Figure 1.35 Click for larger view

Figure 1.36 Click for larger view

Figure 1.37 Click for larger view

Figure 1.38 Click for larger view

Figure 1.39 Click for larger view

Figure 1.40 Click for larger view

Figure 1.41 Click for larger view

Figure 1.42 Click for larger view

Figure 1.43 Click for larger view

Figure 1.44 Click for larger view

Legs to body

Now it's time to connect the front leg (hide the back one to prevent it from

Figure 1.45 Click for larger view

Figure 1.46 Click for larger view

Figure 1.47 Click for larger view

Figure 1.48 Click for larger view

Figure 1.49 Click for larger view

Figure 1.50 Click for larger view

Figure 1.51 Click for larger view

Figure 1.52 Click for larger view

Figure 1.53 Click for larger view

If you haven't already done so, added the toes to each leg. First, make a 16 segment sphere with the hemisphere setting at 0.5. Next stretch the hemisphere to make it oblong and tapered (use a 2x2x2 FFD). Use Edit Mesh to delete the back half of the hemisphere. Once the "toe" is done, duplicate it for the other toes (see Figure 1.41).

Next, delete the appropriate faces on the leg. Once all of the toes have been connected (Figure 1.42), select the vertices comprising the lower leg and apply a Blend until the toes seamlessly run into the upper art of the leg (Figure 1.43).

Add slightly larger toes to the back leg (Figure 1.44). Oh, I see Now is the time to create the eyes. Unfortunately, our reference material doesn't give us a good indication of what the eye area looks like. From the side view (Figure 1.1), it appears to be a simple eye without any brows (similar to a snake). On the front view (Figure 1.2), however, there appears to be a bit of a brow indicated over the eye. Since the front view isn't too clear, it is hard to say if the interpretation of the brow is correct. So, we'll opt for a simple eyes reminiscent of a snake.

NOTE: be sure to add the eye to the side of the model that has the legs. To create the eye socket, first create a simple sphere. Then use a 3x3x3 FFD to massage it into an eye-like shape (Figure 1.45). Using the Front, Left, and Top viewports, position the sphere toward the front of the head near the top of the snout (see Figure 1.46). Once you have the sphere the correct size/shape and in the correct position, make a copy of it, call the copy Fambaa: Eye, and then hide the copy.

Collapse the sphere to an editable mesh, click on the Sub-Object button, select Face from the drop down list, select all of the faces of the sphere, then scroll down to the end of the edit mesh roll-out, and press the Flip button under Normals (see Figure 1.47).

You're about to seriously muck with the mesh, so save now. Select the torso, click on the Creation tab, select Compound Objects from the drop down list, click Boolean 2, make sure Move is selected, make sure Subtraction (A-B) is selected, press the Pick Operand B button and click on the sphere. Once you're satisfied with the outcome, collapse the head to a mesh, unhide and select fambaa: eye, and scale it to around 98% (see Figure 1.48).

Lips To form the mouth, first, create a simple CLOSED spline in the shape of the mouth (Figure 1.49). Then apply an Extrude modifier to make the spline wide enough to cut through the entire head (Figure 1.50). Use Boolean 2 and the steps outlined above to cut the extruded mouth shape into the head (Figure 1.51).

My better half Whew! We're almost done. Collapse the creature to an editable mesh and delete the half which doesn't have legs. Mirror the resulting object (and the eye!) and connect to the other half (Figure 1.52). Now go back and collapse/weld any vertices which are creating a seam on the creature.

Finally, texture the beast. I applied the side reference image to the model and after a little tweaking of the image map, created Figure 1.53.

That's it for this one. Hope it was fun.

Glossary

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