Modeling Characters for My Animated Short Film | Roll to the Beat DevLog 2

Welcome back to the second devlog of my animated short film Roll to the Beat, the story of a beetle who learns to befriend a shy roly-poly using music. In this one, I explain how I modeled and shaded the ladybug and the beetle.

I started with the ladybug. It's a background character, so if I messed up, no one but me would notice. I learned so many new techniques on the ladybug that I went back and remodeled the beetle, and I'm really glad I did. It looks much better and the topology is much cleaner.

Shading is one of my favorite parts of 3D art. The ladybug's red polka-dot shell starts from a Voronoi texture and a color ramp, with the shine kept to just the red areas. The beetle's shell uses a layer weight node, so its color shifts between camera angles.

I also started planning the music. The bugs sing a repeating phrase in a bug language I made up. I'm recording the roly-poly's crystal xylophone part on a steel tongue drum and the beetle's stick-and-spider-web guitar on my dulcimer.

Watch the second devlog of my short film Roll to the Beat on YouTube.