Small Animals - 3D Characters

When we were asked to study an animal in a realistic way, I did not hesitate for a second. I had at home two cool gerbils with whom I shared my everyday life, while I was going through my 3d journey. I decided that it would be a cool tribute to make them as two 3d characters, so here are Oslo (the black and chubbier one) and Minsk (the golden one).  I really enjoy making animals especially working the eyes and the groom to make them feel alive. I also tried to give them their personnality, Minsk was more adventurous and curious, whereas Oslo was more reserved.

Regarding the process, the modeling was made in Maya, when I was happy with that, i textured their skin : Oslo has a dark skin whereas Minsk a pinky one. Handling the subsurface was important as the skin is visible around the eyes, the nose, the paws and the ears. When i was happy with the result, I created curves as guide for the fur made with Xgen and painted their color in substance. 

This Hyalophora Euryalus is the first living being i ever made in 3d. It's a pretty big butterfly that has no mouth and only live for a few days. I chose him in particular because i fell in love with his antennas and his specific red and white pattern. 

My process consisted in making a model in maya. I tried to be precise regarding the volume on the abdomen but also on the veins of the wings. I tried to detail each part of the paws with the little claws and stuff. When I was happy with the model, I sculpted more details in Zbrush. I knew the groom was gonna cover everything but defining as much as possible the volumes would allow the fur to have better shapes. The groom was made with curves in xgen and finally i repainted the whole pattern in substance. It was a long process especially for the wings because repainting every detail of color transitions without looking cheap was pretty hard. Finally I rigged the little guy and animated it to fly on a cotton ball. I modeled the whole cotton ball in maya and textured it in substance and renderman. 

I had a lot of fun with the whole xgen process. I wanted to depict the softness and the grace of this butterfly through a strong color and lighting identity as well as a minimalist but worked environment.