container redux [OCT 2026 – Week 2]

Progress is progress. Continuing to have fun with different design iterations of the container I showed off last week. I also had a sketch of a more outlandish design seen here:

And started modeling it in hopes to 3D print it alongside the other container unit.

Some quick renders to get a feel of the first unit. Want to see how far I can go but also trying to feel what looks right, especially after the print. Here you can see straps coming off the top, making for a cool backpack keychain/charm possibly…

paintCube [SEP – Week 4]

So I lied. I promised to show some work for HOPr, but I took a break from the splatPak project as I was ideating/iterating on the design and story each day, I started to feel that it got boring and I wanted to take a stab at other ideas I had and pivoted to paintCube. This is basically the containers I built for the airpod case project but version 2.0 and not entirely for the Air Pods, but something nice to put on my desk. This may look very similar to the past project design but I just had a interest to do a do-over in this and that’s where there’s a lot of fun too. To try a old design again with newly gained skills.

You might have seen this sketch I had made earlier for my previous project

Based on this sketch, this has been the design so far:

This was a lot of fun to whip up in a couple days, I’m going to continue with this and thinking of adding a cage for it too

TLR-6 Weapon Light [SEP Week 3]

Some ZBrush sculpting practice to get back into it, needs cleaning up but this was my stab at the basic build of this object. Based on the weapon light that Cane sculpts in his ZBrush course. Had to dig for references, this is the actual object: https://www.streamlight.com/products/detail/tlr-6. Next week will be publishing some images on my paint bucket prop HOPr.

Getting back to it… [SEP – 2026]

It’s been a while, had a lot of things happen, moved to a new city for my first 3D modeling job, developing my portfolio and just getting things in order all around! There’s been so many ideas I’ve accumulated and have been building slowly. Here is a preview of a project I am aiming to publish soon:

I have been in ideation purgatory with this, but this started out as a prop project and evolved into a fully character design project based on a story. Can you guess which universe this character is from?

This is all raw work right now, nothing cleaned up as you can see but am now working on finalizing designs and finally moving to building in 3d…

Patlite Siren – Week 4 [MAY 25]

Using the collected reference images I found on Pinterest, I started my model which was a Japanese LED siren of the Patlite corporation, spending a couple hours everyday was able to get most of the model complete. If I go further with this model, I would include several more details such as the LED internals and back wall. And finalize the model in Keyshot.

The reference image (credit to Daniel Everett):

My model:

Week 3 [MAY 25]

Throughout the week I continued to build the radio blockout with Cane’s hard-surface design course (check out his course here!) and was able to reblock the radio BBS-01 he provided in his starter files.

After this practice, I brainstormed ways to continue improvement and practice of my hard-surface skills using ZBrush, I collected 10+ mechanical reference images and will continue practicing by building these out to the best of my ability. Diverse design pieces are always good as they push different your limit in building through various curves, surfaces and complexities the shape can have. It’s a fun puzzle even with simple objects in how you approach replicating it based on what tool you have in hand.

Left side my iteration, right side Cane’s reference radio blockout

I also concentrated on the rear view of the Batter Hammer stun baton design, built a sketch ready for coloring.

Something about the simple orange-white color palette reminds me of tic-tacs…

I started ZBrushing this design in a quick 1.5 hour session, needs a lot more work… pretty rough…

But not sure if I should continue pursuing this project or take a breather and go for a new project now entirely.

Week 2 [MAY 25]

This week I continued practicing in ZBrush, creating my own blockout version of the radio reference blockout from Cane’s Hard-Surface design class.

left side my blockout in progress, right Cane’s radio blockout

Also continuing with the design of the Batter Hammer baton, more specifically the rear view. There was more thought into it because of higher user interaction on this side, keeping scale/size and usability as well. How will the user hold this? How will they operate this?

Aiming to finalize this and then proceed to building this in a 3d software.

Week 1 [MAY 25]

Had a bit of a break, but this week I was able to get back in to the groove of things. I continued looking into the Batter Hammer design (name to be changed…) and made some ideation sketches from the previous blockout I had made.

There are still problems I see with the design, biggest of all how the core functionality works as its a futuristic weapon design that is similar to a stun baton and uses energy projectiles.

I started sculpting in ZBrush, but decided to hold off until the design is further fleshed out.

I did continue practicing hard-surface sculpting and will continue to do so.

Week 2 [FEB25]

This week I spent time getting into diving into different topics/projects I hope to work on.

One such project, I call the Lab, which will be a 3D representation of my design studio and fictional hyperbolic time chamber. I wanted to use Unreal Engine 5 to make it a explorable environment and started by testing how I can import objects into this software. I took my MGSV container model from Fusion 360 and was able to successfully import it, but I quickly realized how you import the model is important. My model had multiple bodies, textures and shaders that came from the Fusion 360 software. After multiple runs, I simplified the model essentially by combining as many bodies as I could. Good to know for the future!

Here are three models stacked in the UE5 level:

One thing I wanted to add was a mini-remote facility on the edge of the Lab, I got the idea one day during a roadtrip with family, I would see tiny facilities housed around by a metal fence, a small driveway for 1-2 vehicles, patch of grass, tiny trees and a small building that looks like a design team would go to everyday to do their work. I made a tiny sketch of what it could like if I gradually get to building the Lab:

My little brother lost a piece from his Gundam Providence MG model kit, tasked me to model and 3d print it, the part ‘J10’ was modelled in Fusion 360 and made the slice run in Chitubox, tonight I will be printing it with him, hopefully they come out well!!

I started sketching at a coffee shop, hope to get back to the groove of things and to build a habit now as I grow my skillset.

Here’s also a quick hour run in Photoshop, trying to re-learn how I used to blend paints, my current brush set is not really ideal though… might revert back to default brush pack…