First things first, I started Olaf this weekend. I started off by installing Lightwave 9 since I hadn't had a chance to play with it while I was finishing the last gig (done in 8.5 and didn't wanna jinx things). I'm enjoying it. The new edge tools are great and I love the new 4+point sub-d's. Bout time. I think I'm still gonna pick up Silo which I've been playing with at work in my downtime. It's a great mix of Maya and Lightwave modeling to me and is hard to beat for $100.

Anyways...so, on Saturday afternoon, I started by taking a hard look at Cory's drawings and trying to get a feel for what that would look like in 3d. Illustrators tend to not worry so much about staying "on model" when they do their illustrations. They're more concerned with the single image then a consistent moving one, so I tried to pick out the key facial landmarks I could. I did some of my own quick studies to try and get a hand on it, drew some quick modeling images and started up. I spent most of last night on starting to model while also refamiliarizing myself with modeling again. I've not really done any serious modeling in some time...especially character modeling. I looked at it this morning before heading to church and saw the utter crap that it was and decided to start over when I got home. After church, I picked up some modeling clay and spent a good bit of this afternoon experimenting with Olaf's head "in the round".

When I was satisfied I had a better understanding (and convinced of the feableness of my sculpting abilities), I started again. The above image is where I'm at. LONG way to go, but can't wait to have this character ready to move around. He's gonna be a ball to animate.

Many thanks again to Cory for letting me give him a CG breath of life:)

Labels: Characters, Modeling, Olaf