W32.Virut

Ugh! Spent the last week dealing with a REALLY nasty virus - fromt the V32.Virut family - super nasty one that infects all .exe, .scr, .html & .htm files on your machine... and then blocks access to anti-virus websites and proceeds to download lots of other malware and viruses. Had over 1200 infections. You REALLY don't want this to get on your machine.
Had to reformat My C: drive.
There is a very useful tool for removing it over at AVG antivirus.

More importantly all My DUNE SPECIAL EDITION FILES are safe... have to make another backup of them ASAP.
Have to keep a close eye on My computer over the next few days and make sure it doesn't come back...
Hope to start back into it asap!

Carryall

 

 

(Click images to see larger versions)

Added more detail to the Carryall model, though its quite difficult as I only have 4 solid reference photos of it and none of them show the top of it clearly or the shape of the wing tips properly, so I've had to "make up" certain details. I still need to detail the Harvester docking areas and add the strange little doohicky that goes on the lower front section. The original model was silver, but owing to the way it was shot and the orange filter that was placed over most of the special effect shots, you can't tell that in the movie.
I've included a render of the carryall landing at the spice refinery as Duke Leto flies past in the ornithopter.

City of Arrakeen

Have finally knuckled down to work on on of the most difficult parts of this project... trying to rebuild the city of Arrakeen - where much of the action in the movie takes place. While the Arrakeen palace and nearby landing field were built as series of minatures/biggatures, and partial sets, the city itself is represented only by a couple of matte paintings.

My revised version of the Duke's 'thopter flight requires a shot following the Duke as he flies over the city past the spice refinery and up over the shield wall. (Originally it was simply two shots in the movie that feature an almost unrecognizable 'thopter sort of flying straight up - not very interesting.)
So, in order to accomplish that I have been creating an entire 3D cityscape that can be viewed from any angle.

I admit that I couldn't be arsed modeling buildings from scratch so I downloaded a pack of 20 tatooine buildings - originally modeled in MAX and converted to Lightwave by someone. However once I opened them up, I discovered they were badly made with incredibly high poly & point counts so I ended up having to remodel every single one of them as a lo-res model - cutting the the poly count by up to 80% in some cases. I also removed the distinctive dome shapes replacing them with sort of concave roofs. I also modeled some windtraps and other buildings based on the old DUNE 2 and DUNE 2000 games as a bit of a Easter egg.

I've added in the 20 palm trees by the palace (a show of water wealth) - featured in several photos of the original model but not in evidence in the movie.

Still plenty to do - Have to work on the landing filed some more and the spice silo yards and actually do the detailing on the spice refinery.

The 3rd Stage Guild Navigator

(Click on preview for larger image)

Continuing on yesterday's blue eye theme, another important character that didn't get the blue eye treatment is the 3rd Stage Guild Navigator (or even the 1st and 2nd stage navigators).
I also don't like the fact that the orange spice gas is more of a dirty brown/tan color so I've whipped up a little animation test where I rotoscoped in the gas and the blue eyes to see how it would all look.

3rd Stage Guild Navigator Rotoscope Test

Who Could Pose As A Freman?

(Click on images for larger version. Top: Enhanced frame. Bottom: Original Theatrical Frame)

The sadistic Piter De Vries as played wonderfully by character Actor Brad Dourif (Alien Resurrection, Lord Of The Rings) acts not only as the Baron Harkonnen's mentat but as a "twisted" mentat, he also acts as an assassin. Consuming spice in large quantities - a privilage of being the Baron's right hand man - his eyes have taken on the blue within blue coloring of a spice addict.
The Atreides worry that with those eyes, Piter would be the perfect assassin - able to pass for one of the native fremen.
However, in the movie - presumably in order to save money on the rotoscoping effect and not confuse the audience as to who the bad guys are - Piter does not have the blue within blue eyes.
I had a quick go in photoshop today at recoloring his eyes to see how he'd look. (Yes, I did muck around with the green wall as well!)

Castle Caladan

(Click previews for larger image)

For the introduction to the planet Caladan in the movie, it starts with a really awesome panning shot of enormous waves crashing against a rugged coastline, before cutting to a really awful model cliff side and totally out of scale waves, before cutting again to show the Castle where the Duke and his family reside.
My vision here, using modern digital compositing techniques, will be to extend the first panning shot, so it continues up the ragged cliffs until the castle is revealed at the top... possibly having the camera close in on the window where paul is sitting, then cutting back tot he interior shot that starts at the window with the rain outside and pans over to see Paul at his desk.
I've included an image of the model, a mock up of what I sort of want it to look lik, a render of the model and a render of the planet Caladan.

Guild Heighliner

(Click image for large view. Click post heading for animation on youtube)

Here is the massive Spacing Guild transport ship. It is so enormous, it dwarfs the huge Atreides Frigates. While most of the model is essential a lightly detailed tube, the mid-section is festooned with mechanical detail. For this I used freely available "greeble" & "nurny" detail models - usually only on two sides of the model to keep the polygon count low while rendering.
The main part of the model that is incomplete are the huge golden "doorways" that open into the interior of the Heighliner. I have various refernce pictures, but none of them show the detail clearly, so I have had to do My best to make it look ok... just have to make some "normal maps" to help create the intricate surface patterns and get some better texturing done.

Film Book

(Click images for larger view)

A simple prop model made in order to facilitate integration of the new planet models that Paul would be looking at.Considering modern technology, the size of the screen seemed too small, so I have enlarged it... however, the four circular "control" knobs while kind of simple looking in 1984 actually now resemble the control wheel of an ipod, with the black central button and a gold "navigation ring".

Emperor's Palace on Kaitain

(click images for large view)

While essentially fairly simple structures (albeit with some ornate detailing), the alternating cube step areas were difficult to work out as the reference photos were fuzzy and did not show the detail clearly. The purpose of creating this model is to feature it in the new opening sequence where the guild ship lands next to the palace.

Arakis, Dune, Desert Planet

(Click on images for larger version. Click on post title for link to animation on youtube)

Nothing tricky about this!
A simple set of nested spheres. One for the planet, one for the atmosphere.
No precipitation on Dune, so no clouds (unless they are dust or sand clouds/storms.)
I used the map in the novel to create the texture for the "main" part of the planet (the north pole to 40 degrees). Also managed to find one for the south pole - also to 40 degrees. The region in between is open desert.
My original model had the northern hemisphere map taking up the whole of the northern hemisphere and looked "wrong", so I researched it a bit further and finally took note of the note on the original map.