Half-Life Alyx Antlion Grub (completed)

[mblackwell1002]

Since I first played Half-Life Alyx, I was pretty blown away by the antlion grub canister that is used as a health kit in the game. It’s such a cool step up from what the HL2 did for health, and a seriously cool and unique prop. I decided that I wanted to make one after my second play through of the game sometime last month:

Here’s how the finished product looked, and an instagram link to more pictures:
instagram

Let me know what y’all think!

 

[Lieutenant Jaku]

Woah that's amazing!!! Awesome work.

 

[RandomRanger]

That's awesome!

 

[PlanetAlexander]

Yo no way! That's amazing (and adorable). Where'd you get the 3D models from/how'd you make them? I have been planning one and started creating some HD files from the game rip to resin print (since it was too delicate for FDM).

 

[mblackwell1002]

Yo no way! That's amazing (and adorable). Where'd you get the 3D models from/how'd you make them? I have been planning one and started creating some HD files from the game rip to resin print (since it was too delicate for FDM).

Thanks! I made the files from scratch in blender using references from the game. I also did a resin print for that level of detail.

Do share yours! That sounds super exciting!

 

[PlanetAlexander]

I started making mine from scratch too, but then found a game rip I was gonna use for scale reference and thought... heck, why not just detail that instead?

The plan was also to make the grub from upholstery foam skinned with latex, add some mechanics inside to make it wiggle and have a glowing butt.

But enough about my ideas! How did you go about sculpting and painting Gary?

 

[mblackwell1002]

I started making mine from scratch too, but then found a game rip I was gonna use for scale reference and thought... heck, why not just detail that instead?
View attachment 316190View attachment 316191View attachment 316192

The plan was also to make the grub from upholstery foam skinned with latex, add some mechanics inside to make it wiggle and have a glowing butt.

But enough about my ideas! How did you go about sculpting and painting Gary?

Ahh, i like your approach. I couldn't find game assets for the life of my so I did my best with reference pictures. The final result isn't the most accurate thing in the world.

Sculpting gary was interesting...I hadn't done any sculpting before, so i had a bit of learning to do.
I don't have many in-progress pictures, but I do have these:

I started out with a low poly worm that was the general shape, then i used a line constraint in blender so that it would become curved along a path in 3D, then I did subdivides and just worked from low detail to high detail. If I'm honest, I'm not one to speak very eloquently on the topic, because I don't really know what I'm doing haha!

This is a (just about) finished render.

As far as the paint job is concerned, I used an airbrush and a few other common techniques. Lots of washes, lol. The first attempt was my test piece:

he looked kind of flat, so I 3D printed another and painted it. The second attempt was a complete and utter failure, and I hope the pictures of it never see the light of day haha, but the third attempt is what you see in the end result.

If you can add mechanics inside yours, I will be so impressed! That sounds really really neat!