your zombie is looking pretty good…the saber tooth cat looks good , but maybe your masking leaked a little bit to some back faces ?? just a thought… Deke 
Thanks, Deke. The bottom of the saber tooth’s jaw was pretty thin at the bottom so he ended up with some hair in his mouth lol. I’ve redone the fibers several time since then, more or less for practice and he’ll be showing up again sometime soon because I really like the base mesh and it’s great for fibermesh practice.
Just about done with the zombie although I’ll probably still be tweaking things for hours to come.
Back to fur and light studies.
For a bright point light source with a small falloff, you could try turning the intensity up and then lower the radius in the Lights Placement subpalette (make sure ambient is on zero - I turn ambient off for all lights anyway as a general rule). As a tip if you didn’t know it, to place lights like this in a scene, you can put some geometry in the scene where you want the light, then click on the “P” button in the lIghts Placement subpalette and drag onto that geometry. The light will be placed wherever you drop it. You can then delete the geometry or hide it if not needed.
The flame itself I would still do in Photoshop
Hi Bonecradle. Really glad you stopped by. It gave me an opportunity to admire your portrait of a warrior again. Yeah, the lighting I had already figured out by doing pretty much exactly as you suggested. It did give a really nice area of light around the lamp, lacking of course the flame itself. Unfortunately Zbrush crashed on me (seemingly without reason) and I didn’t have the heart to load Bag End up again and sitting very still for the 20 or so minutes it takes to render all those fibers, so I did a slap-dash job in PS. I’ll do it properly at some point, but for right now I’m trying different things. Thanks again for the tips, and keep posting! I really want to see some more of your work!
Gave my saber tooth some saber dentures. I couldn’t go to bed without enabling him to go hunt down something to eat. Peta might come ofter me!
Hi Gary 
Hey…Great job on that last version of the zombie…
…The colors are what really make it work… for me anyway…Sometimes less can be more, and the power of suggestion approach, rather than the in your face with blood and guts approach can be alot more powerful.:)The overall green values with just a little tad of toned down red really makes the complementary effects of green and red come to life…no pun intended :D…Nice tonal and value range which really adds to the lighting effect. and the mood/feeling that the piece projects…Excellent.small_orange_diamond:)
About the Hobbit house piece…To make the candle work better as a light sorce…it needs to be darker around it…Rembrandt style lighting, or better yet…Georges de La Tour’s lighting style.
Link to La Tours works above…Might give you an idea and or Inspiration for your hobbit piece…Who Knows…:D:)
Glenn
Hi Glenn. Thanks for your comment about the zombie. I forgot to mention that sculpt was based on a sketch by Bernie Wrightson, one of the best horror artists ever. As far as Bag End, yeah I’m going back to that at some point and give it the love I think it deserves. That’s by far my favorite sculpt, both from a standpoint of fun to do and how it looks in the end, so I’ll eventually go back and do it up right.
For now here’s someting I started tonight just to keep from getting rusty. A lot of folks have done sculpts of Caesar from Rise of the Planet of the Apes. Well, I wanted to go old schools and throw us back to 1968, when an ape wasn’t a motion captured animation but a guy in a latex mask with a big ol’ helmet of hair.
Here’s Cornelius (aka Roddy McDowel) Still a wip. All comments are good comments!
Hi Gary
Hey…Great job so far on the Planet of the Apes piece…Captured the right, and a good facial emotion…Great foundation to work from and build upon…Really looking forward to seeing where it leads you to…:)
Glenn
1968 were people even alive then? Looking forward to seeing him finished. I could tell it was Cornelius form the thumbnail.
Thanks Glenn! I’m probably going to be working on character busts for a while, or at least that’s most likely all I’ll post. I’m working on my anatomy skills on the dl for now lol.
I’m glad you like it Rick. Yes, people were around in ‘68 but the movin’ picture thing was still relatively new.
More progress on Cornelius.
Started a major overhaul of the Frankenstein Monster I was working on several months ago.
The front View of Cornelius is very nice…a quite noble Expression on his face
Thank you for the very kind words, Deke. I liked that one the best too. I’ve been suffering a crisis of confidence and a lack of inspiration for a week or so, so I decided to dive in and tangle with my most dreaded nemesis, the organic sculpt. So you and Glenn and Rick have really picked me up the last couple of days.
Gary (aka voodoodad)
Speaking of Cornelius, I revised him a little. Darkened his hair, although I can’t seem to get it jet black, like it was in the movies. I also noticed after posting the last few images that his cheeks were a bit flat, so I pulled those out a little. Thanks for watching, guys! Your help is always an inspiration to me!
Loving your Cornelius, Gary! I obsessed over Planet of the Apes as a kid in the 70’s, and owned all of the Mego action figures, playsets, etc. Though I did enjoy the new film, somehow it doesn’t feel like POTA without makeup (then again, even Rick Baker’s FANTASTIC makeup couldn’t save the Tim Burton movie).
Also wanted to mention that I really like the way your Bag End turned out, though I would like to see you play a bit more with that candle light, particularly to show some shadow/light play on the door. As of now, it sort of stands apart from the rest of the image and makes it look a bit two-dimensional. I only say this because I think you did such a great job on the piece and want to encourage you to take it further.
Your zombie is cool too! Love the colors and details on him and his grave.
I am hoping to get some stuff of my own up soon, but have been so busy with other work. I feel a bit weird commenting on others’ work with nothing to show for myself, though there are a few Sculptris things on my site. I just got ZB a couple of months ago and have been learning it when I have the time (which is seldom, these days), but have nothing that I feel ready to show.
I think I might try to get a “sketch” or two up this week, just for fun. Or maybe I’ll just post some stuff in the Sculptris forum.
Anyway, keep up the good work! You made a good start on Frankenstein’s monster, and I’m looking forward to seeing where you go with that.
All the best!
Terry
Thanks for your very welcome comments, Terry!
I was obsessed with PotA back then, too! I couldn’t wait for those few times a year when they showed one of the movies on network tv back then. I had the action figures and playsets as well as the snap-tite models. You remember those? God, I loved those things! I remember there was a series of Pirates of the Caribbean models as well. This was 25+ years before the movies of course. I recall those models because they actually had moving parts to them powered by rubber bands and triggered by a small button somewhere on the model. Now I’m going to have to google for some images of those models and see if I can pull one off in Zbrush lol.
As for Tim Burton, don’t get me started lol. He’s made some great movies, no doubt. Ed Wood was a hoot, and I really loved Sleepy Hollow as well. But I’ll always hold a grudge against him for what he did to PotA and even though a lot of people loved it, to me Batman was a disaster! Michael Keaton as the caped crusader? C’mon! Batman movies didn’t get good until they rebooted with Batman Begins as far as I’m concerned.
/rant off
Okay, I’m feeling much better now. Bag End will get that lighted candle (properly) sometime very soon. I’ve decided to place a point light right where the candle is (in Zbrush) and turn down the coverage so it just lights up the area around the door. Then all I’ll need to do in PS is ad a tiny lens flare for the flame. That’s the plan, anyway. Of course, all battle plans fall apart on first contact with the enemy, so we’ll see.:lol:
As for posting your own stuff, hey don’t worry too much about it. When you’re ready you’re ready. Just keep in mind that getting comments such as what you post here will really help you improve your work.
Gary (aka voodoodad)
Here’s an update on Frankenstein’s monster. Tweaking the lights somewhat and still doing major reconstructive surgery on the model itself, as well as adding hair. Let me know what your thoughts are.
great seeing your improvement voodoodad, really nice job on the ape and on frankestein!
One thing that bothers me is the render of your latest artwork! Looks a little dark in my oppinion and a lot of shadow/ao going on^^
Other than that, really nice work buddy!
Keep it going,
- kenny:)
Hey, Kenny! Thanks for your comment. I’m keeping Frankie black and white deliberately to maintain the illusion of being a shot from the original Frankenstein movie with Boris Karloff. Actually now that I think about it, my main reference image (posted below) is from Bride of Frankenstein. But yeah, I’m going to tone down the ao some. I never notice these things until I post here lol.
Reference image.
