Wolf WIP - Honest Critiques Welcome

Hello everyone! I recently held an art raffle on DeviantArt, and the winner had requested a wolf. I began working on it earlier today, and here is what I have so far:



Note that this is a very early screenshot. I’d like some very honest feedback on this, I’d like to make it the best that I can. Thanks in advance!:smiley:

Hmm. Not much to say yet since the sculpt is still in its early stages. Is this going to be a cartoony wolf or more realistic? I ask because I’m curious about how you’ll do the hair

It’ll probably be a slightly less realistic wolf, but not quite cartoony.

Another update:



I’m finished blocking out the head. Now he has ears as well, but my question is, do they look like wolf ears or another animal’s ears?:S The muzzle is quite a bit shorter now, and the head has a proper shape as well. I’ve also added a nose. I noticed that when I was roughing out the original head shape, I ended up with a crease near where the eyes could be. I tweaked that a bit and moved it closer to the center of the head, as well as adding a bit of a brow. There’s also a neck, and I’m not sure if it’s too thick or if it looks right.

looks great so far!

one comment about the shape of the head… the jaw muscles seem more like doberman/pitbull/rot than a wolf.

when looking at this anatomy picture wolves are less “stocky” than dogs which were bred for fighting etc…

Any advice on making the body? I’ve tried a few times and each time it looks awful.:confused:

Hi Terrance,

If I would be you, I would change my approach on the subject. Currently you are trying to model everything at the same time. Shape, Proportion, Details. It’s hard to finish something if you have to care about all of that at the same time.

Try to break the project apart.

I recently created my first sculpt in Blender. I had little to no experience in sculpting. So i created a base mesh of my targeted sculpt.
A base mesh is basically just a rough mesh that captures the proportions and form of the creature you want to model. In my case it was a shark.

https://mir-cdn.behance.net/v1/rendition/project_modules/disp/0262b427852153.55d642c20f124.gif

I started with a rough form that I created by projecting a side view of a shark (reference image) on the background. After that I started to sculpt in the correct shapes and details. At the end I got an model ready for final sculpting (displacement map, weight’s etc).

Try to build your wolf from the ground up. Don’t only focus on one part of the wolf. Try to capture it’s shape and proportions first and then build everything else up on that.

I hope this is helpful to you. Good Luck! and Head’s up!

Greetings from Hamburg,
Fast

You know, with my obsessive sculpting I had entirely forgotten about setting up reference images in the background. I think it may be a little late in the process to use a basemesh, but I may do that in the future. Thanks so much for the advice.:smiley:

Hm, you’re absolutely right. I’ve blocked in the body’s shape at this point, so I think it’s a bit late to change that. What messed me up doing this sculpt is that the reference images I have are of wolves with fur, so I was guessing most of the time if I had the shape right. Definitely saving that picture for future reference though!

Update time!



As you can see, I got a body in there. I had some issues with it until I added a background image and sculpted it to match that. can’t believe I didn’t do that earlier. /facepalms

Up next is sculpting the legs. Unless something should be changed with the body of course. My question is, how should I sculpt the legs? Should I sculpt them as separate objects or sculpt them directly onto the body?

i think you should use a separate mesh, it will make it easier, and when it’s time for retopology you will make everything a single mesh

Well…crap. My mouse’s middle button is broken. It might be awhile before I can get a replacement, so this project is on hold.

Yeah, that’s what I’m doing.

The head doesn’t really have the wolf look yet, the biggest issue is how flat and wide the top of the nose is. I did a paintover to illustrate the basic forms . Use it in conjunction with reference images, I don’t have a lot of experience with dog/canine anatomy.

You also might want to use a lower poly resolution while blocking things out. Generally keep it as low as possible as long as it can contain all the details you want, it makes shapes easier to see and faster to modify. Increase it gradually as you add more and more detail. Blender’s dyntopo is pretty cool in that you can increase resolution and add detail one area at a time if you need to.

If you intend to bake a normalmap from the high poly, use a boolean modifier to attach the legs to the body before retopologizing.

Note that that is a ethiopian wolf, which is much leaner than it’s northern counterparts. http://abouttimberwolves.weebly.com/uploads/2/3/3/9/23393360/5962362_orig.jpg rtshould be more relevant in this case.

I got my new mouse, so it’s time to post some more progress!



<sarcasm>Looks at those amazingly realistic legs.</sarcasm> But I may not sculpt them any further, they don’t really need anymore work because this is a relatively cartoonish wolf.
@ProteinPannkaka Thanks, that is some awesome advice! I’ll work on the head some more and post another update later on.:slight_smile:

Alrighty, I’ve given wolfy a new head!



Not much else to say about it, except for it hopefully resembles a wolf’s head instead of a dog’s head now.:stuck_out_tongue: Any advice on adding the eyes? I always have issues with doing that, they tend to look really bugged out.:frowning:

It is mostly good except that it looks very flimsy. Try adding some weight and muscle.


Here is the wolf with eyes and a tail:



I hope they look good.D:
@GPS14, you know, you’re at least the 4th person to say that.:stuck_out_tongue: I guess it’s time to work on that now.:wink:

Four people said that probably because it really needs to be done:p
I think the eyes are too small.