On Blendernation they had a post about this Japanese Blender artist who created a Hatsune Miku rigged mesh.  This is a very popular video game character from the song creation software Vocaloid 2.  I downloaded the mesh today and started playing with it.  I have a lot to learn from this mesh in terms of good rigging techniques.  I always wanted to check it out to have a reference model of a female character in blender.  I’ve always had problems drawing female characters that actually had female bodies.  I’m hoping with this mesh that I can do a better job with the females in “I’m Not Mad”.  Here are two renders I did messing around.

Trying to do the “Victory V” here.  Unfortunately, the rig didn’t let me split the fingers apart.  Weird since it’s pretty much a stock anime/manga pose.

I know Otaku love them some fan service so I checked if the obligatory panties had been modeled.

The answer is a pathetic “yes”.

The modeler did a very, very good job with the mesh and rig.  The toon shading was also perfect.  It looks like a drawn anime character.  I’d suggest working on the rig to allow the fingers to do a V.  Also, he should add the other joints in the finger.  And, work needs to be done on the skirt.  If you lift the leg to kick, it comes out through the skirt instead of the skirt moving out of the way as it would do in real life.

I used Blender to create INM and I came across this article about new user interface changes to the program.  Looks like most of the interface will just be getting a cosmetic overhaul, but they are trying to change things to make them more like the universal standards.  I’m not sure if they’ll be keeping the old keybindings if people prefer them.  If not, it may be a shaky week or two while I get used to it, but I’ve been building up the archive and it shouldn’t mess with things too much, if at all.