Post 10 - ZBrush Book

Most recently, in association with my 3D Technologies module,  I have been looking into several publications by Scott Spencer. One example of this is the book

called: ZBrush Digital Sculpting Human Anatomy, published by Sybex in 2010.

Here is a link to some information about the book:

More information on this and other books that I am looking at can be found in my 3D Technology blog.

Book - LINK

Post 09 - Modelling and personal requirements research

I have been looking into a lot of modelling techniques; specifically characters and discovered that a lot of products in the gaming and digital entertainment industry are 'sculpted', using digital sculpting, or 'clay'. Two of the main software packages are Autodesk's Mudbox and Pixologic's ZBrush. Although Autodesk has a huge range of 3D software packages, in terms of digital sculpting ZBrush has been around for considerably longer and therefore in my opinion has more to offer in terms of the interface, tools and work output. I have been looking into this as I am interested in roles such as content creator and character designer, specifically in the gaming industry. It was interesting to find out that a lot of products that I know of were made using ZBrush, such as the PS3 game Little Big Planet, as well as the 2010 blockbuster Avatar and many other games games such as Assassin's Creed 2. So it appears that a lot of content for computer games can be created using software such as Autodesk's 3Ds Max, Maya etc, motion is created using either Key framing actions, or Motion Capture (as mentioned in my 3D Animation blog), or by combining the two using programs such as Autodesk's Motion Builder and Maya.

From this, I have been looking into the best way to explore ZBrush and digital sculpting. Here are a couple of links which have been very useful:

Pixologic website

This website is great as it is updated regularly and is hosted by the creators of ZBrush. It includes interviews, case studies, examples of work as well and tutorials and hints and tips. I am currently going through the video tutorials and will soon be experimenting by making a game style character (as mentioned in my 3D Technology blog)

3D Total website

A great online and printed magazine, which also features interviews (currently following the work of Cedric Seaut), case studies and tutorials. This website also provides free models, something which I am taking advantage of in my 3D Animation module)

3D World - ZBrush Essential 'bookazine' 

This is a large magazine, which has been published exclusively on ZBrush. This includes a DVD which has over 20 tutorials on it, with over 10 hours of videos. This was published in November and will b of great help.

CG.tutplus - ZBrush additional tutorials

This website has been very useful and also contains many video tutorials for ZBrush. It covers similar ground to that of the Pixologic website, but as they are different tutorials, its always good to see how other people navigate and use the software. 

At this stage, there seems to be a a lot of research into the modelling, sculpting sector, with relevance to games as this is what I am interested in. Animation is also an interest of mine, so some more research should be done in this area also.

I will soon look into a couple of case studies, before creating my Web Diagram by using Prezi.

Links:

Pixologic website: LINK

3D Total website: LINK

3D World - ZBrush Essential 'bookazine': LINK 

CG.tutplus - ZBrush additional tutorials: LINK 

Post 08 - Week eight session, plus more research

This week's session was devoted to looking back at the module specifications and talking about how to present the information for Task One. The software Prezi was mentioned and has been shown to be very useful in displaying information using paths and links. After discussing how to showcase this information, it became apparent as to how I may show my research.

This diagram shows that the main areas to cover are: 

Animation, 3D Technology (Modelling) and The games industry. 

When each circle connect, each topic is connected, so this then becomes:

Animation & 3D Technology, 3D Technology & Games Industry, Games Industry and Animation

Then in the center, this is all three. I think that this has helped me to see what I need to look into.

Post 07 - Autodesk

 As mentioned in my animation blog, Autodesk provide a large range of resources and software products. These range from animation to modelling. Some of these include 3D Studio Max, Maya, Motionbuilder and Mudbox. An interesting resource for Autodesk can be found in the following link. This is the link for Autodesk's showreels, and showcases how their products have been used in both the games and animation industry. It shows some amazing projects and spans over a wide demographic. Very visually entertaining and makes it relatively clear that they are at the forefront of the industry.

This is a very good source of information as every clip shown has the companies name in the corner, allowing for every clip to be researched.

Another good resource for research is the Autodesk Media and Entertainment section of their website.

Autodesk Showcase reels - LINK

Autodesk Media & Entertainment - LINK

Post 06 - Ethics session with Darren Wall

Ethics 101

Ethics, population ?

In the last session of Research Practice, we had Darren Wall in to speak about media ethics. This was an interesting talk and allowed the group for the first time to actively engage in debate and discussions into the notion of what is suitable to show, share and use as research. This allowed me to gain an understanding of media ethics and will be useful for my research.

I have been doing a significant amount of research, but it is mostly logged on my other blogs, as it is concerned with animation and 3D technology. I have recently found and have been using the on-line publication 'Develop Magazine'. This magazine is focused on the games industry and has an array of articles on both animation and 3D technology. One such article is one on Motionbuilder, which is a motion specific software and can be used with motion capture to gain real time recordings. This magazine can be purchased, or downloaded as a pdf, making it extremely easy to access.

Develop Magazine - LINK
MotionBuilder - LINK
Ethics Image - LINK
 

Post 05 - Undergrad / research practice

This week's session was conducted by Salam Strudwick, who is the Subject Group Leader for Interactive Media. She set us the task to think about where we would like to be in the industry and what we are aiming for once we have finished the Masters.

The Thinking Man by Deb Grise

She suggested that we were more than welcome to arrange to set in any undergrad tutorials and workshops for software packages and other relevant techniques. I found this to be extremely appealing as I wish to learn as much as I can about my chosen subject matter. I have emailed her asking for more details on who to contact in order to put this into motion. 

Unfortunately, I have had no reply yet. This is something I wish to pursue as I really want to get some tutoring in these kind of disciplines.


Thinking Man Painting - LINK

Post 04 - 3D Tech research

I have been recently looking at a couple of books for tutorials in order to understand the various techniques and methods for modelling. This research will mainly feed into my 3D Technology and 3D Animation modules (tasks one and two, due in on weeks 7 and 8).

I have been looking into both Autodesk Mudbox and 3Ds Max tutorials from the following books:

• de la Flor, M. & B. Mongeon (2010) Digital Sculpting with Mudbox: Essential Tools and Techniques for Artists, Amsterdam; London: Focal Press.

• Autodesk Inc. (2006) 3ds Max Essentials 9, Amsterdam; London: Focal Press. 

• Gahan, A. (2009) 3ds Max Modeling for Games, Amsterdam; London :Focal Press/Elsevier.

I have also been looking at some journals surrounding this field and has been used in this section of a 10 minute presentation I am researching for my 3D technology module. The subject up for discussion is the comparison between two types of modeling. This is box, or polygonal modelling and sculpting.

Aspect One - Ease of Use

The ease of use and learning curve of modelling technologies is very important; not only for the artist, but also for work-flow and industry needs. In their discussion of early digital sculpting systems, Ronald N & Sarah F suggest that:

“There is no consideration of user interfaces for digital sculpting, no method for conversion to standard representations, no method for correcting distance values away from the surface, no hardware acceleration, and only discrete steps are supported during editing.”

Ronald N. Perry & Sarah F. Frisken, ‘Kizamu: A System For Sculpting Digital Characters’, Proceedings of the 28th annual conference on Computer graphics and interactive techniques, (2001), 47-56, 49.

Initial sculpting systems were difficult to use, with extremely complex interfaces and tools often alien to the user. Although these systems were available, they were generally exclusive to the commercial animators. It has only been in the last few years that software such as Mudbox and ZBrush have developed the interface, tools and editing capabilities, which closely simulate the art of sculpting, enabling the software to reach a wider audience. In comparison, box / poly modelling has been around for much longer, and functions on a mathematically dependent platform. As it is one of the most long-standing methods for creating 3D objects, there seems to be a ‘what you see is what you get’ approach, and it has a firm position in the industry. Essentially, once you’ve picked up the basic skills needed to create shapes - to edit vertices, edges and so on - it is quite feasible to create more complex objects and models in 3D space, picking up extras tools as the user goes along.

In terms of hardware, software and performance demands, sculpting technologies have rapidly caught up with conventional methods of modelling with the use of several algorithms to compensate for the amount of visual information being shown. In this respect, sculpting and box / poly modelling are of more or less equal standing in the industry. However, where sculpting falls down is when it comes to flexible and versatile content. Items made in programs such as Mudbox are usually extremely complex with a high poly count.  As a result, directly exporting such items into other mediums which use low poly characters and assets can create complications. These models would have to be scaled down, or a low resolution version would need to be mocked up. By comparison, the ‘ground up’ box/poly modelling approach is ideal for creating low poly assets, as it uses direct vertex manipulation giving the user complete control over the file size of the model, thus making box/poly modelling more versatile. However, this is likely to change in the near future, with the demand for realism and the advancements into algorithms and gaming engines.

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This is an interesting comparison and has allowed me to begin to understand a couple of approaches to modelling. The only downside to this however, is that the comparison is not exactly 'up vs down', but more one method of moving points in space vs another, so any conclusions have the risk of not being truly critical. This is something that I will need to keep in mind. I feel that the finished presentation would benefit from a variety of sourced references, and images to back up key points. This research has so far enabled me to use my own experience from tutorials and am beginning to gain an insight into two of the most common modelling approaches.

The next stage is to complete this presentation and use the research gained, along with research on animation technologies and continue to critique them accordingly.