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Creature: a grendel from the novel Legacy of Heorot (WIP)

ZBrush Artworks
#1

A few years ago a friend and I were taking a class together, and he recommended a science fiction novel to me called the Legacy of Heorot. We had to run to the book store to pick up something for the class, and I picked up the book and read it that night. Got inspired to do some sketches and later build a 3d model in 3DSMax of the main creature in the novel, the monster the colonists called a grendel (it’s not completely accurate to the book, but was my take on what I thought it would look like). Haven’t had much time to work on personal projects recently, and thought that it might be fun to try and rework what I’d already done with the grendel. I simplified the geometry a bit, brought it into Zbrush, and worked in Zbrush and Pshop to detail the creature. Haven’t had the time to finish texturing and rigging it (or adding the spikes to the tail, eyes, and tongue), but thought this would be decent enough to post just showing the geometry and bump. Rendered in Mental Ray.

John Stetzer
JWS GrendelAmbientTest.jpg

#2

Kewl Grendel creature…when I was in high school and we read Beowolf was was introduced to Grendel etc…I remember gettign caught sketching during the class…my rendition was nothign like yours…My teacher looked down and said ," Child that is not Grendel’s momma…" Then he pointed at the boobs on my sketch and giggled and walked away…

I see many creatures in you reptile…humanish forearms, creature from the black lagoon hands, anklyosaurus head and head plating, turtle spine, armored salamander tail, and a horned toad lizard’s main body…(just wanting to let you know I did study the image…lol) This is a very kewl looking creature and I will look forward to seeing him all painted and gussyied up.

What are you going to rig and animate him with?

A video clip of him in motion would and will be kewl to view.

thnx for sharing a kewl pic,
Ron

#3

nice work. i just recently read beowulf for a class. not quite as i envisioned grendal, but nevertheless outstanding! give him a bit more of a shadow so he’s more grounded. other than that, really good modeling.

#4

Cool creature!

A perfect candidate for the new Almost Monday Night Challenge!!

#5

Very cool! Great diversity in the scales!

r

#6

Very nice work, great textures! I am especially fond of the flesh folds running down the lateral edge of the ribs. There is a real sense of gravity in those.

This is also fantastic for a mental ray render. Are you using just displacement or displace and bump with diffuse? Can we see the base mesh?

I agree with Ron, this begs… no PLEADS to be animated slithering all Harryhausen style across my screen :smiley:

Awesome creature and a great sculpt!

Scott

#7

So nicely lizardly done, it reminds me heavily of my old friends water dragons.

#8

i want to see the textured version

#9

Thanks for the kind words :^); specific replies below.

Ron: What are you going to rig and animate him with?

Going to do things in Max. When I can find the time; really short on time these days :^/…

Dado: i just recently read beowulf for a class. not quite as i envisioned grendal

Well, this isn’t that Grendel :^); it’s a completely different creature from the science fiction novel I mentioned above.

Scott: This is also fantastic for a mental ray render. Are you using just displacement or displace and bump with diffuse? Can we see the base mesh?

This is using a displacement map and a bump map; other item in the material for the object is an ambient occlusion map in the diffuse. Attached is a image showing the base mesh, displaced mesh, and displaced/bumped mesh.

ilusiondigital: i want to see the textured version

Planning on it; just need to find some more time :^/.

John Stetzer
JWS 3_Steps.jpg

#10

Nice!!

If I may ask are you using a subdiv and a displace approiximation and if so what settings do you find work best for you?

Also, the bump map is suprosingly devoid of artifacts. I find usually I get bad black artifacts in mine, what are your bump settings?

Sorry to send so many questions but it is such a successfl piece.

Congrats on great work,

Scott

#11

Nice work. Good detailing.

#12

I’m actually using Mental Ray’s rendering subdiv displacement; have it set at .85 for the pixel length. If I were doing this with straight geometry, I’d use a Turbosmooth modifier set to 3 iterations, the Displace modifier, and a normal map to get the extra detail. I’d set both the Turbosmooth and Displace to Off In Viewport for speed reasons. This would render very quickly, but wouldn’t have all the geomtric detail from the MR render.

Also, the bump map is suprosingly devoid of artifacts. I find usually I get bad black artifacts in mine, what are your bump settings?

It’s just using the default of 30; when I made the bump map, I used the Roller Brush, then went over it with the Blur brush before picking things have up. Made for a nice smooth bump map without some potentially harsh edges.

John Stetzer
JWS

#13

Thanks fro the information! I have never heard of turbosmooth or a displace modeifier… Is this Mental Ray for Maya or XSI?

Scott

#14

is that the grendel monster that the babies are fish-like and taste like salmon or something? i think i know what you’re talking about and thats very close to what I envisioned it. ^^ very good job!

#15

Sorry, this is Max; don’t know what the Maya/XSI equivelents are. Turbosmooth is a faster/less memory intensive version of Max’s Meshsmooth modifier, and Displace displaces geometry without adding extra geometry.

John Stetzer
JWS

#16

That’s the one, and thanks :^).

John Stetzer
JWS