A dolphin was always going to act as the centrepiece of the image. And because of the fact that it was going to be so important... it decided to give me the greatest amount of agro. Much like Mr Clam, the finished product here is around the 6-7th version. Even now, I might go back and start work on Version VIII at some point...
And so I sat down with a few sketches and pictures of dolphins, as I attempted to create one from a sphere. The number of segments was bumped up to around 70, as there'd be a lot of editing going on; and I didn't want a lack of vertices making things difficult! Pulling the sphere out into this submarine-like shape was a safe start. Save. Handy starting point.
A little bit of pulling here and there to create more a fish shape. In particular, the tail was worked on. (The snout was to be built separately. I tried it from the sphere, and it just made things really, really messy.)
As the head of the dolphin was pulled from the sphere shape, a pair of eyes were added to the body. Though not a dolphin... the body is at least fishy. Another good place to save.
Fins were then added. The dorsal fin by far the easier to implement. After a failed attempt or 2 with a flattened sphere; it was several times easier to create a fun shape with the line tool and extrude it. (Sometimes, the simpler methods are the most effective...)
The pectoral fins (I'm sure those are the ones...) are sneaky clones of the dorsal fin. Hey, I already made a fin... why make 2 more when I can just clone that one?
Mr dolphin was now coming along quite nicely. Looks a little bit like a shark though...Unfortunately, a shark wasn't much of a viable option. This image was meant to represent June. Summer, happiness, and fun times... dolphins represent it beautifully. Sharks aren't exactly the personification of 'fun' are they? (Aside from when you're an evil Overlord and chuck your enemies into a pool of them. Then it's just a really good giggle!) 
The tail fin was then added. Again, these were made from clones of the dorsal fin, and edited to fit.
Whilst editing... it became clear that the dolphin would look best from a side-profile shot, like the image above. For this to be viable, the dolphin's body had to be arced around slightly, so more of it faced the camera. Luckily, the 'Bones' tool was here to save the day!
After all this, it was time to work on the worst bit... the snout. It was started off in a similar style to the crow from September's image. A single cone formed the starting point.
From here, its vertices were edited and pulled about until it looked less like a cone and more like a dolphin's snout. To get rid of the annoying mess of rounded vertices at the end of the snout (3DS Max is rubbish with rounded edges...) I resorted to creating a rounded block and ProBoolean'ing it out of the end, and then filling the gap with a sphere. The lower snout was simply a smaller clone of the upper one (Rotated, of course).
Now dolphins are perceived to be very happy creatures (That's because their snout makes them look like they're smiling! For all we know, they might be miserable inside...). Either way, it was time to add a little smile to the creature. A careful bit of point rotation made this possible.
The base of the snout was then fitted with another sphere, to help even out the transition between the snout and the body. Previously, the snout looked like it had literally been stuck on the end of the body with superglue. This little 'filler' slightly helped to mould the 2 together. (or just look like superglue that had leaked out of the sides...). Either way, this was the finished article
And there it is! Luckily, it didn't really need any texturing. The skin was the right colour and reflected the light sufficiently. Any further textures added to it actually ruined the image more than it helped it. So there it is... Mr Dolphin with Dolphin Junior swimming beside it. Aww... doesn't it just make you want to throw up?
The tail fin was then added. Again, these were made from clones of the dorsal fin, and edited to fit.
Whilst editing... it became clear that the dolphin would look best from a side-profile shot, like the image above. For this to be viable, the dolphin's body had to be arced around slightly, so more of it faced the camera. Luckily, the 'Bones' tool was here to save the day!
After all this, it was time to work on the worst bit... the snout. It was started off in a similar style to the crow from September's image. A single cone formed the starting point.
From here, its vertices were edited and pulled about until it looked less like a cone and more like a dolphin's snout. To get rid of the annoying mess of rounded vertices at the end of the snout (3DS Max is rubbish with rounded edges...) I resorted to creating a rounded block and ProBoolean'ing it out of the end, and then filling the gap with a sphere. The lower snout was simply a smaller clone of the upper one (Rotated, of course).
Now dolphins are perceived to be very happy creatures (That's because their snout makes them look like they're smiling! For all we know, they might be miserable inside...). Either way, it was time to add a little smile to the creature. A careful bit of point rotation made this possible.
The base of the snout was then fitted with another sphere, to help even out the transition between the snout and the body. Previously, the snout looked like it had literally been stuck on the end of the body with superglue. This little 'filler' slightly helped to mould the 2 together. (or just look like superglue that had leaked out of the sides...). Either way, this was the finished article
And there it is! Luckily, it didn't really need any texturing. The skin was the right colour and reflected the light sufficiently. Any further textures added to it actually ruined the image more than it helped it. So there it is... Mr Dolphin with Dolphin Junior swimming beside it. Aww... doesn't it just make you want to throw up?The addition of these 2 then marked the end of the heavy 3D work. All that was left was the polish the image and really make it look awesome. Nearly there...
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