The Jeff Underdown CGI Gallery

Sunday Afternoon

2008-03-02T19:15:00.000-08:00

Freelance 3d Work

2008-02-27T10:01:00.000-08:00

I've been debating whether to jump into this market or not till now. This website convinced me that it's worth it. It allows users to publish, host and advertise their 3d models for free without doing any of the work.

Bits of Free Time

2008-01-14T23:11:00.000-08:00

Until this semester really gets started, I'll have free time to work on the raytracer and projects like this.

Book Review: Children of Hurin

2007-11-29T08:44:00.000-08:00

In a word, it's incredible. When I first read the short story version, I found it very interesting, but not fleshed out enough. The novel version fills that void and much more. I highly recommend it to anyone.
I've been really busy with school so the ray-tracer is still in its beginnings. The goal might shift toward a 3d sub-division modeler. Right now, I'm just working with writing the object hierarchy.

Real Time Raytracing

2007-10-08T08:24:00.000-07:00

I've been working overtime lately on my newest, most exciting project: a real-time raytracing engine. I've been reading up on my Quantum Electro-Dynamics and python syntax and writing code for the last few months (sorry for not posting too often).
On a side note, the last chance to see Daft Punk in the United States in 2007 is October 27th at the Vegoose music festival. Tickets are roughly $80-$110, but plane tickets are about $300 :(

More UV / Texturing

2007-08-30T14:25:00.000-07:00

So, I've just moved to BYU and I'm taking some classes to help me decide between doing Electrical Engineering or Animation. It's a tough choice that I really don't have to make just yet, but I figure I should start thinking about it.
On another note, I got my computer set up here and got some UV mapping and texturing done:

[Update 2: 8/31/07]

JSF speed modeling part 2

2007-08-08T17:35:00.000-07:00

JSF speed modeling part 1

2007-08-08T13:34:00.001-07:00

Hands

2007-07-12T16:10:00.000-07:00

Sorry this isn't the full Hands and Feet tutorial I promised and late but my next short project should make up for this. Part of the reason is that I don't have fraps yet.

Face Mesh Tutorial

2007-06-25T15:54:00.000-07:00

After a week long recovery from my latest hard drive's suicide (I feel so stupid for not setting up a RAID 0), I started work on this face mesh tutorial. It's designed to help noob 3d modelers to get a feel for the process of organic modeling specifically the human face. Using only Free and Open Source Software, this tutorial can help anyone get a feel for the world of 3d animation. So, grab a download of Wings3d and follow the simple directions on the following imagery loaded tutorial:First go to the Edit:Preferences:Advanced menu and check the option for "Advanced Menus"
Begin with a cube

Select 4 parallel edges and use the connect command then loop cut along the newly formed edges

Create a virtual mirror on the new face

Select the cube in object mode and use the smooth command

Use the connect command on the 4 edges underneath the mesh

Flatten the 4 resulting inscribed faces

Move the faces down along the y-axis

Download front and side images for the human skull and import them into the workspace and rotate and move them into useful positions

Align the view to the z-axis by pressing the "z" keyboard button (use the wireframe view mode accessed by the view menu in the toolbar)

move each vertex so that the mesh fits around the skull

Repeat this process on the x-axis

Cut this edge in half using the cut command and setting the cut value to "2"

Scale the neck radially along the y-axis

Use the extrude command and extrude the new faces on a path "normal" to the face

Rotate the eye-sockets by moving the verticies until it looks like a nice fit

Move the surrounding verticies around till they form more square shaped faces

Create this face by connecting the two close verticies on the 6 sided polygon

Move these vericies out along the z-axis to create the nose

Connect the 3 edges between the eye-sockets and connect the end vertex to an existing one

Create these edges by connecting the vertical nasal edges and then move them inward along the z-axis

Move these verticies out just a tad along the z-axis

Create the highlighted edges by using the "connect" command

Again, using the connect command on select edges, create a new edge loop

When you want to see your progress, select your mesh in object mode and use the smooth command (more than once if you like) it can always be reverted by pressing:
CTRL+ALT+Z or using the "undo" command

Since the face is a bit square looking, take a string of edges and move them back along the z-axis and repeat on inward edges but to a lesser degree

Align the mesh to the skull again

After this first half it gets a bit harder to keep up, but don't give up

Pulling back edges again to round out the face...

Create a new edge loop

Create the eyelids by extruding the "region" of faces

Hide the incomplete face and create a sphere in order to start working on the eyes

Rotate the sphere 90 degrees on the x-axis

Extrude this face inward along the z-axis

Repeat the extrusion process for the pupil of the eye

Create a cylinder and rotate it 90 degrees on the x-axis to begin working on the cornea

Transform the cylinder using the scale and move commands until it fits just over the iris

Select the outer face of the cornea and scale it down

Using the "combine" boolean operator, put the two objects together

Unhide the head and find a vertex to bevel in the proximity of where the ear should be located

Extrude the face that is left over from the beveled vertex and use the inset command on the face that was extruded and make it larger than an ear should be and extrude the face again

Round the ear

Select the edges that connect the ear to the head and use the "loop cut" command to separate the ear from the rest of the mesh

Import an image of a human ear into the workspace and use it to sculpt the ear (don't forget to use the orthographic view when necessary)

Unhide the mesh again and prepare to reconnect the ear

Ensure both faces have the same number of edges and then use the bridge command

Collapse any edges toward the front of the ear that connect it to the head

If you want, you can download a free and accurate human face model from Facegen's website here so you can line up all the major features now that you have a working system of edges (download a .obj version and use the File:Import:Wavefront.obj command in Wings)

And once you are done with the base mesh then start creating characters, It's so easy to do with the tweak tool. Don't forget that 2,3 and 4 (on the number pad) are hotkeys for the 3 transformation modes while using the tweak tool. Also, remember to use the + and - buttons to increase or decrease the soft selection size.
Here is a character I created using the tweak tool and starting with my base face mesh: (the original below and the character at the bottom)

Stay tuned here for next week's Hands and Feet Tutorial
(I think from now on, I'm going to do video tutorials)

Mech Animation

2007-05-06T11:25:00.000-07:00

This is a little old by now, but here is an update on the mech/walker thing.

Tutorials

2007-04-17T20:40:00.000-07:00

I found some excellent face mesh tutorials today...
Video tutorials:
Video 1
Video 2
Image tutorials:
Image 1
Image 2
Image 3
Image 4
Image 5
they are all pretty good tutorials...
I personally recommend the first video tutorial if you were just planning to choose one. The creator of that tutorial really opened my eyes to new methods it truly is superb.

Dino Run

2007-03-23T19:14:00.000-07:00

Mech Scene

2007-02-15T22:21:00.001-08:00

Fish Render Final

2007-01-01T19:54:00.000-08:00

The "photobucket" encoding really screwed up the detail in the maps.

Dropships

2006-12-22T18:44:00.000-08:00

This is a short animation of some current works in progress.

Fish Render [Update]

2006-12-22T18:34:00.000-08:00

[Update]

This is the main character for a short side project I'm working on currently

First Animated Reel!

2006-11-02T19:36:00.001-08:00

Hard Drive Frisbees

2006-10-30T15:46:00.000-08:00

Lately I've been working more on my other project, a mapping robot. While both at a loss of parts and an excess of time, I dissembled an old hard drive and decided to make some frisbees from its guts. It's pretty easy to get the edge curved downward is with some standard pliers.

More Work

2006-10-20T20:35:00.000-07:00

I finished the low poly version of the rine, now it's time to detail it. I used a reference photo for the gun (someone from SC:C made it).

Marine Work [Updates: 2]

2006-09-27T07:22:00.000-07:00

[Update 3: 9-29-06]

[Update 1: 9-28-06]

It's finally starting to come together after those first bad runs.

Character Work: Ghost

2006-09-23T18:50:00.000-07:00

A quick study in facial edge loops. It may also evolve into a character for SC:C. I did not use references for this one.

New WIP's Mech and Shuttle

2006-09-12T21:38:00.000-07:00

Mech wire shots:

Mech Render:

Shuttle wires

Terran Battlecruiser

2006-08-29T17:56:00.000-07:00

simple wire

flat render

Data Disk Drive!

2006-08-24T19:23:00.000-07:00

You can tell I've been short on time lately huh? I'll have more meaningful posts soon, so don't worry.

Marine 2.0 WIP [Update 3]

2006-08-21T18:51:00.000-07:00

[Update 3] 8-25-06

[Update 2] 8-25-06

[Update 1] 8-23-06

I am completely redoing this thing to make it cg quality, as you can see, I am not very far yet.
[Edit] I hate all of these versions (good thing none of them took more than 30 minutes!) so I have started work on a new one.

Some WIPs New and Old

2006-08-16T21:18:00.000-07:00

Terran Vulture

Origional Cartoon Character

Alien and Marines - accidentally transparent gun

Zealot, Zergling, Marine

Hello World!

2006-08-16T20:39:00.000-07:00

Introducing the CGGallery... I am Turdmoe, a 3d modeller/texturer for the CGI project Starcraft Chronicles. Though I will be posting my work frequently on this site, you are free to email me with your origional-concept or starcraft-based work and I would be happy to post it along with the sender. Please feel free to post any negative/positive comments to any work posted or just download the images in high resolution.