Hi Everyone,
Since the last update, I have been working on fleshing out my design for the Dinobot. The last time I wrote a blog, I worked on blocking out the scene and the Robot itself.
This is where we left off last time, with a rough blockout for the raptor mech 
Next, I worked on fleshing out the design to create what I call a 'high poly blockout,' where the majority of the design's forms and shapes are defined. It's not to say that panels and design can't change later, but it's a loose intention of how the design will look. I am mostly focusing on a few different things, which I will list here
- How does each of the individual elements move? What is the range of movement? What type of joint, etc.
- Setting up the Blender file in a way that creates the least amount of work and allows me to iterate on the design easily - (Using collection instances)
- Start breaking the model down into materials, panels, and a rough design idea.
A lot of the thought process happens in my head, but to make this a bit easier to digest, I made these diagrams that detail how I approached each major section and how I thought it might work. I grabbed the illustrations of joints from this website here
I am also using an anatomy model of a raptor as a base to design over, so I can get the anatomy and silhouette to read like the real dinosaur. For the leg, I want to display the obvious joints on the knee, show off that big claw on the foot, and get a rough idea of some panel lines. I will definitely revisit these later as I go through the design.
For the arm. It's a similar story: get the rough joints and movement solved. Again, starting to think about how the arm could be sliced up into multiple chunks. This helps me to think about opportunities for different material reads as well. A big thing I wanted to do with this design was add mechanical feathers, so I also worked on an arrangement that solved this. I thought it would be cool to have these as mostly visual, more like armour plating with feathers that actually function.
When I work on robot creatures like this, I typically start with the legs and arms. I find that because they tend to be the least complex part of the design, it's easier to figure out the overall design language on something simple before approaching how joints and panels look across more complex parts like the body or head.
For the body, I mostly needed some sockets for where the legs and arms would attach. I then used raptors as inspiration for a section of panels underneath the stomach, made from a single material and generally more interlocking and connected. For the back, I planned harder, sharper shape panels like an armour. I also wanted to experiment with either weaponry or some sort of water tanks that might go in the machine's back, so I figure I will need an attachment point on this area as well.
For the head, I wanted to keep the Raptor's head mostly intact because I want the robot to be recognisable, which makes it very easy to identify. Again, I am thinking of a colour scheme with a different colour on the front of the neck from the back. Also, a big thing with this design was the feathers, as mentioned with the arm. On the head and around the neck, I wanted that cool silhouette read of the feathers. The neck is also a nice place for interlocking panels and cables, and for a housing that runs up the neck to show how the machine functions while also looking cool and creating depth.
With the tail, it was a very similar story to the neck, lots of interlocking panels and a cool feathery tail at the end. Again, this is a good opportunity to introduce some depth with cables. I also wanted to test a joint that would work for the movement, not decided if I will actually include this joint or not within the tail, cause the panels may mostly cover it anyway, so I need to test a quick rig and see how it performs or whether I just allow that part to deform the panels a little. Just depends on how noticeable it is.
That's it for the breakdown of the different parts. I hope this does a good job of explaining my thought process a bit and shows some of the progress in the high-poly blocking for the model.
I also wanted to provide a render of what this looks like compared to last time, and a GIF of the WIP modelling.
Finally, let's talk about the next steps for the project. My plan now is the following steps
- Final high poly design for the leg, arm, body, neck, and head
- Rig and animation testing
- Pose and test in the environment
If you got this far, I appreciate your time and thank you for reading about my process. Let me know if there is something specific you would like to see next or if you have any feedback on the project so far.
Thanks
Ben