Southern White African Rhino Low-poly 3D model

The Southern White African Rhino is a 3D model made in Blender 2.79 that forms part of a series of African Savannah inhabitants. This product has a wide variety of applications as it includes realtime and high resolution models. The model is both rigged and animated using Deer Rigger, which is a modified version of Rigify for Quadrupeds. The standard Rigify that ships with Blender is the only plugin used.

The product consists of,

1. 4k Color, Mask and Normal Textures
2. Non-overlapping UV's
3. Realtime Model made-up of 1186 Faces
4. High Resolution Sculpt model
5. Rig
6. Active Modifier stack
7. Animated walk cycle
8. Cycles Material Node Network

The Southern White African Rhino product consists of several files,

1. rhino_realTime.blend : A realtime, low poly version of the rhino consisting of approximately 2k polys and non-overlapping UV's.

2. rhino_Sculpt.blend : High resolution sculpted rhino consisting of approximately 950k polys.

3. rhino_walk.blend : Rigged and animated rhino, with an active modifier stack that's ready to render for Cycles.

4. rhino_walk-SB-HR.blend : Same as walk but rhino has dynamic secondary animation in Soft Body Modifier applied to a high res model for rendering.

5. rhinoPose.blend : Poses used for product renderings.

6. rhinoColor4k.png : Color channel texture map in 4K.

7. rhinoSSSMask4k.png : SSS channel Mask in 4K.

8. hornMask4k.png : Mask for isolating horns in 4K.

9. rhinoNormal4k.png : Normal Map baked from high resolution sculpt in 4K.

10. rhino.obj : 3D mesh for compatibility with other software.

The realtime model is lite enough to be used in games and apps. Whereas the same model can be subdivided to produce a high resolution model that can be used for cinematic close-up to wide shots, without having to rely on a Normal map alone to reproduce the model's details.

The scene is setup such that all animation is performed on the realtime model, this information can then be propagated to the high resolution model for rendering. The setup of the modifier stack handles much of this task.

The animation file (rhino_walk.blend) consists of a particular setup with both realtime and high resolution meshes linked within the same scene. Regardless of the final output be that, realtime applications to high quality cinema; interaction, editing, animation and rendering is always performed on the realtime model.

The realtime model is setup to subdivide (through the Subdivision surface Modifier) at rendertime. Increasing subdivisions here will allow the realtime model to more closely match the look of the sculpted model.Vertices generated through subdivision will match surface points of the high resolution, sculpted model through the Shrinkwrap Modifier.

Deformation is then performed on the model through the Armature modifier.

Dynamic, secondary animation can be baked into the model with the Soft Body modifier. rhino_walk-SB-HR.blend is setup for dynamic, secondary animation on a high res model, baking a simulation is all that is needed.