Sunday, April 14, 2013

Sloth robot and a timelapse video

An idea for a sentinel robot that could be operating either indoor within industrial buildings i.e. warehouses and factories or in outdoor locations using trees or man-made constructions.
I was inspired to make this one after watching videos about gyro-stabilized marksman platform Talon, camera stabilizer Movi and a video of a sloth falling out of a tree.

Since I won't have much time soon to make a proper tutorial I decided to at least record a video of the design process that you can see here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ct9voyU3h0

The speed of the timelapse is set to 250% of original recording speed. During the video(especially towards the end) you'll be seeing details appearing from nowhere. The way it works is that my kitbash library is broken down in-to individual pieces with each of them being assigned to a specific hot-key.
I made a little script that brings a certain piece from kitbash library or even a whole set of pieces in-to the scene and then selects it, so you can plug it in right away into the model. This saves a lot of time and allows to try different things without getting attached too much to the design.

Thanks,
-Vitaly










68 comments:

  1. fucken awesome vitaly. again man thanks for sharing your dev and workflow

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  2. Unbelievable stuff. I know that it's based on a sloth but this is so unique with incredible shapes and rythms. Don't stop Vitaly..

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  3. Bloody awesome Vitaly, thanks for sharing!

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  4. This is incredible! Thank for you sharing this!
    Quick question, what is the program you used to make it?

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    1. Thanks! It's XSI, Maya (for cloth piece), Keyshot, Photoshop

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  5. Amazing work Mr. Bulgarov. Of course your work is always unsurpassed and extremely innovative. The idea for the sloth hands that move along a trussed roof drop is something never seen. The detail for the skin and the end color and lighting are beautiful.
    Love to see this in a short or full length film animated as soon as possible. :)
    Miss you me brother and hope to see you soon!
    Judah.

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    1. Heeey Judah! Long time no see man:) Thanks for stopping by and such good words, much appreciate it. Hope to see you soon too:)

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  6. absolutely insane work dude. i (and many others) will be watching and rewatching this for some time i can assure you. thanks so much for sharing!! :)

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  7. this is so amazing and THANKS SOO MUCH FOR SHARING !!!

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  8. Vitaly, thank you very much for this timelapse - it's really helpful and inspirational! * * * * * (5 stars!)

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  9. Awesome stuff! Really like your designs. Couple questions on your modeling operations, I see you frequently forming vertices into a circle, how do you do that in softimage? any idea if that can be done in Maya?

    Also how do you make the edge flow diagonal when you're making the cloth towards the end?

    Thanks!

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    1. Vitaly has done 2 tutorials for the Gnomon Worksop. http://www.thegnomonworkshop.com/store/product/544/Character-Design-and-Modeling-for-Next-Gen-Games#.UW7WAIKpeKE should answer allot of your XSI question.

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    2. Thanks Skot for pointing to the dvd tutorial!

      Christopher,
      I used MX_ROundish script modifier ver. 1.0 created by MaxFox in 2011. Not sure if there is a similar script for Maya.
      Regarding the edgeflow - it is changed by using value of vertex bevel distance higher than the length of the edges. By doing so Bevel Op in XSI forces the points to weld when they're close, therefore leaving a rearranged topology

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  10. It was a 2+ hours of pleasure.
    Thank you sir !

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  11. Cool We shared it here:
    http://tutorials.cgrecord.net/2013/04/sloth-robot-design-with-vitaly-bulgarov.html
    Cheer!

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  12. Fuck yeah! This kicks ass Vitaly-san :)

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  13. Great work Vitaly! Keep it up man :)

    Looking forward to seeing your designs on the big screen soon!

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  14. Killer blog man- loving your designs!!

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  15. Amazing work!

    You should sell your kits, I would gladly buy them

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  16. Nice one Vitaly !
    Are you using Rounded Edge feature from Keyshot ?

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    1. I haven't used it for this one. I just upgraded to Keyshot 4 and looking forward to try "Rounded Edges" in my next work. Thanks!

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  17. Thank you fot sharing this great stuff. Hope to see more.
    Please tell me do you model with wacom pen or mouse?

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    1. I model with wacom pen. Actually I don't even have a mouse. Thanks a lot!

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    2. That is cool. How do you set up your tablet? I am having some delays for example when I try to move a vertex.

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  18. primera vez que youtube me recomienda algo bueno ...
    thanks for sharing your workflow.

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  19. This is AMAZING. Really fantastic design and modeling skills.
    Can you help me with this question.

    -What would be the advantage of using polymodeling for hard surface instead of using sculpting like zbrush or 3d coat or a nurbs app like rhino?

    Thanks

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    1. Thank you!
      It depends what kind of design you build. For more organic stuff zbrush base and than retopo is way to go. For boxy stuff like this polymodeling felt cleaner and faster personally for me, but I've seen people doing similar work in Zbrush very fast too. I haven't used nurbs in like 9-10 years, so it would be hard for me to use it right now. So i guess it boils down to whatever tool is more comfortable for you personally.

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  20. Amazing modeling!

    Do you use some special shader? As there are no artifacts near n-sided polygons. How do you do that?

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    1. Thanks! No, I use standard Keyshot shaders. But I do triangulate n-sided polygons before rendering to avoid artifacts.
      cheers!

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  21. Великолепно! Когда нибудь я тоже так смогу >.<

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  22. Thanks for the inside look, Vitaly! Have you thought about how you model these mechs without dirty modeling techniques and make them production ready?

    Also, How clear was the concept in your mind for this mech? I noticed that you didn't block out your overall shape like you did on your DVDs.

    Thanks again

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    1. Hi! Thanks for the question.

      Before making transition in-to conceptual design I used to work full-time as a production modeler, so I had to be mindful about clean SUBD-based topology, quads, supporting edges and stuff like that all the time. Now with the main goal of making a concept-art piece it is no longer important to me to spend redundant time on something that doesn't contribute to design. But whenever I had to take the concept models like this one to vfx production, depending on rendering pipeline requirements I would either have to retopo and clean up the whole model or at least some parts of it. Generally I'd use all "curvy" shapes as a guideline meshes and I would create new shapes on top of them from scratch using retopo approaches like "polygon creation snap to surface" of Softimage (similar idea to what programs like Topogun do). For hard-shaped parts I would dissolve all internal topology within a plane (removing vertices and edges within a flat shape without deleting a polygon) and then would build a new inside topology to resolve all the crossing edgeloops and supporting edgeloops to make sure it's all clean and tight when you apply subdivision to it. But even when I was a modeler I still would go with concept modeling first and then with production modeling as a clean-up stage. The reason is that it's easier to focus on one thing at a time rather than trying to be creative and bold with your designs and at the same time to think about creating all quad-based subd-geometry.

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    2. Answering you second question: I didn't feel the need to make a block-out for this particular design as I was very clear with what were my expectations on the key design elements and overall proportions before I even got started modeling. I did a quick but pretty detailed plan on all the items I wanted to introduce (like hand hooks, curvy back frame, cloth wrap or gyro disks of the gun...). That really increased the level of clarity and helped me to visualize things in my mind much better.

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  23. Круто Виталий ! Пытаюсь повторить эти трюки . Если не влом , опиши что происходит на 49-50 секунде видео , так понимаю - выбираешь 4 полигона , сабдивиш их на 2 и применяешь MX-roundish ? но вот никак не пойму куда пропадают эджи и как я не кручу у меня так не получается . Ведь у тебя много где применяются скругления , не могу разобраться ...

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    1. Спасибо! Я использую функцию Dissolve Components чтобы очистить сетку от всего того, что внутри выборки :) Советую повесить на хоткей!

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  24. This is very incredible. It makes me think a lot about topology. I have a question if you have to put this model on production do you have to retopo this? I always think you have to put as much as possible in quad.

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    1. Thanks a lot for the nice words. Please check out one of the comments above. I hope this answers your question.
      I can also add that from what I remember when I used to work within a Renderman pipeline the rule for using a non-subd geometry like this (geometry that won't receive subdivision when rendered) was to make sure that not more than 11 edges converge in-to one point. This means that I would have to clean up this geo and take out some of the edges from so-called 11+ "edge converge point" spikes to make pipeline-checker friendly. But it doesn't mean I have to make it all subd-friendly if I have no intention to subdivide it during rendering:) But definitely, for curvy parts I'd have to retopo since the way it's done in a concept model such parts tend to be too heavy for production. Well, again, all depends on what kind of rendering pipeline you're in and what tech. limitations you might have.

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  25. Потрясающе. Впрочем как всегда... Я давний поклонник вашего творчества, и надо сказать вы не перестаете удивлять.
    Кстати, Виталий, скажите пожалуйста а почему вы вместо мышки используеет планшет. Неужели это удобно? И если не секрет, какой именно планшет вы использует и как настроены кнопки планшета?

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    1. Спасибо большое за добрые слова!

      Действительно, планшет для меня намного удобнее мышки. Я использую Wacom Intuos4 размера A5. Кнопки на планшете не использую вообще:)
      Softimage очень хорошо реагирует на планшет, response и вцелом навигация очень мягкая и удобная с планшетом. В maya и max мне не очень удобно с планшетом... Ну и конечно же дополнительная серьезная причина - не так устает запястье и кисть по сравнению с мышкой:)

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  26. Hi, maybe a little late, but I have a question: what did you use for making the folding on the cloth piece. I can not distinguish the name of whatever you are using and it looks amazingly useful and fast. It is a pluging or something?

    Thanks a lot, great and inspiring work, looking forward for more.

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    1. Sorry for late reply, somehow I missed your question. For this piece I used Maya's native NCloth. Cheers!

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  27. Привет Виталий, кожух на деталь механизма в конце второго часа работы над роботом, как в кси сделать без помощи программ других

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  28. Доброго дня. Не знаю как даже выразить восхищение вашим творчеством, то ли гениальность на грани с сумасшествия ) Попал на этот блог новым интересом к графики и анимации в целом. Сам я архитектор и работаю в AutoDesk Max и V-ray, но такого я еще не видел) Как вы считаете в 35 лет не поздно переквалифицироваться? И ксати у Oakley Angel при всем то что она из металла весьма приятные формы;) ))

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  29. hi vitaly im great work. Im looking for the mx roundish any idea where can i download it?

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  30. Do you have to set up the scene..lighting and if so how many lights were used here? Amazing work

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