More catfish-water-dragon-fish-embryo fun!

I wrapped this one up 5 minutes ago. Time to celebrate with some modeling! I'll put a couple of hours into it and finish during class tomorrow, I think.

Oh, and an update on the bird's nest 3D print. There will be no such print at this time due to a clog in the print head. Hopefully John's got some acetone/ate to soak it in... but in the mean time I'm going to get a more conventional model set up to have printed on the godly 3d printer in Portland! I hope I don't squander the opportunity ;P

Enjoi!

Oh, baby! It's a dragon-fish-horse! I got a bit of modeling done in class today. I did waste the last 2 hours trying to trouble shoot a normal mapping problem, though. :/

NEVER rotate your UV islands separate from one another if you are going to be importing a normal map and not baking directly onto the mesh. Lesson learned.

Also, due to ongoing difficulties with the 3D printer, there is no birds nest as of yet, maybe tomorrow, though.

Ok! The test was an absolute success. I haven't taken a picture of the result, but the form of the object was held very well. My next attempt at modeling/printing a complex solid object will most likely use this method.
But...
For now, my next idea is to abuse the manor in which the printer lays down the material. I thought I would either like to do a bowl of spaghetti or something like a bird's nest. Which do you think I decided on? Essentially, the 'twig' objects are floating above each other and will compress/roll/fall and look fairly natural (I hope). The eggs will serve to contrast with the loose construction of the nest. I might be taking video of this thing at work... so cross your fingers ;)

Wow, It's that time of year again, school is back in swing and the blenderheads are gonna lose out on some sleep for a while. ;P I'm testing out support structures for the 3D printer, and am realizing that the going is a lot slower and resource intensive this way :/

Here's the basic idea: The sphere is testing the ability of the buttresses to support its initial wide angled flair. Ideally, those supports should break away from the sphere (test object) and leave it looking superior to a non supported model. If successful, more intricate prints should be possible. If not... huh... well, that would suck. I hope I'm right! I'll see the results shortly.