I've looked forward to making this thread for a long time!
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Okay so enough with the smileys and back on to the description of the thread.
So I just about a week ago decided to boot my copy of maya back up again and try and learn it again, and as I have learnt some intense amounts of stuff since the last month(not trying to be smug and saying I'm good, just saying I've learnt a LOT) it makes it a HECK of a lot easier, so I now pretty much know Maya as good as I know Blender after this project. Also picked up a copy of Zbrush(just got payed from some work I did so heck, why not blow the cash away heh) and wow, I can just tell you now, it is amazingly fun, everyone should get it
And also had some cash I got from christmas left so I went and bought some training DVD's from the amazing site of
http://www.digitaltutors.com (Go check it out, they have some amazing DVD's there, might be a bit pricey but well worth it, trust me), I chose the "Modeling next-generation characters in maya" and the "Detailing next-gen characters in Zbrush" And "Texturing next gen characters in maya", yes I had a ton of spare cash, and I got some from my parents as well. Feel kinda spoiled after this hah.
And these are amazing dvd's let me tell you, I've learnt so incredible much in this past week my brain is boiling, well, not literally but still.
And I finished the first two DVD's today(PHEW!) and while I tried to keep the model EXACTLY like the model in the DVD(it's like an unofficial OCD or something, takes like 2x more time but I just want it to be like the dvd for the quality it gives) I polished the UVMap(I finally got the art of UV Mapping
) to have 4 maps instead of 5, and I like my uv map better than the one in the DVD anyways =) And I had some fun with the sculpting, can ZBrush be anymore fun?
And while I had some sever damn issues with Zbrush at times(I run a mac, so I ran Zbrush 3 in a VM with about 1500 MB of RAM and 64 VRAM, I would dedicate more VRAM but it wouldn't let me
) as I was able to handle up to about 40 mil poly's but sometimes when I saved Zbrush would crash and corrupt the save
So I had to redo some areas up to 5 times, and the ZMapper didn't like me so I had to use the more crappy "built in" one and manually make it more intense in photoshop(thank you Jon for doing that tutorial on how to!).
And this is what I have now, WARNING! This is like a gazillion images screenshot'ed from maya/zbrush as I still don't know how to make good looking renders in maya
. So yeah, as always C & C and by the way, some areas are less detailed than others for the reason that I thought that those would just be able to paint out in the texture and had no real need for any normal mapping. And I'm by no means trying to sound smug or anything, just talking about how I made this and why and whatnot.
Sorry for the flood of images and the random long post. Hopefully you read the entire thing and don't mind.
And also mind the UV Maps are FAR from perfect, I still consider myself being a NOOBZORLETCAKEOMFGLETZOR, although I like the leg and the upper body ones(try and see if you can tell which ones they are, it should be easy)
So yeah.
Yeeah.
I'm happy
Zbrush High poly screens
Maya Low Poly normal map screens
UV Maps
I think I just killed imageshack
EDIT: The UV's are FAR from perfect, FAAAARRRRR
Although they don't give any stretching!