ODST
So, as many know im a big Halo fan, and as the time goes by, its only getting worse. Guess i dont need to say more.
Ill be ordering alot of sculpting materials and tool for something like 200 dollars, so im realy going to take some big steps now. Im going to work with super sculpey, a clay i have never used before. Also some new tools will come into play wich will probably make sculpting alot easier (since im used to my good ol potato knife).
I use iron wire to build the frame (normaly you would use aluminium i guess).
I used 3 wires, and twisted them into one strong wire. Since the sculpture is going to be 40 cm's high, it needs to be realy strong to support all the weight. (will do more with the frame onces posed)
The arms will be removable, so i still need to build the slides.
There are small indicators where the joints should be, this will help me pose the frame.
On the left in the photo is some small stuff, that will become clear soon enough.
Im very excited, so with this im going to kick off the ODST sculpt.
Right now theres alot of guess work, since there are very few references of an ODST.
If any of you guys have some cool refs that he's alowed to share, i would realy appreciate it.
Thanks guys
Ill be ordering alot of sculpting materials and tool for something like 200 dollars, so im realy going to take some big steps now. Im going to work with super sculpey, a clay i have never used before. Also some new tools will come into play wich will probably make sculpting alot easier (since im used to my good ol potato knife).
I use iron wire to build the frame (normaly you would use aluminium i guess).
I used 3 wires, and twisted them into one strong wire. Since the sculpture is going to be 40 cm's high, it needs to be realy strong to support all the weight. (will do more with the frame onces posed)
The arms will be removable, so i still need to build the slides.
There are small indicators where the joints should be, this will help me pose the frame.
On the left in the photo is some small stuff, that will become clear soon enough.
Im very excited, so with this im going to kick off the ODST sculpt.
Right now theres alot of guess work, since there are very few references of an ODST.
If any of you guys have some cool refs that he's alowed to share, i would realy appreciate it.
And ofcourse we cant start without a good tune to get excited
[ame]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rPwO8RVUqf0&feature=related[/ame]
[ame]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rPwO8RVUqf0&feature=related[/ame]
Thanks guys
Replies
Rens, I tried digging some old shots of my ODST models but I guess their getting moldy cuz I'm having some issues opening them up. If you have Halo 3 still kicking around, you could try firing up the mission called The Ark. You have ODST's with you in that mission and you could use save films to get some shots of them.
Sorry about that, dude.
Also it might be worth it to try and pick up one of these figures, and if nothing else its a pretty good shot of the lower portion of the character.
http://www.toymandala.com/halo3-ser2-odst.html
And then here is a CA.org thread with some great info on making custom sculpting tools rather than spending tons of money on them, its worth a look.
http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=100894
Good luck, I cant wait to see how this turns out.
Question for ya.. do you plan on painting it when you're done? I never got to that point but I bet that part could be fun.
The reference picture isn't exactly fan made. It's actually made by WETA Workshop (lord of the rings). They also made a warthog.
Anyway it is a pretty good reference.
Rens: I'm also a huge halo fan.
Cheez, thanks for the effort man, appreciate it!
Pior, I think im up for the challenge, succesful or not, its going to be one frustrating ride
nkotse, the ref on the left is a sketch from bungie, the ref on the right is from the landfall video's, and as said, there not really fan based, they are just a bit different from the ingame models
nrek, thanks for the links man, i thought about building my own tools, but i dont know how long those will last, so i dont really mind spending a few bucks a tool. I do try to build most things myself, since there arent always that complicated.
GOBEE yeah man! im going all the way with this, so a big fineart paint job will be part of it. I have no idea wich paints i will be using, but i do have some exp with oilpainting now, so fineart will not be that big of a problem.
DEElek, wow... thats one database full of refs! there are alot that will really help me out, thanks alot.
Only problem with those shots are the amount of detail they have. This is a big sculpt, so there is alot of room for details. Im trying to find the level of detail compared to the new shots from HALO 3 ODST, or some concept art.
talbot, teri, mLichy Thanks alot guys!
Ok so i didnt have alot of time today, but i can explain one of my ideas.
The idea is to have a pin connected to each lowerleg of the armature, and go through the "shiney wooden footpiece" and act like a "bolt and nut" system. This will keep the sculpture firmly in place (while making it, and when its done).
I will make some photos tomorrow that will back this up.
Also im building my own turntable.
I have quite alot of stuff in the garage, including a set of motorblock bearings.
I will use these with some nice wooden boards to create a big and steady turntable.
Pictures will follow
Thanks for the great replies, it really motivates me
looking forward to this
I have the Halo 3 Master Chief mini busts from Gentle Giant. Awesome stuff and the Koto statues are sweet.
making armor with super sculpey is really hard.
duoxan, thanks man. I bought the halo 3 art book last week. Its really awesome, though there arent that much character shots in there as i hoped. But thanks for the offer.
Jesse, yeah, i talked about that with xysdf. Its probably best to flesh it out to get an idea of proportion ect, and start the detail progress with the helmet.
I have no casting exp what so ever, so it might be a good idea to let some profecional give it a try.
Rory, Zero, thanks guys
and as for Talbot, UPDATE!
Ok so i had a bit of a setback,
I started building the slides for the arms, but that turned out to be not such a good idea.
First off i couldn't find any square tubes that had a decent size, so i gave round tubes a try.
They started rotating too much, and the arms kept going into possitions i didnt want, and specialy with a heavy load of clay that would have been a disaster.
So, now that the wire from the shouder & arm part was cut down, i had to improvise to repair it. A bit of a trick but it turned out quite good. It will be quite the challenge to sculpt in the details now that the arms cannot be removed. But its alot more comforting, knowing that it will support the weight alot better.
So with everything done, its kinda looks like this right now
(lens was set at f1,8 , remind me to not do that again)
I still need to work on the pose*
Im going for a bit of a "hero" look, not too much action, not too much of a show off, so its realy ticky.
The piece of wire that he's holding will become a Battle rifle.
The SMG is pretty cool, but it doesnt realy fit the overall look. Also it has alot of details that are unclear.
Here's a photo of the foot, it shows a bit of the "bolt system" i showed earlier.
The foot is .. 6mm of the ground.
This way i can fill it up with clay, and give myself a bit more room for detail.
I will try and pick up the pase.
When i get all the supplies i want, ill do some hardcore night time sculpting
Lookin Good!
haha. When I saw your first I was wondering if you did work at bungie.
On the few occasions I've used sculpy I've always padded the armature with aluminium foil. That way you have to use less clay and theres lesser chance of the sculpture cracking up in the owen.
Haha, yeah i figured, since bothell is near kirkland, WA
Bucc, i learned that trick some time ago, but thanks for the headsup
Sooooooo, i dont have any armature to show for now, just gimme a couple more days.
I did manage to build the turntable today.
It is realy basic, but it works great!
i think i spend 3 bucks on this turntable
im keeping a sharp eye out on this one, ill try to get my friend to post up his ODST model hes working on for class
It took @$#% long enough for some super sculpey firm gray to arive, but i finaly got it!
Means that i will fill up the gabs in the wire and put on some volume to help me do some final tweaks on the pose tonight!
The pose changed a bit after i wrapped another bunch of wire and foil around it.
It lost its clean looks, but its all for firmness right now, it needs to be strong.
also made some small wire tools, but i dont have my camera here atm, so ill post them next time.
Time for some kickass sculpting
Please post more WIP's, would like to learn the workflow.
At the end of this sculpture, i think i can say more about what to do, and what not.
I noticed, giving volume to it, went alot faster with small pieces.
They heat up fast and are easy to press onto it, instead of smudging it into one piece.
So before i knew i wasted sculpey pack number one.
To get a good idea how big this sculpture is:
put your elbow on the table, and make a fist.
take a look at the lenght from the table to the knockle of the pinky.
Still messing around with the pose, but that goes way easier now i have a good feeling what it will look like.
im glad i build a pretty strong frame!
pose doesnt beam out any energy,
biggest issue is probably the elbows, makes him look like a poopsack.
also bringing his feet closer together might be a better way to go.
im going to adjust it to the chief i posed infront of it
I tried some different poses, you can really bring out the energy with some assault or gesture poses, but i duno if thats the way i want to go, by doing so it loses a bit of the hero feeling im trying to bring over.
I would say don't bother too much trying to do smooth stuff right from the start. You could fill in all that volume with tinfoil and save some sculpey already. It's not to late to scrap this off and restart, so go bold, don't hold back!! Also I think it is great that you are doing this based on an existing figure. It will be a great learning experience.
You're braver than I thought.
I'm interested in seeing how you'll execute this thing. In my experience, sculpy is not the easiest to do hard surface sculpting with.
You might want to consider making the armor parts with sculptable epoxy (sucks but holds hard shapes nice), and use the sculpy to build up his organic foundation if the sculpy can't take the hard shapes well enough.
Also consider that with epoxy you can rough on the shape, take it off, work on it individually, and then glue/epoxy it on.
Gotta be quick though.
I wonder though, those master chief pieces look really like one piece composites; 'd have to get your shapes really perfect.
That definitely would work though.
Though i dont want to end up cutting parts out and hit my frame/foil at some point.
Therefor wasting some more clay isnt a problem, the weight also isn't an issue.
Only thing im a bit concerned about is how thick parts of sculpey bake compared to normal layers. Guess its going to be fine, will find out at some point :P
Hard surfaces, i guess its always tricky to do with clay, doesnt really matter what type it is.
Its going to be tough, but thats how i like it
The dominance war can wait a couple days, so ill update this in a bit!
so i just finished sculpey pack number 2, it should weigh around 1kg atm
i hate how it looks from just one angle,
if you dont get it totaly right, it will look different from what you actualy have (too tired to make 20 other shots and pick)
hmmm i think making photos in a dark cave isnt that flattering, next time ill make sure to include daylight XD
also, i still got a digital video cam laying around here, so i will include a turntable vid
agreed. Rens your sculpt just looks to clean to be in the beginning right now. Get the general shape of it before you spend time smoothing. Attack this sucker and have fun with it.
to be honost, i havent payed any attention to smoothing it,
i work with small pieces so they heat up fast and i dont damage my girly thumbs trying to get it flexable. make small strips and just past it on there, and move on to the next.
so yeah, im fleshing it out atm, not paying attention to detail, just getting all the volume in before i move on.
Dont know if this helps but when I was sculpting we would use foam to make our hard surfaces, armor, weapons, etc. We'd usually cut the shape out with the band saw and sand it from there. If we tried doing a hard surface though clay it usually ended up looking...well...not like a hard surface.
Not sure how much you have sculpted but i suggest getting some cans of compressed are to freeze the clay (turn can upside down) and that will help with hard edges. Once you get him more shaped then if you can start putting him in the freezer at night or whenever you're not working on it.
Keep "blobing" him in. He'll take shape
-hmm was trying to find a pic of one on the internet but only 9 were made for Rare. And we werent allowed to take pics in the studio do to some disney thing...*sigh*
Reich, that freezer trick ive gotta try out!
Looking good so far. Just a few more spots before you can start your fist shaping pass.
Are you going to do the gun sepritly or try to sculpt it in hand?
That gives me a good chance to work on both rifle and trooper without stuff getting in the way.
I intend to give the rifle a base layer that i bake.
Then finish it up and attach it to the sculpture itself.
After that i will sculpt in the final details and bake it as a whole sculpture.