I'm still here...

Just to let everyone know that I am still working, just implementing the controls systems into the model. Got the hands and legs left to do. This is what it looks like now:

So it looks a little confusing, but there's a lot of control there, switches between IK and FK for the arms, and everything works pretty well. Just to give you an idea of the level of detail I've gone into here, here's a quick peak at my outliner

OH MY GOD THIS IS LONG! I SHOULD HAVE JUST USED AUTO RIG!!


No, no. Gotta learn this stuff. Important. Useful. Good. Help me get a job. Yes.

rigging test

Right, so the skeleton is in, here's the first tests of whether the joints are working and what I'll be reworking

 Oh. Dear. Gotta fix that. Looks broken.

Here's the leg and foot, works perfectly. Lucky!

Model

 So here's the finished model, I'm pretty happy with how it's turned out. The geometry is quite even and I think it should work fairly well when it comes to rigging etc.

 There are a couple of problems mind you. I decided, in my infinite wisdom, to model the whole thing at once, as opposed to one half and then mirror it, so it's a little asymmetrical. You may notice that the left arm is about a hands length longer than the right. I will be fixing this. Also, the left foot is a little further forward that the right. That shouldn't be as much of a problem.

It's got quite a nice feel to it anyway, I suppose I might revise my positive opinion once I've tried to rig it. Oh yeah, should probably teach myself rigging...

Ed did a great job sorting out the UV map for this, he's the bomb.

Prep work

These first images show my musings about guitar types/shapes and style. The guitar on the left is a bit like a BC rich Mockingbird, which is a possible guitar. As for the figure I had not yet decided on the look, but I think the long haired look could be trouble to model and is probably too rock and roll to start with.

This is where I think a little more about the character design. I think the middle figure works pretty well as an ordinary kind of guy that could be tweaked a little to become a lot more rock and roll when the change happens

So I'm thinking here about how to change the hair when he becomes more rock n roll. It's important for me to think more three dimensionally with these drawings as you'll notice a lot of them are at pretty much the same angle... The middle style works quite nicely, although it might be a bit too extreme... Not the robot. Never the robot.

Thinking more full body here, getting some idea of how the body is constructed. I'm trying to decide whether or not to have the shorts baggy or tight, or even to use shorts at all. Obviously the easiest thing to do would be tight shorts or jeans, but I quite like the look of the baggy shorts. I have to make the decision whether it is worth the extra work. More musings on the second hair style here as well. You'll notice the shoes have gotten a little cooler, but I don't think that will be an actual change

My initial design for the squire copy headstock was to have the make be called "shit". Can't really do that. A little inappropriate. So went the Fandar, which is a bit of a reference to a Gibson copy that was in a music shop that used to be down the road from me (before it closed because it was rubbish). This Gibson copy looked exactly right from a distance, but as you got closer you noticed the neck was warped, the pickguard was coming loose, it played like death and the headstock said "Gibsun". Genius. Should have bought it really.

Still thinking about whether or not I'm going to axe the hood. Trying to weigh up whether it adds anything or not. Here he's holding an SG like guitar, but I reckon we need to go more archetypal with the bad guitar, so a fender copy, and more radical with the good guitar, so a BC Rich Mockingbird.

In fact I think I'll have access to a terrible squire to record the poor guitar parts on. Best news ever.

For the amplifier we'll be using something like a Fender 65 Princeton Reverb

 Storyboard is as follows

So aside from a few dodgy panels (especially the one where he first goes in to the guitar pose) this pretty much sums up what we're trying to do. It's ambitious as a project, but also I think achievable. 

After going through all this with my client I'm now working on the character model.

Hello!

For this project I am working with a client to produce a promo for his new practice/recording studio. The basic premise is that it will be between 10 and 30 second, showing a chap playing guitar badly, switching his amp settings to "crunch" mode, and then suddenly being amazing. I'll put up concepts and storyboards soon.

So I'm thinking this is the kind of level we'll be working to:

 the xbox avatars are quite simple but effective. You'll notice that the facial features are textured and as such we wont need to rig any facial deformation

So yeah, hopefully I'll be able to make something to this standard.