Hi Folks,
This is my first Blender model, after a year and a half on the forums just watching and reading and the odd bit of help thrown in where I can I thought it was time I posted something I been tinkering with the last several months when I can.
It’s basically the Buzz Lightyear character that my mate’s little boy loves to bits and so I’m making him for an animated CG/live footgate composited short film for him. Thankfully as little kids go he’s very patient
I’m basically doing all my Blender learning on this model too hence it is very much a WIP. The arms are out of place at the mo as I’m having to totally re-do those - I started rigging and found that he can’t reach across his body to fire his laser - a travesty! Also his legs and top arms still need some work.The purple band around his belly is also very nasty;can’t figure RETOPO properly so hand to like, hand draw it.
I’m proud of his face, took a while to get it right but the few shape keys I’ve added work really well with him too.
Much thanks to Ryan Dale’s “Introduction to Character Animation” tutorial which helped in more ways than just the rigging part and to all on the forums whose bits of knowledge I have gleaned along the way too.
Materials and UVing has been a fun learning curve too and I’ve used a bit of SSS to get his face skin the right texture.
Anyway, would appreciate comments and crits and will endeavour to keep the WIP going as I work towards the final film.
Lighting is just for viewing and modelling purposes, nothing special.
Cheers
OMG i completely forgot about this movie i used to watch it like eery day!!..that was an awesome movie…i never really liked buzz…but i liked the cowboy guy…i dont remember his name… been a loooonngg time lol… good work i like it
Blender-spartan - cheers mate
Hobo-Joe - Yes I see what you mean; think I must’ve got it to where I thought was OK but it needs some more work hey? Fatter rounder chin and deeper brows. Totally missed the chin curly thing too, thanks
ha ha great start so far I would second Hobo-joe comment and pay attention to the head, this brings a smile to my face as even though I have collected pretty much all of pixar feature releases that is easily the most watched dvd in my collection my nephew can’t get enough of it.
The buttons on the front are way off scale, from the though model is pretty much spot on. The face i would pay the most ammount of attention to. If the face isn’t right, it doesn’t matter who you say it is, or what the body looks like, it wont be Buzz Lightyear. Great work so far
You can’t remember what the cowboys name was, even though you watched it every day? Thats almost like saying, 'I didn’t really like donald duck, but what was that mouses name again…erm??? lol
Thanks Folks, I really appreciate all the comments and pointers; much thanks for taking the time and trouble to share your views. So back to the drawing board on the head then I guess and yes, good call on the buttons too AndyStudio29. Hope to get back to it a bit before Xmas and start making some of those rebuilds; thank you
Thanks for all the encouragement and feedback folks it’s really appreciated. I’ve been getting back into the head the last couple of days after a bit of a hiatus; trying with the Sculpt tools to get something more akin the pic posted by HoboJoe. Bit disheartening but then I just read the thread again to try and get some direction and feel newly energised to start again with it, thank you. Hope to post an update soon.It’s a tricky one for me but it’s a great way to learn Blender and I feel really supported by the Forum here which is great. Big thanks.
No worries mate; I’ve attached the most recent Blend file as well as a WIP showing some development on the face; I’m getting a bit bogged down in it but it’s slowly improving, I think! I’ve stripped out most of the body and all the armature to keep it under the attachment file size limit but hopefully this is enough for you to have a play around with.
Obviously some textures probably will be missing and just a note that the camera is constrained to the face-object at the mo.
A humble request though; I’m a bit “precious” about my learning process with things; I’m certain there a thousands of people could whip this up in no time and could post a quick pic and a blend in a few hours of a totally re-sculpted face to equal Pixars However I’m a great believer for me in learning by doing and asking so please allow me to bumble along in my own time and don’t post a perfect buzz blend
Well it’s starting to look better…but a couple things you should fix…
-The eyes are bulging a little to much, so your best bet would be to move the skin around the eyes forward
-The nose is a little large, thin it a little and the arch also bends towards the face, not away, also don’t have such a huge indent at the top of the nose
-the cheek bones are a little large, reduce them a little, and it’ll look better
-The top of the head shouldn’t be so flat, ad the purple “hood” should extend a little farther forward
-And eyebrows would be good
I know it sounds harsh, but fix those things up and it’ll definitly be alot better!
Are you usingany reference images in the blend? If not you should probably put the reference image Hobo Joe posted earlier as a background in Blender. I know it definitly helps me when I’m working. It’s really nice to be able to glance quickly back forth to see what needs to be fixed.
But all in all, it’s definitly looking better, you’re well on your way to an awesome model.
Not harsh at all maul2, i really appreciate you taking the time to comment, thank you.
yes am using the pic from Hobo; it’s a bit different to the others i’ve been using as reference - there’s so many Buzz pics out there! but that one’s straight from Pixar so probably the best to use. Most of my reference was taken from a toy model of Buzz and there’s not much face detail in those. Anyway, much thanks again, give’s me good direction, cheers.
PS - I’m having some probs with the eyebrows at the mo Can’t get a clean line with subsurf on; will keep at it anyhoo
set the eyes back a little and brought surrounding skin forward some.
thinned the nose and corrected the arch and top indent
-undefined the cheek bones and swollen the cheek fat a little to get more cutesy chubbiness
-rounded head and extended hood forward a bit
-penned in some eyebrows and especially for Minifig, the infamous goatee [roughed].
-also redefined the ‘ears’ a bit too.
Today I also, thanks to the forums and the wiki, learnt UV unwrapping and texture baking [so i could see where the eyebrows should go i assigned a darker material to those faces then baked the face mesh and exported it onto the face-layout image from the UV unwrap]. These textures obviously need a bit more work as they’re just early tests to make sure it all fits in the correct place.
ALright well thats looking loads beter. But something seems to be off still…
Aha! The chin still seems to be a bit too large. Try deflating it a bit and bringing it a little closer to the face…and theres was something else…
Oh yes, if you look at the actual pixar reference, Buzz’s cheeks start below the eyes, whereas your’s seem to start in the middle of his eyes, if you get what I mean. Try lower the cheeks and narrowing the head aound the eyes. That should help… hopefully you get what I mean…
As for creating sharp edges with Subsurf. In edit mode select the edge you want to be sharp, then press “n”, which will bring up a dialouge box. At the bottom there will be a box labelled “Median Crease”, this is where you can set a value from 0-1, 1 will make those edge ultra shrp, and 0 will have no sharpness, you can select any value between for the level of sharpness you want. Very useful tool.
PS. Also the ears need to be a little larger and more circular and a little more foreward…just going from the Pixar reference.
just keep goin with it, the head at least looks like a face, hehe so i know you can do it 
Can’t get a clean line with subsurf on; will keep at it anyhoo
