In the past few weeks I've decided to pursue in learning the art of CGI (Computer Generated Imagery). Years ago, I've already dabbled in 3d art softwares like Zbrush and Blender and thought of going back to my roots and might make a killer career out of this. Then I've decided to livestream my progress to Twitch and export them to Youtube to save my progress for longterm.
It's been long ago since I've opened Blender so I took my time studying youtube tutorials but here is my progress for all those time studying and learning new things along the way.
Armature Bone Rigging Practice
This is what I did first. Learning how to create bones for rigging a mesh or any character so I can create movements for animation or pose them for a sculpture. Animation will be my 2nd priority since I've already had experience in sculpture and for me making sculpture is easier than animation. What I did here was adding "Bone Constraints" to extruded bones and "Chain Linking" them so they move in unison instead of moving bones one at a time.
Humanoid Bone Rig
I was trying to make it more humanoid and learn how body parts would be rigged to create a life-like movement. This time I was so eager to create a humanoid base mesh for rigging.
Object to Bone Parenting
This became an exciting part for me. I learned how to attach an object to a bone and move the bone and object together at the same time. It's called "Parenting" a bone to an object. This trick is very handy. I was planning to add objects that resemble body parts to attach to the bones to make my own Puppet or Mannequin for me to easily pose a humanoid base mesh but I changed my mind and go for sculpting a human base mesh then adding bones to it.
Adding Mesh To Armature / Bones Rig Using Automatic Weights
Finally, was able to add a mesh to a skeleton using automatic weights but instantly encountered a problem. There was a problem with the mesh. Parts of the mesh became so distorted and it's because of the mesh being high polycount and vertices are attached all over the place. So fixing things like these is through low poly mesh by retopology and fixing mesh weights.
Anime Head Sculpt
This is nostalgic to me as I've already had knowledge in sculpting but I never tried going for something that is stylized which is anime. So basically, anime style 3d is a first for me. It was a challenge 'cause the proportions are different than a real human being. Though I'm proud of myself to be able to make it.
Sculpture of Anime Female Anatomy
My best work so far. The major problem with this full t-pose anatomy is that it's sculpted with a really high polycount that Blender crashes when I move it. There are solutions like using automatic remesh by Blender but it destroy the anatomy by fusing the fingers and the toes. I might just adjust the auto-remesh but I wanted to go for how the professionals fix mesh by manual retopology.
Retopology of Anime Female Anatomy Part 1
This was my first step to learn manual retopology livestreamed on Twitch. Most of this session was retopology on the head and you'll notice I'm being really lazy as there are timeframes I'm AFK where I'm at my me-time or watching Blender Youtube Tutorials.
Retopology of Anime Female Anatomy Part 2
Finally, I've reached this stage of retopology where almost full body is done. I didn't finish the hands and feet on livestream but did finish all of the retopology offline. This whole journey was very tiring sculpting while watching tutorials at the same time can be draining but worth it.
Now, if you guys want to know what my latest update is regarding this project...you can visit my Twitch channel and see what I'm working on there Live or watch my Past Broadcasts on Youtube. I also have started a Patreon for followers who want to support me on a monthly basis.