Learning through practice

Most of this is just self-notes for...well.. myself, but it's covering a couple lessons I've learned in my bird beast concepts/speedsculpts. I struggle with design, and a lot of other areas in 2d, and 3d is my chance to roam wild. I feel so much more comfortable in zbrush. But even then I still come across a lot of snags and don't always remember the key points.

Pine Grosbeak
2d
-I felt broken when I began- just kept drawing the bird over and over and at one point gave up and made something on top of the bird. Not sure how successful that choice was but it gave me a better start for the sculpt.
-Working on textures from AO bakes has led me to focus a lot less on details when doing 2d sketches
3d
-Fur isnt a good idea in a speed sculpt, which is obvious, what was I thinking
-Some minor details like cuts go a long way
-In this sculpt I learned it was more fun to use my concepts as general guidelines and make a different version of them rather than to actually sculpt my concepts :P

Chickadee
2d
-Sometimes it's harder to really get what I want in a drawing but I have a clear enough idea of what I'm going for it's easier in the sculpt.
3d
-Mixing ideas of what you want to do for the teeth is bad, things get sloppy and confusing fast
-Coloring in zbrush doesnt give me the results I want at all, im too used to painting in photoshop or 3dcoat at this point and my paints end up looking like base colors

Cardinal
2d
-Fighting ideas will end up looking like fighting ideas, best to pick a direction and run, not choose one and then consider others.
3d
-Asymmetry isn't always necessary and can really hurt a sculpt when going for speed (even if I do think it'll make it more interesting)
-Spraying places with an alpha to give things texture will more likely just end up looking like you just sprayed on an alpha
-Spend enough time on masks and double check your mesh after you make a move or rotate before resuming sculpt, going for speed or not

Cardinal sculpt

Here's my speedsculpt of the cardinal :)

Cardinal

Sketch of a cardinal beast- sculpt to follow

Chickadee

Today's bird beast is based off a chickadee- Next step- cardinal

1 hr dynamesh speedsculpt of my pine grosbeak (yep- that's what it was!) inspired beast. Started off with the idea of this being a male version..

Playing with an idea. My sis and I were talking about making bird themed art, I wanted to do bird themed beasts- so here's the first. She suggested it :) Any guesses on my reference?

Merry Christmas