Creature-Design

This is the 5th of 10 monsters I am creating. This here is a camel spider, or solifugae, monster. See wireframe and wireframe comparison below. Because these are game characters, I’ve paid special attention to retopography as always, and the breakthrough with these characters is the fact that they are completely built in Zbrush, and imported into Blender 3d only for rigging and animation. If you are not acquainted with insects, this Camel Spider is different than the actual insect in a few ways. ...

Sluggor and Occulon. Sluggor is a slug monster. Oculon is a centipede with an eye. Both are inspired from classic games. These are freshly retopologized, and ready for animation. I have some more creatures to adapt from Zbrush. It has been a fairly large project, but the end result is 10 new and interesting creatures for use in Unity 3d game engine. These are both fairly low topology. ...

In my 10 monsters spree, we now have #2, the Roctopus, now retopologized. This character is inspired slightly from the old Legend of Zelda game, NES original. Wireframe preview below. You can see the previous entries for the entire 10 monsters. While zBrush is good for “creating at the speed of imagination” (and truly, it is) retopology happens at the speed crystals grow at. Its the more tiresome part of the process. ...

Now that I’m done generating all 10 new monsters, I’m going to be re-topologizing each one and importing them into blender, and preparing them for animation. Working in phases like this allows me to streamline my work, doing similar operations all at once. It is very much like an assembly line. Using Zbrush for Re-Topology It seems to be an unpopular choice, but Zbrush can be used for retopology. I try to avoid excessive imports and exports between programs, and one artist I follow stated that it is best to do as much dev in Zbrush as possible, even up to the re-topology process. ...

Tired, I decided not to make another monster, but to revive and improve one of my older models: https://www.turbosquid.com/3d-models/3ds-wasp-hornet/689029 To my great surprise, this model is already 8 years old. I remember tediously creating this model, working from photographs, trying very hard to get the details correct. Creating 3d insects can be very difficult. They might be smaller, but they are very intricate in their body structure. It helps to know some general anatomy of insects, since reference photos are often fuzzy macro images with detail in only some areas. ...

9/10. I’m happy to be near my goal of 10 monsters created in Zbrush. In one grand project, I’m starting 10 monsters from base form, then bringing them into a game engine, progressively, all at once. Here is something simpler, done in a short time. A sort of poisonous bottom-dwelling worm. There is no particular inspiration for this, other than some sea creatures and salamanders I’ve seen. I tried to for more non-symmetry in this to keep it freaky. ...

I’ve been making it a point to take inspiration from classic game characters. Having revisited old games like Mega Man, Altered Beast, and even Zelda, I’ve noticed there is a level of originality in those games that, my opinion, just isn’t achieved anymore in sci-fi culture. Quite often, most modern sci-fi concepts have a root in what was produced in the 80’s. A perfect example, of course, is how Riddly Scott’s Alien movie set a standard and a foundation for the majority of sci-fi culture afterward. ...

A hand-like alien inspired from a few sci-fi sources. As usual, I wanted to make it sort of gross. This is another monster in the monster series I’m making, which will total to 10.

The camel spider needed some work. I wasn’t happy with the claws and the cuticles between the shells. I improved both. I find its often the small details that determine the difference between realism and highly-detailed plasticine-like models. Usually its the seemingly meaningless embellishments that give realism. One thing I should employ more in my models is minor deviations from symmetry. No creature is perfectly symmetrical, and character designers know this. For now, I often rely on perfect symmetry for animation and rigging, to avoid projects running excessively long. ...

My goal is 10 new monsters. Then I will be retopologizing them, animating, and deploying on this website and Unity 3d asset store. This is a solifugae monster, or a creature based on the camel spider. This one took a bit longer due to detail. I was not overly strict on accuracy since it is a monster. The yellow arms against the brown body should imply this creature stings. Hopefully this was carried out successfully. ...