Early Witch Concept Model- Head

This is an early model I did, but since then I decided to go with a much more stylized approach (see maquette). I like the idea of realistic skin textures and lighting, but with unusual proportions. Still, I'll post it to show the evolution.

Here She Comes........

Here's a roughly 5" tall actual clay sculpture (as opposed to digital-that comes later) I made for Stuart Cudlitz' Thesis Research class. She will have a certain amount of hair (see drawings).

Made with polymer clay, and painted with acrylics.

"The Imp" Concept Drawing 1

Another drawing, this time of the Witch's trusty helper. I decided to go with cartoony eyes. Who doesn't love a nice set of cartoony eyes? Charcoal on paper with digital color added in Photoshop.

Old School Charcoal Art

Mostly charcoal, but I threw a little white and blue acrylics in, for good measure.

Facial Expressions Drawings

Maya Fluids Cauldron Test

The Cauldron will most likely consist of several layers of FX; particles, particle smoke, and fluids. Of course, I'll keep the fluid simulation simple (since I'm not actually a dynamics guy). This delightful burst is actually a "non-dynamic' explosion, meaning there is no actual fluid emitter. It's more like a cloud that I keyed the attributes for, making it look like an explosion.

Witch House Interior Tests

Here is an early test showing the Cauldron, which should be seen as not a prop, but rather another character. Like the old saying "Cauldrons are people too". Rendered in Mental Ray.

The House, ZBrush model, with 11 glorious subtools

Well, if I had a dollar for every vertex in this Ztool, I'd have 17.151 million dollars (thanks Pixologic!) I really wanted to bulid a house that was relatively free of unrealistic, mathematically perfect straight lines (which is what 3D programs do), so ZBrush was the logical choice to make it more organic. It's always about making it more organic, and covered with moss, and cracks, and lichen...

Tests for the Witch's New England house (ext.)

This house consists of I don't even remember how many individual models, each with nice big 2048k color and normal maps. The ground is displaced, and the clouds are Maya fluids. The smoke is NParticles. The whole shot was rendered in several passes, there were even separate occlusion passes for the house, ground, and vegetation. Using passes is the best thing ever...powerful. I'll put up the ZBrush model next.