Week 4

This week I have been working on sculpting the carnivorous plant in zBrush. It has been a fairly slow process because I am still getting used to zBrush. Before I started working, I reset the settings on my Wacom tablet for better navigation in zBrush. The default navigation in zBrush is not very intuitive so I set it closer to Maya navigation while using my tablet. I also watched more videos about various zBrush tools and techniques as needed throughout the process.

I first started working on the pot, since that is the base of my mesh. I started with a basic sphere with Dynamesh turned on and, with radial symmetry on, I shaped the sphere into a pot shape. From there, I sculpted a lot of damage and cracks into the pot to make it look very old and crumbling. Once I finished the pot, I used zSpheres to block out the form of the main stem and head of the plant. Then I continued to refine the shape and used the masking and extract tools to create two parts of the head. I am considering redoing the head, however, so that I can work on it with symmetry turned on and then move it into place later. This would help a lot since the head will be primarily symmetrical and at the moment the head is at an odd angle that would prevent symmetry (unless there is a way to set my own axis for symmetry---I will research that when I get the chance). Below is a time-lapse video of the sculpt and some screenshots of what I have so far. I am planning on finishing sculpting early next week and then spending some time texturing it in substance painter. Hopefully, I will have it all finished by the week 5 post so I can start on my next project during week 6.

Timelapse Video

The pot:

The entire mesh so far: