here-be-dragons-and-whatnot

[here-be-dragons-and-whatnot]

Put together a quick VRC avatar for a friend in exchange for some computer help. Interestingly, I haven't spent much time making clothing before!

#blender #VRChat #avatar #deer #furry #flannel #croptop #own art #artist on tumblr #digital art #3d modeling #character

[here-be-dragons-and-whatnot]

Update: She fluffy!

This render is Not Great™ but I'm hyped because I got something workable out of the geometry node fur system. As with the rest of the project, the fur needs a lot of tuning. Unfortunately, the file has become so bogged down that BEEFMASTER can no longer handle it. In my attempts to troubleshoot, I learned that I probably have the wrong kind of RAM which is likely why I've had such wild instability. Also the processor I bought is notorious for this sort of behavior so... BEEFMASTER is getting surgery soon with some new hardware ; ;

Also have a bonus GIF where I confirmed that the geo node fur system will warp with an armature:

#digital art #artist on tumblr #creature design #art #blender #character design #avira #dragon #dragoness #own art

[here-be-dragons-and-whatnot]

She's rigged! Sort of! This image brought to you by some heavy lifting courtesy of the viewport denoiser.

I'd say she's about half way done with rigging. I'm running into some significant challenges with this model, namely the wings and her spines. Thankfully I solved the wing issue (in fact, I'll probably record a video about that later because I'm pretty pleased with the movement) but her spines and fins continue to elude me. I've tried using a data transfer modifier, geometry nodes, even putting bones on each spine but I'm having a heck of a time getting things to compress and stretch properly:

Unfortunately, the solution is probably decapitation; I modeled an S-curve into her neck and it's giving me a lot of grief. If I model her with a straight neck, it will clean up a lot of deformation issues and make it much easier to distribute those spikes and fins. I'll straighten her tail while I'm at it for the same benefits. Unfortunately, this will force me to re-do UV mapping which in turn means re-doing her paint job... But hey, I learned a good lesson! Don't bake shapes into your model that you want to change...

#avira #digital art #artist on tumblr #blender #character design #creature design #dragon #dragoness #rigging #rigify

[here-be-dragons-and-whatnot]

Here she is retopologized and colored! The sculpt had 1.5M polys, so once again I used Retopoflow to make that into something workable. I looked at a LOT of models across Sketchfab, Turbosquid, and ArtStation for reference. I chose to topologize for optimal deformation which means all that musculature I sculpted is essentially gone. While I could recapture it with a normal map, it wouldn't show beneath a fur system. I do think it's possible to achieve a more detailed topology that moves well, but for this project I'll stick with straight-forward topology that lets me really focus on quality deformations. I'll capture muscles next time around! As an aside, my early rigging experiments found that vertical wings really weren't able to fold down so I modified them to be horizontal.

The topology in question:

#blender 3d #blender #dragon #digital art #artist on tumblr #creature design #b3d #dragoness #character design #character model #own art #work in progress

[here-be-dragons-and-whatnot]

I totally forgot to upload this! It was supposed to be a sketch, but I rendered her a little more to see if I could paint a workable fur texture. I'd say it's good enough for sketches, but I'll need more practice for something that looks painterly. By the way, this is what inspired the 3D model. I learned enough with my progress on Jar Full of Cosmos to be confident that I could pull off a character model and make her fluffy. I've spent the last few days bogged down with wing rigs (specifically Rigify-compatible wings) but I'll post WIP shots once I get her weight painting finished. Onwards!

#digital art #photoshop #artist on tumblr #sketch #creature design #dragon #dragoness #Avira #digital sketch #character design #fur texture #digital painting #art

[here-be-dragons-and-whatnot]

I've been working on a dragon character for quite some time, and she's finally getting some proper reference! I could have stopped with the 2D reference, but I was really inspired by @villiedoom to make a high quality 3D model. This is the completed sculpture of her body (the wing membranes, horns, and claws are temporary) which I need to retopologize. At this point, basic retopology is no sweat but I'm not entirely sure how to preserve her muscular detail while prioritizing good deformation. She'll be getting a coat of fur so I'm not sure how much it matters anyway, but this was a good anatomy study! More process (including skeletal and muscular diagrams) below the cut!

#digital art #photoshop #artist on tumblr #sketch #art #blender #dragon #creature design #Avira

[here-be-dragons-and-whatnot]

Important notes from a discussion about whether or not dragons can loaf

#digital art #photoshop #artist on tumblr #sketch #digital sketch #dragon #loaf #loafing

[here-be-dragons-and-whatnot]

I busted out this whole course in like a week and then didn't upload any of it lol. Anyway, this is work from the second half of Woulter Tulp's Fundamentals of Expressive Character Design course on Schoolism. In the first half, the focus was on dynamic, fluid shapes. This half was about proper perspective and 3D rotations. Let me tell you, this just about broke my brain. There is also some expression work at the bottom which I have historically struggled with. After all these years of drawing, it's interesting how these fundamentals kick my butt.

#woulter tulp #schoolism #schoolism course #photoshop #artist on tumblr #studies #sketches #dynamic #fundamentals of expressive character design #fundamentals #my brain :')

[here-be-dragons-and-whatnot]

Selected assignments from weeks 1-4 of Woulter Tulp's Fundamentals of Expressive Character Design course on Schoolism. This course is more about rendering complex 3D shapes in a way that looks fluid and living vs actual character design, but it's definitely something missing from my current drawings. This course will probably be my last notable diversion before diving back into Jar Full of Cosmos. Lots more below the cut!

#schoolism #schoolism course #woulter tulp #expressive character design #drills #digital art #digital sketch #practice #photoshop #artist on tumblr #art

[here-be-dragons-and-whatnot]

I wrote another script! Mirroring UVs takes a 4-5 clicks depending on how to you do it, so I condensed those clicks down to one operator. This time, I did not use ChatGPT; now that I understand the basic format, the digital hallucinations take more time to correct than they're worth. Now I need to figure out how I can combine scripts into one convenient add-on.

HOT TIP: you can enable Python Tooltips in preferences and this will reveal the python path of any action in Blender. Turning on Developer Extras lets you copy those python paths, among other things. It makes this kind of scripting way easier!

#blender #blender add-on #python #python scripting #add-on #DIY #babydev #mirror uvs #custon add on #blender scripting

[here-be-dragons-and-whatnot]

... I made a Blender addon.

I like using a mirrored skin modifier with a level 2 subdivision as the block out for my sculpting. If a character is simple enough, sometimes I can get by without retopologizing. Suffice to say, I find myself adding those three modifiers over and over and over. Below are two recent of examples of how I use them:

My addon (which is really just a simple script) adds a object consisting of a single vertex with mirror, skin, and subD modifiers already applied and toggles Xray mode. There's just one catch: I made it with help from ChatGTP.

(musings on AI below the cut)

I have very mixed feelings on AI; as a creator, it's infuriating that decades of work was stolen and used to replace its creators. As someone who works in tech, I know it's an invaluable tool and here to stay. I know very little about Python scripting--my coding is about as sophisticated as playing Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star on the piano--and ChatGPT 3.5 was able to get me an outline that was almost workable. What I asked was a very basic set of steps, and the model failed as soon as I tried to inject logic. Sometimes we don't notice when AIs do things like throw in some extra fingers or an errant limb, but code requires precision. ChatGPT only had a tenuous grasp on the intricacies of Blender's API, and I don't have the python experience to figure out where it was going wrong. If I wanted to complete my short laundry list of functionalities, I would need at least a beginner overview of Python (and a stack overflow account, lol). As it stands, ChatGPT made 60% of this.

So far I have only dabbled with whatever model of ChatGPT I could access for free. It was mostly useful to me as a digital rubber duck. This experience makes me both curious and trepidatious about the cutting edge models and whatever comes next. I also feel squicked out having used it for anything creative :/

#blender addon #blender #scripting #python #chatGPT #sculpting block out #custom interface

[here-be-dragons-and-whatnot]

I'm playing around with different ways to showcase my models. Pretty much anything is better than screen-shotting out of blender, but I want to get better at presentation in general. Also, some process stuff below the cut!

#strawberry bunbun #strawberry dress #bunny #rabbit #cartoon #stylized #chibi #animal crossing #vrc #vrchat #avatar #vrc avatar #quest compatible #blender #unity #illustrator #art #artist on tumblr

[here-be-dragons-and-whatnot]

I made another one :B

After figuring out the basic steps for avatar upload with my monster/dragon, I wanted to get a better idea of of how long it takes to make an avatar. Meet Strawberry Bunbun. I spent most of my time texturing with Adobe Illustrator, and while vectors helped immensely the process was still clunky. I'm probably getting Substance soon. Also, I attempted 2D lipsync just for funsies. It recorded very jittery but looks smooth in-game. Weird.

#VRChat #avatar #quest #bunny #strawberry bunbun #strawberry dress #bunbun #strawberry #cute #kawaii #sun hat #blender #3D model #virtual reality

[here-be-dragons-and-whatnot]

She's textured!

I love Blender, but dang their texturing workflow needs an update...

#blender #vrchat #avatar #avatar 3.0 #character model #character design #anthropomorphic #gargoyle #dragon #hyena #monster

[here-be-dragons-and-whatnot]

And now for something completely different:

I was never a big VRChat player, but there are some events happening this year I'd like to attend. The tools for building avatars are so much better these days, so I'm putting something together. This is still very much a WIP; the unity components need polish and she needs an actual paint job and some more facial expressions. Nevertheless, I'm quite pleased with this!

Once I finish this model, I will be open for a limited number of avatar commissions.

#vrchat #custom avatar #3d modeling #blender #unity #vrc #virtual reality #vr #av 3.0 #WIP

[here-be-dragons-and-whatnot]

throwback to that time when I drew a bunch of furries

... And by "that time" I mean a several year span where I was lurking on dA and fA mostly too burnt out from school to make very much art. I am migrating my old harddrives on to BEEFMASTER and came across these drawings. None of the characters are mine, and unfortunately I can't give credit because those art accounts are long gone ; ;

#furries #sketches #digital art #digital sketches #colored sketch #commissions #freebies #furry #anthro #anthropomorphic #artist on tumblr #art #furryart

[here-be-dragons-and-whatnot]

I have a couple shots of Matt's monster that I intended to render, but it just took too long on the little laptop. I put this one on BEEFMASTER and it finished in about three minutes (vs. 4 hrs on the laptop). Assuming I can solve some stability issues with the CPU, this will make JoC soooooooooo much easier!

Also, fun fact: this shot specifically inspired Jar Full of Cosmos. I have been considering hosting a workshop on using tools like mocap and phsyics sims to make animations without needing specialty skills. I wanting something a little more generic than this monster, so I thought a cat would be cute. Later that evening I saw an illustration of a cat in a galaxy, and the rest was history.

#blender 3d #monster #swimming #srimple #shrimps #animation #artist on tumblr