So this seems to be a pretty popular thing to do, and with it keeping me accountable to actually produce content and be able to get feedback easily, I thought it'd be a good idea to start one of these myself. Lets see how far we can go.
thecabbagedetective Nice work!  For the eyelashes, take a look at your own.  Multiple eyelashes don't sprout from one point, they sprout from multiple points and clump at the end with some singular hairs to break up the clumps.  They also curve outward a touch, and are pretty stiff.  Go get a mirror and take a look yourself. Nice texture on the boots.
ssmurfmier1985 Hey there, and thanks! Whilst I can hum and harr about it for ages my friend seems pleased with it and ultimately that's what's important, so I think I'll simply move on with it. You got a point with the eyelashes too, though it's definitely not helped by the fact that they don't look that great to begin with, so maybe more tweaking will ensue? We shall see!
As much as I'd love to use Rigify these models are rather... odd, and none of the rigify rigs work with it, or more specifically I can't apply IKs to them with one easy button press, and need to actually work. The horror! But hey, gotta git gud eventually right?
As for the cereal bowl it's still certainly being worked on, just that it's my last priority due to it being the easiest, plus these other ones have taken a while so they're my priority, but rest assured you'll be seeing it soon!
silentheart00 Cheers for the advice! It's definitely not an area I'm well versed in so this trial and error approach has taught me a lot, so I'll certainly be attempting them again!
Happy New Year! On the third...
Welp, better late than never I suppose? Naturally due to spending the Christmas period eating and being lazy I don't really have much to show you, but that's over with now, so lets get to it. Still have some errands to run for the next couple days so progress will be slow but I'm looking forward to getting into the swing of things. As much as I love Blender I'm looking forward to finishing these projects, want to make something for myself again.
So how are all your New Years Resolutions? Don't really have any myself, other than continuing with my art and fitness. Though I would like to have finished a simple game by the end of the year, I suppose that could count? Stupidly ambitious and unfeasible? Probably, but I wouldn't be me if I didn't shoot for the sun only to land head first into the sand.
Whilst I don't have anything to really show any of you yet here's Isaac in better lighting. Was taken before Xmas so the eyelashes are still ehh but that's hopefully gonna get fixed in the coming days:
With that being said I hope all the ladies and gentlemen here had an excellent and Merry Christmas/Happy Holidays/Mediocre Final Few Days of the Year, whichever applies to you most, and that this year will be better than the last. Happy Blending!Â
Finally, after approximately 17 years, it is DONE.
One of them anyways. My friend wanted a background for his PS4 so that's what I've been working on this entire time, and whilst he's been happy with it  for a while I'm finally at a point where I'm happy too, so here it is:
Definitely a lot to improve on, such as more details on the building, better fur (grr), more effects etc but I think it's gotten to a point where we're all happy.
In case any of you recognise the buildings in the background I paid attention to CG Geek's tutorial on how to make a destroyed building, which you can find here. Definitely could've gone more into detail but they serve their purpose very well. Excellent tutorial!
I'm honestly rather glad I managed to get this one done because the bear model I made a long time ago, before I understood things such as retopology, rigging and animation-friendly models, so the rig only kind of worked, which meant I had to manually pose a lot of it. The fact it turned out halfway decent is nothing short of a miracle.
If anyone wants me to make them a background for a very competitive fee, just hit me up! Yeah, can't really advertise my services on a site where most people are better at it than me...
Welp, one down, two to go, then after that I have a special personal project I want to pursue, so until the next update I wish you all a happy Blending and I'll see you then!
thecabbagedetective Congrats on finishing the first! I think it will look pretty cool as a PS4 background 😎
Good luck with the last two. Kinda curious what you're personal projects after that will be.....?
Happy modeling Aaron! 😄
thecabbagedetective Congrats on getting something done! Â Now you can focus on improving yourself even more!
thecabbagedetective getting something done is the hardest part! Congrats!
ssmurfmier1985 Thanks! Yeah it looks pretty neat to me on his profile, seeing other people use my work is cool in and of itself.
And for the personal project I'll leave a hint: Whilst I recently celebrated my one year anniversary of Blender, that's not the only 3D-modeling themed anniversary I have...
silentheart00 Hell yeah brother, at least with the other projects I have they were started fairly recently so I get to experiment more and not just "Oh God how do I compensate for this". Thanks!
nekronavt  You're telling me man, the amount of times I thought I'd never get done, but perseverance and you guys helped make it possible. Thank you!
You know, with the bear completed it feels almost kind of odd. Now I no longer have any kind of direct plans, told exactly what to do and getting the approval of someone else. I'm finally... FREE!
Oh wait I still got two more, nevermind.
I jest of course, I love doing this, and making my friend's ideas come to life is always neat. So whilst I have worked a bit on Isaac I don't think it's enough to bother showing, so I'll show what I've been doing with the evil cereal bowl instead. Here's the basic scene, lighting and HDRI are bound to change:
Here's a better view of the bowl:
Huge thanks to nekronavt for sharing his bone shader with me, it was really fun picking it apart and putting my own spin on it. Admittedly his was made in 2.8 and he has a better understand of shading than I so I had to compensate with 2.79 nodes and make more simple node setups for my tiny brain but I still like what I came up with. Might have to change it though, 'cause they look a bit like teeth...
And here's the (currently oversized) evil cereal to go with it. Not sure how many different designs there should be, thinking maybe one more but not sure what:
Should probably make the cross upside-down, think I'm sending the wrong message here...
My biggest query is what are your thoughts on the shaders? Mostly the cereal one? I guess it's not gotta be photoreal considering they're gonna be pretty small but I'm thinking they're looking rather cereal-y, lumpy and sticky, though if you have any thoughts on how I could improve them then by all means let me know! I feel the goat's sides are too smooth so I can fix that at least. Also they all have the same shader, just different colours.
And that's it for me, definitely getting all of these wrapped up this month. Looking forward to what we all create and until next time, happy Blending!
thecabbagedetective Getting there!  For more symbols, what else represents the devil/satanic things?  Might be able to find a list somewhere.  I think ravens are symbolic for similar ideas, so you could throw that in, too.  As for the cereal shader, you'll have to be the judge on how detailed they need to be.  Heck, go find some cereal and take a look for reference.  I'm not sure what varieties you have in England, but I'd reference something like Fruit Loops or similar.
thecabbagedetective I think that noise on this cereal pieces is too small. They looks like they are pretty big.
silentheart00 Cheers for the advice man, was definitely helpful! Also I swear I thought you were from England, now I'm confused lol.
nekronavt Yeah that seems to help, look much better now. Thanks!
Evening!
So whilst I took today off from work I decided it'd be a good time to start rendering my progress. The "Evil Cereal Bowl" is coming along nicely I believe.
Here's a lighter version:
Here's also a more close up of the "skull":
Anatomy definitely isn't my strong point, but in my defense I did this in like 20 minutes and for a first attempt I wouldn't call it awful. Fortunately I managed to get some critique so I'll be improving it in the coming day or two. Also might be a good idea to tone down the wet look of the bone shader, poor thing looks drenched.
Really liking this project so far, but I know once I've finished the spoon I'm gonna need to delve into 2D again for the cereal box design, which is... daunting, to say the least. If you have any general 2D advice I'm always willing to hear it.
Right, if you'll excuse me I'm very tired so I'm gonna call it a night and then I'll have a gander at all of yous threads in the morning. Until then though, happy Blending!
thecabbagedetective Awesome stuff! You might want to consider adding a bit more light to the front of your cereal bowl, so we can actually see all the nice details and shaders your creating. It's now pitch dark didn't even notice the cereal until I saw the lighter version... Maybe an eerie reddish glow or something? Not too bright, just enough so you can see 😊
thecabbagedetective Lol, no problem, dude. Â I really enjoy British culture, so maybe that's leaking through. Â Cats Does Countdown is my favorite thing to throw on, but I can't find it on YouTube anymore as a result of that one bill, I'm sure. Â Oh well. Â I guess it's Scenes We'd Like to See from Mock the Week compilations for me now lol.
Good progress on the cereal bowl. Â I agree the details are getting a bit lost, maybe making those details bigger would help and a little bit of front lighting, too. Â Of course, this is dependent on your client.
Skulls are difficult.  One of these days I'd like to get skeletons to draw from or anatomical models with the different layers of muscle.  There's something different about having that 3D reference in front of you than a 2D reference that just feels like you're learning more.  Well, for me anyway.  It's a good start.  And yes, maybe a touch too much on the specularity. Keep pushing!
ssmurfmier1985 Thanks! Yeah that's definitely what I intend to do with the lighting, I should've pointed out that the lighting was temporary and only used so I could get the rim light looking good. Didn't think about  a red tint though so I'll certainly look into adding that, thanks for the idea!