Nice… very nice… I think I’d like to have a go at designing something like this…
Hey guys, Remember this video a few weeks back. If you
didn’t see it, the owners of this website - how would you say that? Gothic? Yes, let’s
go with Gothic… So the guys at gothic dot com previously sent
me a fabulous Tiger ring and I had a go at designing my own. Well now they’ve sent
me these excellent skull rings and just like last time, they haven’t charged me anything
and haven’t asked for anything in return… except for just one thing…
They asked me, if I designed one, to show them the design before I show you.
That seemed a reasonable request and I like a challenge… but for me this is actually
a double challenge. For a while now folks have been encouraging
me to have a play with ZBrush. It’s an amazing bit of software used by jewellers, graphic
artists, game designers, even film makers. The problem is it has a reputation for being
a bit of a pig to learn and, very importantly, it’s not cheap… but there is a free trial
version, so that’s where I began. I started with a couple of rough sketch of
a skull which I’d made and then a began sculpting.
Now I have been taking an online Zbrush course, which I aim to tell you more about very soon,
but I assure you, THIS is my very first project with this software… and it took me days.
It’s certainly more versatile than Fusion 360 and much less temperamental than Blender.
Don’t get me wrong, I like Blender as it’s Open Resource and Free, but it crashes on
my PC all the time, it’s slow and frequently buggy… at least in my amateur hands. But
Zbrush, whilst complicated to initially get my head around, is an absolute joy to work
with. Obviously everything you’re seeing here
is dramatically sped up. I’m still learning and I’m certainly not fast.
Right now, you can see me pushing and pulling on a virtual piece of clay, using the background
images as guides. Now you certainly can do something similar
to this in Blender, but personally I’ve always found it a little like pushing water
up hill. Why, I don’t know, but Zbrush somehow seems easier.
There’s a variety of tools that are used to scrape away or add on more clay and whilst
with me this seems like a never ending cycle, for those with skill and experience, it’s
a very intuitive process. Have you guessed what it is yet? No, me neither…
Push, pull, push, pull… it reminds me of my honeymoon. Yeah, there was a hell of a
queue to get into that hotel. Smoothing is your best friend. It can be used
to remove mistakes, but it’s very useful to ease back harsh areas and form more natural
shapes. From here onwards, I’ve abandoned the drawings
and I’m just winging it. Genuinely there’s not much of a plan here. There’s a basic
concept in my head but whether or not I can ever achieve it is an uncertainty. So that
means lots and lots of experimentation and frustration. Funny how my honeymoon comes
back to mind. We really should have tried another restaurant.
Here things are very blocky and at the beginning that’s good. But eventually you need to
increase the resolution to give yourself finer clay and, ultimately, finer details.
At this point I created a simple cylinder. Through Boolean operation, this cuts through
the skull making a finger hole. To reach this stage probably took me a few
hours, but after this began days of trial and error. I was trying to add gestures to
a skull, something it’s obviously not really meant to do, and I’m no artist. So there
were changes galore as I fiddled about with expressions.
Add, smooth. Subtract, smooth. Swear. Try again. Luckily, at the heart of it all, I
was enjoying the process. Please don’t look for anatomical accuracy
here. I spent most of my Biology lessons chatting to the girls on the back row, so here I’m
just going for something skull-like… but obviously imaginary.
It amazed me how tiny movements of the clay really
altered the appearance. I was looking for something, but the problem was I didn’t
know what – and wouldn’t until I found it.
In truth, all the time I was changing things, I guess I was learning.
This level of control isn’t really possible with a mouse most Graphics Tablets can be
stupidly expensive. Fortunately I found one on Amazon about 12 months back now. It’s
a reasonable price and does a great job… everything I’m doing here is done using
this Tablet. I’ll place a link in the description if it helps folks.
When I say many, many hours, I’m not kidding. Getting the basic shape didn’t take me long,
but I spent days tinkering with the expression of this guy. Finally, I captured that warped,
twisted smile that reminded me so much of my mother-in-law.
Of course at this point I would normally print and cast this. But look here.
Having seen my design, those wonderful guys at Gthic asked me if they could manufacture
and sell it on their website. I was incredibly flattered and this fabulous creation is their
work. It’s solid sterling silver and a fairly heavy ring, weighing roughly 45 grams depending
on size, so it’s not for those that don’t like substantial jewellery. Now that’s a
lot of silver so it’s obviously not as cheap as their stainless steel rings, but if you
fancy one of these, you can buy it on their website. It’s even got my mark on it.
I’ll place a link in the description if any of you fancy taking a look at my first
ZBrush creation. Obviously yours truly will get a small commission on each sale and that
helps keep Mrs VOG happy, giving me more time to make videos, so we all get something nice
out of that arrangement. I don’t think this will be my last outing
with ZBrush… I found it extremely responsive and it’s results were excellent.
So that’s it for this one guys. I hope you enjoyed this one. Take care and thanks for
watching.