088811278ptj.jpg


Hi all. I've really enjoyed reading through the various posts and seeing all the wonderful things people have been doing with ZBrush over the past couple of months. I've been playing around with ZBrush a little when I can but mostly just minor experiments and watching alot of scripted tutorials up to now.

I first started dabbling with the demo version a bit around 3 months ago out of curiosity because I had heard alot of people mentioning it on the various forums out there. That early trial compelled me to go without groceries for awhile so I could get the money together to buy version 2. That's alright, I needed a diet anyway. I've been chomping at the bit to really jump into the program but up until now I've had too many other tasks taking precedence.

I've been busy getting my website portfolio together and am now in the process of hunting down another job at a video game studio somewhere. I did that already for about 7 or 8 years and have been freelancing in the video game industry for the last couple years. I've learned the idea of freelancing for a living really isn't for me so I'm planning to jump back into the field again fulltime. Being your own boss isn't all it's cracked up to be at least not for me.

Anyway, this is a model I did of an Egyptian Scarab Beetle I did recently. A little too late for the Insects Monday Night Challenge but better late than never as they say. Now that I'm starting to get a little time to finally do some finished pieces in ZBrush I figured it was time to start displaying what I'm doing. Plus, I'd like to get some feedback from the community to get better and hopefully be a help in turn to other artists here.

Sometime in the next few days I'll be texturing the Scarab. I'll be sure to put the textured version up as soon as it's ready along with a view of the ZSphere stage then. It's got a heck of alot of magnet spheres all around to deform it. Looks like a Chia Pet in the ZSphere view. They did most of the contouring work. I didn't really need to do very much in detailing it with the Alpha and Inflate brushes. Just a little mottling up of the surface with some various Alphas in Projection Master. I didn't want to go too crazy with that since I wanted the carapace to remain relatively smooth - just enough to breakup the highlights a bit once I apply the final shader.

By a wierd coincidence I just got contracted to do a concept painting for a company in Texas the other day that requires a bunch of scarabs in the picture around the central figure. I just got the assignment a couple days after completing the untextured model. Convenient that I already have something to use for it, eh? If they give me permission to post images of the piece I'll be working on, I'll try to post them on this forum so you can see how this Scarab is going to be used. I usually do these kind of illustrations I get contracted for in Photoshop and Painter but this time I'm thinking of creating alot of the elements for it in ZBrush. I already have a headstart with this Scarab for it.

[wenna]

Hi and glad you posted this..Great modeling!! Would be very interested in seeing those attractor spears and of course the final with all the texturing! Congrats on getting to use this one so quickly!

wenna

[marc]

Yeah, the modeling is great! And.. I would be intersted in seeing the zsphere view as well ;) keep it up!

so long
marc

[Dickie]

Excellent Scarab, David. Very Cool modle...then again I'm biased as I love bugs of all sorts...Keep up the great work...

Dickie

[kobi1kobi]

lovely :)
I assume there is no script?
it would be nice to see the zsphere model, and the final textured one.

[Tantramancer]

http://www.blacktortoise.com/assetts/_graphics/3Dwork/Personal/ScarabModel_001/Scarab_ZSphereView_01.jpg

[Ron Harris]

the last images arent showing up....

[Tantramancer]

Let me try that again:

http://www.blacktortoise.com/assetts/_graphics/3Dwork/Personal/ScarabModel_001/Scarab_shadertest_01.jpg

[Tantramancer]

Damn, not sure what the heck is wrong. Tried posting some new images but I'm having some kind of difficulty. From what I can see the image URL is being entered correctly and I did double-check to be sure the files were in the correct place online. Not sure why these aren't working but the first one did. I can't see anything different in what I'm doing. It's got to be something simple I'm missing that I'm just not seeing.

[Tantramancer]

Ah. I think I see the problem. A minor tweek to my last edit on my site messed things up a bit.

[Tantramancer]

http://www.blacktortoise.com/assetts/_graphics/3Dwork/Personal/ScarabModel_001/Scarab_ZSphereView_02.jpg

[Tantramancer]

The shaded view is just and early shader test for now. Just an experiment with a semi-translucent material and some different colors assigned to the spec, ambient, diffuse and cavity colors to try getting the iridescent beetle shell look I want. It's just a quick early experiment for now but seems to be getting close to what I want for the main shell. The legs and head will be a bit different and I'd like to do something for a lighter underbody material and paint in some specific details.

[Tantramancer]

Sorry kobi1kobi. I didn't save a script of the modeling session.

[Tantramancer]

http://www.blacktortoise.com/assetts/_graphics/3Dwork/Personal/ScarabModel_001/Scarab_polyframeview_01.jpg

Polyframe view.

[mahwok]

OMG that's a LOT of zspheres!!
really makes me wonder how you handled that, considering how tiny/huge some of them are and how much fiddling with zsphere resolutions and rotating those nasty things to avoid twists and turns they usually mean to me.

amazing model and and awesome job, congrats! :)

[AdamT]

Very nice work. That *is* a lot of Zspheres!

Question: can someone tell me about those shaded handles coming out of the Zspheres? I've seen them in other pics but they don't appear in my Zsphere models.

[tdrs]

Can you explain the creation method of the material£¿thanks :D :D :D

[Tantramancer]

Those are 'magnet spheres' or 'attractor spheres.' I can't remember which is the proper term for them. They help to gradually pull and deform the model into the desired shape. Of course, you could always just do that with the Standard Brush or the Inflate Brush by painting the deformations into the model. However, I've found that good use of these magnet spheres can be a bit more precise in getting that base mesh much closer to the sillhouette you want for the final object and sometimes be a little faster as well.

While in Draw mode and laying out your ZSphere model just Alt+click on any connector sphere in the chain connecting to the ZSphere you wish to convert to a magnet sphere. For a ZSphere to become a magnet sphere it must be the last sphere at the end of a string of ZSpheres. It's effect varies depending on it's distance from your model and it's scale. Once you get used to them they can be very fast to set up during the ZSphere modeling stage and really cut down on the amount of work you have to do with the editing brushes in the later stages.

Basically, I think there are 2 main methods of using magnet spheres in the modeling process from what I've been able to see so far:

The first is what I like to refer to as a 'point' method. This uses only one magnet sphere or sometimes a few magnet spheres in a tight cluster along a central line to deform a sharper bulge in one part of the model. You'll see this in a few areas around the legs on the scarab. So far I haven't done any models that really call for extensive use of this - I tend to use the next technique more often.

The second method and the one I think I use most often is the 'row' method. You can see this most noticeably along the scarab's carapace. I have an even row going down the centerline with 2 other rows on either side a little farther out. It's also used to a lesser extent in some places on the legs. By using rows of magnet spheres you can get some nice subtle deforming of your mesh. Notice in the ZSphere views of the model how most of the carapace was deformed from that one ZSphere around the middle. I can set the magnet spheres up quickly and do alot of easy fine tuning of the shape by grabbing different magnet spheres in each row and adjust their scale and distance from the rest of the model. I toggle between the ZSphere view and the polyframe view frequently to see the changes made by the magnet spheres I've adjusted.

That amount of control of fine tuning the base shape can be tough to do sometimes using just the editing brushes. They aren't as precise. With practice the magnet spheres can be very quick to use and get you a basic shape very close to what you want for the final result. Then you can focus on using the editing brushes to jump right into doing all the fun details. It's just a different approach - a little more work up front to make less work later. The technique seems to work for me in most modeling situations I've come across so far and it may work for some of you as well. It's just a matter of finding what works for your particular style and way of thinking.

[mahwok]

oh yes, those magneto-spheres are absolutely brilliant and a joy to work with for the exact reasons you mentioned. their main advantage IMHO is, that everything remains editable and reversable, if you don't like the result just kill the sphere - feels like unlimited undo, even your model has detail, texture, whatever ... and they allow for vast, easy deformations with a few klicks.

though i must admit that compared to this amazing scarab all my experiments with tem are but child's play :)

just imagine what an awesome tool they would be, if your mesh was visible while tweaking them (anyone at pixologic reading this? hin hint :) )

btw: there's no way to have *negative* attractors, pushing, not pulling the mesh, or is there?

[Tantramancer]

Scarab Beetle Shell Material_01 (http://www.blacktortoise.com/downloads/MiscStuff/ScarabBeetleShell_01.ZIP)

Here's the material I started experimenting with for you all to play around with. It's got some gel and metal properties and is slightly translucent and other things. Just poking around with different materials and slider settings so I really don't remember how I started it exactly. The irridescent effect comes from assigning different colors to the diff, spec and ambient channels mostly. I've seen some neat variations on this by just changing the colors assigned to those channels while I was trying to get the combination that I wanted. For the beetle I assigned a really dark desaturated blue color that was almost black then assigned this material to it to get what you see in the shaded rendering. Hopefully some of you will find a variation of this useful for something you are working on. I'd be interested in seeing what some of you do with it.

I'm probably going to modify this material to get a darker and a slightly more matte finish look for the head and legs and then probably use a completely different material altogether for the underside of the scarab.

[Tantramancer]

Mahwok: Dude - it's like you're reading my mind! The ability to see and manipulate the magnet spheres while in mesh view would be so incredibly awesome! I strongly second that motion for Pixologic to include a feature like that in the next version. That would save alot of time toggling the view and keep that key on my keyboard from wearing out prematurely.

As far as I know there isn't a 'negative' attractor sphere effect. If I'm wrong, someone please correct me and tell me how to change the polarity on a magnet sphere. That's a feature I really wish I could use. If it doesn't exist now then I really hope something like that gets implemented in the next version of the program.

[AdamT]

Thanks for the thorough explanation Tantramancer. Somehow that feature completely escaped me! I don't think it's mentioned in the practical manual is it?

[Ron Harris]

I have been watching this thread and have enjoyed the posts and the explanations of how you did it and the accompanying support images. Thank you for taking the time to explain it. I will have to try my hand at a realistic insect in the very near future. All my bugs to date end up looking too cartoonish. You achieved a very kewl model and its really kewl that you will be able to use it in your new irl work project. :cool: :cool: :cool:

Ron

[dareczek]

(sorry for my bad english)

yes, Zspheres are amazing!!
Model also very good too!

so real...

[Aztec...soljA]

Well, great to see you here :p .
This forum has endeless experiences and well welcome in!Glad to see new people with such potential as yours.
Hehe nice model too.
Take care :)

[Lord Rae]

really nice... great detail and you can tell that alot of effort went towards it. How did you get the crisp edges off the zspheres thats something I'm struggling with now getting back into the program.

[Tantramancer]

Lord Rae: I apologize, but I'm not entirely clear as to specifically what you are referring to about the 'crisp' edges. Are you referring to the flow of the geometry lines in general across the whole model or something specific to a portion of it's anatomy like the legs?

Areas like the joints separating the leg sections start with a zsphere scaled much smaller than the rest of the leg then I convert a connector sphere on either side of it into a zsphere (draw mode + click on a specific connector sphere) then scale them down a bit. That helps to cinch in the membrane of the model making a nice clean joint. You can see a bunch of cinches all over the legs. I wanted to get the overall form quickly though so most of that cinching I did after something like the whole length of a leg had been quickly roughed in with only a few ZSpheres. The small scaled magnet spheres placed so close to the legs help to flatten the leg segments a little so they aren't so unnaturally rounded. You can fine-tune that effect and creat gradual twists and sweeps as you can see in the ZSphere views by moving the magnet sphere handles around and scale them up and down a bit. Each one shouldn't be angled too differently from it's next neighbor or you'll get knots and other undesirable things. The nice advantage to that is the magnetic pull of the magnet spheres curves the geometry lines in a nice flow with those sweeps and twists. That makes your detailing later considerably less 'jaggy' when you are doing all the fun edit brush stuff since your geometry lines are already flowing in the direction you want to paint.

I come from more of a fine-art training background. Practically everything I know about computers and software came on the job over the years. It hasn't been easy since much of the time I'm forced to learn on my own and still somehow have to make deadlines. One thing you'll almost always hear in any kind of fine-art painting, drawing or sculpting class is not to worry about the details up front. Rough in your ENTIRE subject as quick and simple as you can then gradually refine and add detail in successive passes. That principle definitely holds true in the digital realm as well. I see too many people succumb to the tempation to jump right into the fun details without paying much attention to the basic form and proportions. The details can look nice when done but the overall piece often suffers because the basic form wasn't nailed down first. It seems like that temptation is something everyone has to deal with. The habit of succumbing to it can be broken.

As an anecdote let me tell you about one of my experiences in college: I had a professor in one of my life drawing classes who was this funny little German lady. To get us to loosen up and stop focusing on details she would time the sessions with a stop watch counting down the last 15 seconds then slap a pair of rulers held in one hand onto her desk - making an ear-splitting whip-crack sound to get us to stop drawing or painting. Sometimes we would have as much as 20 minutes or more to do something but then in later sessions be required to do the same thing in shorter periods down to only 30 seconds. 30 seconds seems impossible to do a complicated subject and it is but it got us to really loosen up and focus our perceptions on the basic form and discard the details from the view our eyes were transmitting to our brains. As an added measure she would draw her 'line of death' on the floor in front of each of us with masking tape that we had to stand behind. Heaven help you if you crossed the line! She'd sneak up behind you and crack those rulers into the palm of her hand with a BANG which would make you jump right out of your skin. We were so far away from our paper or canvas that we were at full arm's length from the surface. That physically prevented us from tightening up into the details.

She was a weird lady and it was a weird class, but even today if I catch myself tightening up too quick or take too long on the initial rough stage of something I still expect to hear that crack of the rulers right behind me.

In the example of the Scarab model the very first rough in of the model was probably only a dozen or so ZSpheres representing the main areas of the head, body and legs done in around the first 5 minutes. It's a very primitive charicature stick figure at that point but let's me see how the general proportions and placements look in the level 1 and 2 resolution levels. The IRES and Membrane sliders are real important at this stage too along with the Minimal Skin to Child and Minimal Skin to Parent buttons.

I gradually started adding magnet spheres and cinches, working across the whole model from one end to the other in multiple passes until I felt I couldn't take it any farther in the res 2 density stage. I didn't do much at all with the editing brushes on the base modeling. Mostly just the Nudge brush sometimes to push/pull some mesh lines into a more natural looking flow. I use that brush more than any of the others in the beginning stages to adjust the flow of the geometry lines to be neater in areas that have problems. Even that isn't really needed extensively if you've used your magnet spheres well. They can really help get a very clean base model with good line flow that will make your detailing in the hi-res stages much easier and with fewer 'jaggy' areas.

I've been having alot of fun experimenting with the possibilities of magnet spheres. They are one of my favorite tools I've found so far but I haven't learned more than half of all the features in ZBrush yet. There's still plenty of territory left for me to stumble over something else unexpected and equally cool.

By the way: earlier in the first page of this post I described 2 methods of making use of magnet spheres. In a recent experiment, trying to create a better starter low poly human head with a large array of magnet spheres, I came across a cool 3rd method. I'll describe that method later when I post images of the head model.

Not sure if this answered your question Lord Rae or not but hopefully someone out there will find it useful. It seems some people aren't really taking advantage of the full potential of magnet spheres (or is the official name attractor spheres? - It's stuck in my head as magnet spheres) so I'm thinking of making a more formal tutorial on what I've learned of the subject and maybe a scripted session later when I have a little more time.

[Frenchy Pilou]

Hi tantra
Cool Scarab :cool: and text :D
You will love Zbrush !
It's a prog for "artist" :)
Have happy Zbrushing!
Pilou