BOOMER
References:
These were the main references I gathered for this project. Anyone with a cat knows how hard it is to get one to sit still for pictures, so this part of the process took longer than it reasonably should have. Luckily, these four shots were relatively workable.
ZBrush Modeling Process:
To begin, I dragged a sphere in ZBrush. Then I started pulling out major facial features like the nose/mouth, ears, and neck. I carved depressions into the face to mark the general placement of the eyes. Symmetry was very helpful throughout the entire process of this sculpt.
With my sphere beginning to look generally like a cat, I started pulling out the more massive features like the neck and cheeks of the bust.
Once I had the vague shapes, I started to define more facial features. I carved in the mouth and the nose, as well as defining the ears. The ears entailed both internal shaping and the sculpting of the mound at the back of the ear, which attaches down toward the neck. At this stage, I also added two spheres into the eye sockets in order to see how the eye shape would look based on the shape of the sockets. I also began refining the back shape and the slight indication of shoulders.
I had already been looking at my reference photos to create a realistic cat form, but at this stage I began refining with the intention of making the model resemble my specific cat. This entailed looking at all views to shape the mouth, nose, eyes, ears, etc. in relation to each other. They needed to be the correct size and shape, and also the correct distance from each other.
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Once I had the features in place, I needed to start adding fur. I began by carving guides into the model in the direction of the fur. These helped me sculpt quickly and without too much glancing back and forth with my reference pictures.
I used the clay buildup tool to sculpt rough fur shapes all over the model. I also tried to keep some sense of the stripes at this stage.
At this point, I was ready to refine the fur. The results can be seen in the final model below.
Renders from ZBrush:
Final Composites from Photoshop:
Turntable: