"We're wasting time Sire"

 

(Click images to enlarge)

This shot is a bit harder to do as the camera pans from right to left with a subtle change in elevation as well, so I am trying to match move this by hand as best I can. It has also been a rotoscoping nightmare but I am almost done! Then all that remains to do is render out the far background and the thopter in separate layers and composite it all together! Then I think I am almost ready to release about 80% of the 1st half of the sequence, just in time for Christmas.

Judge of the change... and Imperial Ecologist...

 

Well, here is a little taste of what I am currently working on... rotoscoping out the original background from behind Dr Kynes (Max Von Sydow), and replacing it with My new ornithopter model and the landing pad (based on a mix of the original concept art and the final production model of the Arakeen palace and grounds).
In the original shot, the ornithopter is housed at the base of a shaft deep inside the palace, but I really wanted to open it up so it didn't feel like a small soundstage set.
Since the new shot features outdoor lighting, I have had to lighten the shot a bit and give it more of a daylight tint.
This is currently a concept composite to see how the shot will look when assembled.
There are 3 primary layers:
1: The original shot of Dr Kynes (Rotoscoped, lightened and color corrected)
2: The ornithopter and landing pad (Have to turn of those front lights on the thopter though and the thopter is smaller because it is further back)
3: The palace wall and shield effect with the mountainous shield wall cliffs in the distance (Distorted by the shield effect).
Luckily there is no sky visible in this shot, so there is no need to worry about the color of it for now! LOL
Would love to get your constructive feedback on this shot, so comment away!

Well, as you may have noticed, the poll "What scene in the movie would you most like to see "redone"?" has closed and the results are in!

32%: Final battle vs Sardaukar

25%: Atreides frigates dock with guild heighliner above Caladan

14%: Folding Space

14%: Emperor's Arrival / Landsraad above Arrakis

10%: Worm chase + Paul falling from cliff

  3%: Piter's arrival by tram on Geidi Prime

  0%: Harkonnen ornithopter flight & crash

I find the results interesting, simply because I would have had a completely different order! Though I do agree with the top two results.. but surely that horrible greenscreen shot of Paul "Falling" down the cliff would be higher up the list! LOL

Sadly, I am nowhere near being able to tackle the final the final battle - would have to spend a lot of time making new assests (Fremen, Sardaukar etc) in order for that to happen.

However, on a more positive note, I have already spent some time working on a new animation for the Atreides ships docking with the Guild ship and I think that will be the next sequence I tackle once I get the Duke's spice harvesting inspection (Version 1) completed.

Happy holidays all and thanks for reading!

Hopefully the job market will pick up in the new year and I will at last be able to find work!

Regards

Sasha

Update: 2nd Stage Navigator

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I completely resculpted the 2nd Stage Navigator I had been working on.
I think it's starting to get there but I have to fix a few things like the mouth, tentacle thingies and teeth.
Have to learn how to texture him and such like now - that is the real key to selling a character like this.

"They defend the spice sands... as to their relationship with the spice... who knows?"

Original shot.

Enhanced shot (v1.0)

(click on images to enlarge)

Spent the last few days rotoscoping several hundred frames to remove the thopter cockpit window from behind Dr Kynes (Max Von Sydow) so I could place the new desert dunes render in place. I also took the opportunity to lighten the really dark footage so it looks like they are out flying during the day - I really do not like the orange filtered sky used in all the original out-door effects shots.

Sand, Sand Everywhere...

Sand dunes are a real pain in the ass to model convincingly... they are very distinctive looking, and quite tricky to texture... I initially just put a few bumps and dips into a subdivided plain and while it was fine for just getting an idea of scale and motion, they really doesn't look like "real" sand dunes...

So I have tried a different approach - this time using a greyscale height map that I drew using an aerial photo of sand dune formations in the Namib Desert...

As you can see it looks a bit more convincing (The dunes in the back are still the original "bumps") ... still not quite there and I suspect I am going to have to hand model some "Hero" dunes for close up work as these dunes do not hold up under close scrutiny.

Plans within plans...

 

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For those of you who are interested, and since My own model is a modified "shorter" version (See earlier posts), I am uploading the plans for the Harkonnen "Hammer" ship, in case someone is interested in making the full version of it.
These are scans from the reduced version of the blueprints kindly loaned to Me by Ron Miller, who has been very helpful to Me throughout this project.
However, I think there are some minor changes between the plans and the actual miniatures that were built, so you may want to check other references as well.
I am always looking for more references - especially photos of the filming models and scans of other blueprints, so please contact Me if you happen to have any!

2nd Stage Navigator

Since zbrush is a program I have been needing to learn, I decided to have a crack at sculpting the 2nd Stage Navigator head... still learning though... have to try and create a texture for it. SO here is a look at what I've come up with so far... added the eye and "spice gas" very quickly in photoshop just to give an idea of how it will look...

2nd Stage Guild Navigator

Here's something on My wish list... head replacements for the 2nd stage guild navigators.
Although originally conceived as an animatronic head (Image Here), ultimately it appears there was not enough time or money to complete development and in the final movie, the 2nd stage guild navigators wear some rather silly looking "gimp" masks.

(2nd Stage Gimp Navigator with translator microphone)

With advances in technology, most notably Star Wars Episode 3, where Christopher Lee's head was successfully composited over the stunt double's head for much of the climactic duel at the start of the film, I feel it would be possible to replace the heads with the originally designed ones (Which bridge the evolution between the human 1st Stage Navigators seen prominently in the movie, and the giant mutated 3rd Stage Guild Navigators). Today I had some time on My hands, so I did a ROUGH composite in photoshop to see how the final product might look (Only better!).

(Concept of 2nd Stage Guild Navigator)

Harkonnen Frigate (Special Edition Version)

 

(Click images for larger version)

So I managed to get some more time this weekend to go in and really try and finidh up My special edition version of the Harkonnen Frigate.
It took quite a bit of work to get the main hull into the shape I wanted, since it was not designed to be so short and getting all the shapes to blend together was a challenge.
I think over all that it has been fairly successful - though I have had to change many details, but will have to wait to see how it looks rendered.
There are still plenty of small details I need to add to it but wanted to show you how it is coming together.
You can see the new orithopter launcher doors on the underside of the main "wings"... originally these were along the side of the hull - but remained mostly unseen and definitely unused in the final movie.