Week 6 and 7: Skeleton development (Grim Fandango and Posada Research)

GRIM FANDANGO

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I have been trying to look for inspiration to make a good skeleton model. Matt had suggested to me that I should look at some images from the Grim Fandango game, so I went on the good old world wide web to look at some concept.

The images that I found on the Internet showed that the actual designs of the characters in the game are very simple but also effective. I have never actually played this game but I can tell from the screenshots that i have taken that the character defiantly fit in well with the environment. The characters however look very comical and I don't really know if a comical looking skeleton would look good in the environment that we are creating.

Here is a screen shot of a test model I did of the skull using reference from the Grim Fandango pictures I took from the Internet. I personally liked the simplicity of the skull, and the fact that you can clearly see that it resembles a skull but it has its own character to it.

Well anyway I had to have approval from the guys about what they thought of it and if they thought it could connect with our environment. In the end the vote came down to 3 to 2 against the fandango skull. Myself and Matt seemed keen on it and thought it could remain within the environment, however Harvey, Sam and Jeff thought it would be more effective if a more realistic skeleton was used. So to try and incorporate some fandango esc design into a more realistic skull was my next challenge, to try and persuade the other party poopers this was the way to go!

POSADA
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Before I started to model another skull, Jared suggested that we looked at an artist called Posada who did art relating to the day of the dead Mexican festival. I found this art really extraordinary almost surreal in a sense. It also seemed comical like the fandango images but to a lower degree. The style is also more of a realistic style than the fandango art. Out of the two styles I would have to say that I like the Posada art more, I feel it symbolises more what we are looking for and has this traditional feel about it.

So....... skull number 2, I took the top half from skull number 1 and started to work on it using my second inspiration Posada. What I like about how it has come out is the fact that it looks a bit deformed but not in a bad way, like it's supposed to look like that it defiantly looks more realistic than the last one! However it still looks quite comical, which could very well go against me when I'm trying to persuade the others.

I showed the guys my second attempt at trying to incorporate both mine and Matt's vision and Harvey, Jeff and Sam's vision. It still didn't work, the other three still wanted a more realistic looking skull. They didn't feel that this particular skull would work in the environment as it had more of a toon like aspect to it.

aaahhh well....back to the drawing board!

FINAL SKULL

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I had decided to give in and accept the fact that the majority has ruled, so I got to work on modelling a realistic skull.

I started by getting the basic shape of the skull by using yes.........A POLYGON CUBE!

Once I got the basic shape of the skull I started putting in the detail. I originally thought of doing the teeth by extruding it out from this model. It wasn't really working in the way that I had wanted it to, so I am now thinking on whether to model the teeth separately it might be easier. The most difficult part of this model surprisingly is the eye, because when I smooth it to test out how it is going to look, I am getting this cartoon look; which we are defiantly not going for.

Here is a screen shot of a more worked on skull from the previous shot, I have been trying to get more definition in the eyes and the nose and just to fill out the face a bit more so that it doesn't look flat.

Here is a side view of my model so far, I'm having a few minor problems with some of the verticies and how it looks when it is smoothed. But Louis introduced me to a flood tool in maya that has helped with this. It has become another one of my favourite tools to use in this program along side the split edge loop tool!

Here I have mirrored the model so that it has made the other half (also love that tool!). I am really happy with the way it has turned out. I believe I have meet the need of the other three group members and hopefully they will like it to.

This is the final skull, it has now been smoothed and finalised. I showed my group this skull and it was happy faces all around!! So skull number 3 will be the final skull used for our environment.

HAND

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The easiest way I could think of doing an authentic skeleton hand was to model each bone. So thats exactly what I did, I got reference from anatomy pictures and i started to model each bone at a time. It was quite time consuming but as I got into it, and I started to like what I was producing the process began to speed up.

This is the finished hand model in wire frame mode, I am very pleased with the outcome. Now all i have to do is texture it and move the bones into the actual position we need them.

FOOT
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After I modelled the hand modelling the foot seemed alot easier. So just like the hand I modelled each bone to build up the foot.

This is a screenshot of the final modelled foot its finished yay!!!!!!