Tutorial building the dragon model part 10

Press space and add armature. You will want to turn on x-ray and x-axis mirror.

Position the armature within model, rotating and scaling if needed.

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Select the armature and in edit mode, extrude armature to fit the body

When you are finished, select the model and apply mirror modifier.

In object mode, select the model and then shift+click the armature. Press Ctrl+p and select parent to armature. You will want to create from bone heat.

Test the model out by switching into pose mode. Return to original poses with ctrl+z after each test. If no further changes need to be made, switch to the animation mode.

Turn on automatic keyframe insertion or insert keyframes after each move with I, and use the correct option for the type of movement, such as rot if a bone was rotated.

Keyframes are inserted each time you rotate a bone on the armature. Create an animation by moving the bones. After each frame, move forward by using the arrows or typing in the frame you want to move to.

Once the animation is finished, it can be rendered and played back.

In object mode, you can press space and add lights if scene too dark.

Tutorial building the dragon model part 9

Switch one side into UV/image editor and leave other side to display the model.

Begin cutting  up model by selecting edges and using ctrl+e to mark seam.

Seams marked in yellow.

Continue marking seam until model is split into pieces. You do not need to create a seam down middle of model when using mirror modifier.

Select the whole model by pressing a and then u to unwrap. Make modifications to segments if needed. Rearrange, resize pieces as needed. Move pieces that are too close together.

Click on the UVs at bottom and select scripts then save UV face layout. Select size and save location

Open up the file in an image editor program such as photoshop and draw in texture.

When finished with the texture, select Image, open and then open the image file.

Select faces (such as skin of wings) and press f9. Select texture face to enable double sided. Do for each needed face such as the skin of the wings.

Once texture is done, apply the subsurf modifier and make modifications if needed.

Change back into object mode

Tutorial building the dragon model part 8

Fill in the skin of the wings.

Select the faces on the back where the sadle will be, extrude and move the vertices to shape. Further extrude the faces if needed to form the shape.

Fill in any other decorations.

Tutorial building the dragon model part 7

You will add the fingers of the wings by selecting the faces on the wings and extruding them. Keep in mind where the wings will bend.

Select 4x4 faces where legs will be, loop cutting if necessary and delete the faces. Shape the opening into a circle.

Draw in a layer of faces until you reach the bottom where you draw in  two triangle shaped faces

Extrude the circle into the shape of a leg, resizing and rotate to the correct shape.

Select faces for the toes and extrude them.

Tutorial building the dragon model part 6

Begin working on shaping body by selecting faces where neck ends and extrude, resize and rotate them to shape the body. At this point, do not add wings. The wings will be added at a later time.

When dealing with objects that come to a point, select the vertices that you want to merge, hit w and then merge at the center.

Where wings will go, select 4x2 faces and delete them.

It make be necessary to loop cut by hitting k and selecting loop cut.

Arange the edges into a circle, select the edges and extrude into the basic shape of the wings.

Tutorial building the dragon model part 5

You will select faces where the eyes shall go and delete them. Move the points into the shape of the eye.

You will select the edges of the eye socked. An easy way to do this is to hold down alt while clicking.
You can extrude the edges and scale them to form an eye. Fill in any spaces.

You will also do the same thing for the nose by selecting the face where it will be, deleting it and extuding it into the shape of the nose.

Tutorial building the dragon model part 4

Filling in a face using f.

Continue extruding vertices and filling into the mouth until the whole mouth has been filled in.

It might be necessary to open the mouth to fill in all the faces of the mouth.

It is important to have the whole mouth filled in so that the inside of the model is not visible when the mouth of the model is opened.