Step 3.

Time to create NURBS patches out of all these curves. Select 4 (hold shift for multiple selections) curves forming one patch as shown in figure 4. Start off with the top curve then go clockwise, this way all patches will have the same direction. Try doing this to as many patches as possible, and in areas around the nose or eye, start off with a curve aligned to a top or bottom curve. After you have selected the 4 curves, go -Surfaces -Square. Next you might want to disable the ability to select surfaces



Step 4.



This screen shot shows all the patches created. Next you want them to have equal amount of isoparms in the different directions. Again, as you still need to pull the points out to shape the creature, a low amount of points is preferred.



Above shows all the patches rebuilt with a reasonable detail level. First select a row of curves - see figure 8 as well, then go -Edit curves -Rebuild curve and choose 3 as the number of spans, and parameter range as '0 to # of spans', and leave out the rest as default. Continue doing this in the other directions using a decent number of spans.

Step 5.

Now you want to start shaping the 2d curve cage into a 3d creature, and a good thing to start with is assigning a phong or blinn shader to the patches, which easifies the modeling process. Go -Window -Hypershade, and inside the Hypershade go -Create -Material -Blinn (or Phong), and put it somewhere in the Hypershade area. Then select all the patches (easiest done in the Outliner), right click on the shader and choose 'Assign material to selection'.

Next go into shaded view (hit 5) and detail level to maximum (hit 3).

Step 6.

Now it's time to shape the model as far as current detail level i.e. surface complexity goes. Select all the curves and go into default sub object mode, and start pulling the curve points outwards. Switch between shaded and wireframe (4) mode when you can't see the points, and in areas where several points meet (the end of the curves) drag a selection box around them making sure you got them all. Also remember that you're doing a really rough model at this moment, don't spend a lot of time making a smooth surface: first drag all the necessary points and fine tune later.Another thing that might help sometimes is to show the hulls (select by component-hull) so you can easily see what point is next to another.

Even though you kept the amount of points down on the curves, there are quite a few to move around with.



Figure 9 shows the first version after dragging the points into a rough model. Don't worry too much if the model will look too thin when mirrored, the scaling and basic volume shaping is done later using either a lattice or just the scale tool.

Step 7.

One rule for having tangency continuity between surfaces is to have enough isoparms in the surfaces. Now that you've been modeling the rough shape of the head you need to start the more detailed shaping on a surface level. Thus you need more isoparms ensuring detail and continuity. Basically you add 2 or 3 spans on each curve row. Smaller curves might just need 1 span more. Rebuild the curves so the density becomes somewhat like figure 10.



Also add a NURBS sphere for the eye, because the next thing to do is shape it to the final appearance.

Step 8.

Create a new layer and move all the curves to it, then hide it. Go 'Edit - Delete all by type - History'. Then select the two patches shown in figure 11.



Go 'Edit surfaces -Align surfaces option box' using the default settings and check 'Attach' at the top of the menu, and hit 'Align'. Continue with the merged surface and the one above it, so it becomes a single surface. If the surfaces twists after the alignment, go into the attributes for that surface, and check twist (and sometimes reverse) in the settings - see figure 12.