Dog Character Setup

A friend of mine started fleshing out an idea he has for a dog-walking game, in which the object is to keep control of a bunch of goofy dogs. For this, he needed at least one dog model rigged up and ready to go, so I got to sketching out a few ideas. He wanted a very soft, toony look to the characters, so I took the opportunity to try some different shapes.

The curvy, snub-nosed mutt-looking fellow on the top left won out, as the name of the game here was to make a simple character that didn't need a load of alpha planes or fur plugins. I started work right away, and within a couple days' worth of working on it in my free time, I had produced a model ready for rigging - the fact that I haven't rigged a quadruped yet wasn't going to stop me. I really enjoy rigging and want to use this opportunity to learn!

I took a slightly different approach to doing the eyes here. I saw that some artists who have done work for Disney and the like model their characters with eyes either fully closed, or nearly closed, for ease of use of the animator. Additionally the eyelids look better when they just have the geometry there as opposed to being wrenched downwards after having been textured. The mouth I modelled closed, then pulled it open and made the inside pocket - There were some issues with the corner of the mouth that I knew would require a blendshape or two to solve later on with the jaw opening.

Still to do:

• IK systems for legs and neck
• Eyelid deformers, via bones or wire deformer, not sure yet
• Facial controls for eyes and blendshape expressions
• Foot locks