db01eb8a7aa34582bad71905d42dfdb4

Taygeta - Creation Process

Mon, 13 Mar 2023 22:22:01 GMT

Taygeta - Celestial Demon

Taygeta is probably one of the weirder avatars that I have made. I wanted to create something with a lot of moving parts to it, but also focus a lot on my creative freedom with it. Her name comes from one of the star systems within the Pleiades cluster. I plan on releasing similar style avatars after other stars within the cluster. The other star names are: Asterope, Alcyone, Atlas, Maia, Electra, Calaehe, Merope and Pleione.

Starting off I had no idea what I wanted to make, I wanted something a bit different from my usual smooth form cybernetic stuff I have made before. I wanted something bulkier, something heavy and a bit monstrous.

I began work on a some heavy wings which you can see at the top of the page. Unfortunately I didn't take too many screenshots during the creation of it but I have a few. The design has changed a bit from when I first pictured and I'm not entirely sure why because in hindsight I prefer out hit previously looked but still happy with the result.

Here is the first rendition of the wings:

Overall, I have been working on this project since October 13 2022. It has been 5 months of work because of my constant delays and procrastination. I also had a massive break from VR because I was drinking too much so needed the break to have a mental reset and get back into it with a healthier mindset. I found that a lot of my friends experienced the same thing. Moving past that though, I am very happy with the results, and I believe that the hard work has paid off because this bitch is fucking hot! If no one buys her I won't care because she is easily my main avatar now, which means I have been testing her a lot in full body on the weekends. Check out the spin preview before.

For more picture updates make sure to join the discord as I only do these occasionally and usually at the end of a project.

9K - Upload Tutorial

183:769881650 (Catt Vines) — Mon, 25 Apr 2022 22:52:34 GMT

Uploading the Quest and PC versions under 1 blueprint ID

The basics:

Before you import the model into Unity make sure that you have the latest VRChat SDK and Poiyomi Toon added to the project first. You can get the Poiyomi shader from their discord server: https://discord.gg/297DRszj

You can then drag in the 9K Unity Package into the Unity Scene

Stage 1: Uploading the model for PC:

First go into the following Directory Assets/9K/Prefab and drag the 9k (PC Upload) under the Hierarchy on the left side.

2. Open the VRChat SDK Tab and show the Control Panel

3. Sign into your VRChat Account under the Authentication Tab

4. Click on the Builder Tab to upload the model by clicking “Build & Publish for Windows”

5. When uploading make sure that the avatar is Private as it is against my ToS to upload Public

6. Upload

Stage 2: Uploading for the Quest Compatibility:

7. Go back into Assets/9K/Prefab and drag “9K (Quest Compatible Upload)” into the Hierarchy on the left side but highlight the “PC Upload” avatar.

8. Copy your Blueprint ID from the PC version

9. Paste into the Quest Compatible version and attach it

10. Delete your PC Version out of the scene or hide it

11. Reopen the VRChat SDK and go into Builder, change the Build Target to Android

Side Note: It should have the same name as the PC upload, if it doesn’t then you have not attached the Blueprint ID correctly.

12. Build & Publish Avatar again

Common Issues and Fixes:

Pink Textures:

Pink Textures will likely mean that the shader is missing. This is more than likely because Poiyomi or the VRChat SDK was not added first. You can delete the 9K folder add these first and try again, this should correct the issue. If they remain pink, then we need to select the shaders for the materials again.

Won’t Switch to Android build:

You might not have Android Platform added to your Unity. To enable do the following:

Open File > Build Settings…

Install the Android Build

Upload greyed out:

You probably have the PC version and the Quest version enabled at the same time. Hide or Delete the other version to allow uploading

Imperial - Creation Process

183:769881650 (Catt Vines) — Fri, 03 Dec 2021 15:21:43 GMT

Imperial - Creation Process

I have been working on more stuff that is made from scratch now including hard surface sculping modeling. This has been a very fun project and I am happy with the results of her. She has had completely from scratch Cybernetic legs created by myself for her which I will go further into the details of later in this blog.

Lets get into it then, I first started this project without even the desire to make a model. I wanted to initially just make some robotic legs for sale but instead I had a few additional ideas on what to work on such as clothing, tails and even had the thought on cybernetic animal inspired gear.

Leg creation process

I have been working on shoes from scratch a few times and thought I could apply the same techniques to actually making metal / hard surface stuff. I knew I wanted to have finer details as well such as a piston, wires, maybe a battery stuff similar to that. You know, cyber shit. I didn't really have a design going into this so I just started making it, using modifiers like Mirror, Subdivision surface, Bevel and Solidify I got to creating. The results of these combined is a flat shape that you can easily manipulate into a 3D shape as shown below.

I used this technique to build out a base of what I wanted the leg to look like, using an existing armature to determine where the knee and the ankle will be on the model. Somehow I managed to keep the poly count at 5599 polys for these entire process until a little bit later where I add a few more details to make it more fitting for full body. It still remains under 6k polys per leg though which I am very happy with. I didn't go into this with the intention to make an optimized leg it just happened.

Leg Texturing

I had to get the leg ready for the UV maps... and needless to say this process was fucking pain. Trying to find where I want the seems to lay and overall unfolding this leg like origami was not an easy task, it was not the cleanest end result either but I finally got it done and put into Substance Painter. I knew I wanted a more "Organizational" look to the leg, something that says corporation so I went down the route of hard blacks and gold with white informative details. Here are the end results of that.

I'm happy with the results of how it came out, it looks pretty industrial to me and almost militarized which is why I wanted to base the rest of my outfit around this color scheme and almost make a cyber army girl in a sense. Off the back of this I also decided to make a tail as well. The tail was created in a very similar way however with 1 major change. I made 1 piece and then used array curves to make it flow and position exactly how I wanted.

Using a combination of these techniques I managed to continue and create a set of items that were completely made in blender and then unwrapped for Substance Painter.

I wanted to make a body suit as well but doing this in blender seemed more tedious than fun so I took it into a software called Marvelous Designer which is made to create clothing. This was much easier and very quickly I was able to create the body suit type I wanted. After taking this into marvelous and spending a few hours staring at it not knowing what to do I finally came out with an idea.

Next up will be the body texturing and I really wanted to add more cybernetics to the model to kind of make her look like an android or at least a half android with primarily human proportions so I kept to all cyber stuff on the base to just textures. So we dive yet again into even more substance painter and start slapping shit on until it eventually look nice. I'm not amazing at Substance but I am pretty happy with the results of it. They include emissions in within the components to make them glow under the full body suit to really add to the cybernetic look.

I'm not going to go into the Unity side of things due to me hating the Unity part with a passion but I hope this has been somewhat inciteful to the general process of this model and it's creation. I also hope it inspires you to go out of your comfort zone when creating models to learn new techniques and create some fucking amazing stuff. It takes time, effort and at points you'll want to pull your hair out but the overall experience is worth it and you'll gradually be able to make more advantageous models and assets.

For constant updates join my Discord server as it's by far the easiest place to see what I'm working out. Most of my projects I do not write up a blog for either. Link: https://discord.gg/VTr29yR

How to make Fishnets

183:769881650 (Catt Vines) — Thu, 28 Jan 2021 20:15:02 GMT

db01eb8a7aa34582bad71905d42dfdb4

Taygeta - Creation Process

Taygeta - Celestial Demon

9K - Upload Tutorial

Uploading the Quest and PC versions under 1 blueprint ID

The basics:

Stage 1: Uploading the model for PC:

Stage 2: Uploading for the Quest Compatibility:

Common Issues and Fixes:

Pink Textures:

Won’t Switch to Android build:

Upload greyed out:

Imperial - Creation Process

Imperial - Creation Process

Leg creation process

Leg Texturing

How to make Fishnets

Here is a way to make fishnets for your model