Create any low poly animal | Blender | 10 mins 

This video is the start of my 3D career, when I became a 3D artist, the first ever 3D project I did was this Elephant in this video. I just wanna say I am a 3D artist with a portfolio right now because of you . Thank you so much 😊

It would be really helpful if you had the little box in the corner that shows every button you press or click you make so that I can follow along easier

Y’all, this took me over 2 hours and two separate frustrating attempts BUT I finally did it! Here are 2 things I discovered along the way that would have been nice to know prior to spending 2+ hours on a low poly animal that’s supposed to take 10 min😂 1) When applying the mirror, pay attention to where your object is on the axis. I repeatedly deleted the wrong face (following him) after extruding and used a mirror only to have the inside filled in and the outsides faceless. His object placement and mine were opposite for some reason, so I essentially had to work opposite of him. Had to delete the opposite face, had to flip my reference image therefore using ctrl+3 to do side view instead of 3, etc. 2) While initially forming the body of the animal (like very beginning), MAKE SURE that you have two vertices on the top and two on the bottom per block/face. While you can create a face using any 4 vertices (no more than 4 for loop cuts) , this will end up being problematic later on when you try to add the loop cut across the side of the body. There needs to be consistency/continuity. So pretty much can’t do 3 vertices in the top and one on the bottom (that will create a point and prevent you from creating that seamless across the side of the body loop cut). Thank you for this tutorial, really helped me figure out the smaller/simpler details and functions!

For anyone confused about deleting the faces and mirroring at 3:28 : Extrude (E key) to the OPPOSITE side than what the video shows. The video shows it extruding to the left, but you should extrude to the right, deleting the faces that are near the green line. The hollow opening side needs to point to the green line (or center) so the mirror mod can flip over that green line, thus making the whole thing solid. Then, once in object mode, press CtrlA and select "rotate" (just check off location and scale in the bottom left panel on the screen). Go back into edit mode, on the right side find the wrench icon (modifiers) and select mirror.

I just have to say that you may be the best tutorial guy out there. You never assume that people watching your videos know how to do even simple tasks (shift+tab for example). At the same time you drop in this knowledge without slowing down the pace of a quick tutorial. I have much respect for that. I've been using blender for a few years now, so I knew most of the pointers you had, but I people usually loose me when they start doing the "for Dummies" version of a lesson. That wasn't the case here because you didn't drop the pace when you went back to basics. Great job, mate. I will admit that I never knew about the CTRL+click extruding. This is a great trick that will speed up my work greatly. It does one cool thing that extrude doesn't do: the edges follow the curvature instead of keeping the same rotation.

In case this is controversial in comments 4 years later, I really liked this tutorial -- it built upon a lot of super basic skills I've acquired from other tutorials, and gave me an approach to something rather than do this exactly. I ran into one pitfall early on where I somehow mirrored the wrong side, and ended up with the wrong face orientation AND a ngon. One pro tip I learned in one of Andrew's tutorials though is to make a copy and move to a new collection and hide it--- so that when I did run into this trouble I didn't have to start all over, I mirrored properly and I sorted it out. I like that I could do this tutorial and end up something unique and my own, rather than the copy cat of the teacher. Loving you're channel during quarantine! Thanks.

This is the 3D equivalent of those "Learn to Draw" books: 1. Draw a square. 2. Draw a circle. 3. Draw an elephant.

Tip of the Day: It's always better to leave calculations to the software, so when you have a very low poly model and need something rounded there's a "to sphere" function inside Blender (Ctrl+Shif+S I think), that would work perfect for the legs and other rounded parts (living things are always rounded anyway), just select a ring and use it. Also, Ctrl+V and "smooth vertex" is quite useful when you get edges too sharp.

The singular of "vertices" is "vertex". Apart from that small, yet annoying mistake, this was a very helpful tutorial. Thank you very much!

For those looking on how to add the background image in Blender 2.9, Just do Shift + A, select Image -> Background :)

Step 1. Draw yourself a rough outline. Step 2. Add small artistic detail.

Best Blender Tutorials on RU-vid. These tutorials are quick and straight to the point and literally show you hands on the tools and modifiers that you need to use. My blender modeling has improved because of these videos, thank you.

You know what? I've noticed myself returning to this video every time I want to create a creature! It's so general, and yet so effective! I'm currently making a man out of you...r tutorial! :P It looks great!

Grant: creates a low poly elephant in 10 minutes Me: found the delete basic cube in 10 minutes

Wow, this is just what I needed for a project. Great tutorial, very clear and straight to the oint for us who already knw the basics.

This tutorial is great, highly recommend it. Did everything as he instructed and my animal turned out fantastic. Thanks for the contribution.

If any one else was wondering how to extrude 3:20 just press E.

used to create the leggs after all the Rest was finished, that little tip with the leg saved me loads of time, thx

If you stop modelling at 6:36 you have a bear

Thank you very much. There should be more people like you on yt :D Have a good day!

Very nice and simple tutorial. Could you show how to rig and export model/animations please?

Good tutorial. To place the loopcut in the middle of every object you can press the right mouse button AFTER pressing CTRL+R

And then just turbosmooth and boom you get photorealistic

This video was one of my big inspirations when I was starting 3 years ago , so nostalgic to see it come up on my feed

This is awesome. I’m trying to learn how to make a Spyro level.

For those who were lost as me: 3:20 ctrl+tab to open select window between vert/edge/face 3:24 simply click "A" button

This makes me wonder why I still persevere with maya. It may be all-powerful but at any moment maya can kick you in the teeth and take all your change. Mirroring is a fine example of that.

at around 2:55, when you are extruding the edges, imho, you should keep extruding until the mesh is detailed enough, then working on pulling the vertices, this way is much faster, and makes more sense.

i got a blender ad just when i pressed this vid

I'd just like to say that as someone who's been using blender for some years now, I understand everything he's doing without a problem. It's a good video, but just not really precise enough for someone just starting out. "this video is meant for those that have a basic understanding of Blender." is in the description. I'd say that's pretty accurate.

It took me more than an hour

1 million of views, congrat Grant, but i think you deserve such amount of subscribers at least!

Thank you so much! This video helped me a lot. I'm almost done making a wolf/husky thing.

Thanks for the vid it was pretty frustrating being my first time ever using blender but I got the hang of it

My model mirrored on the wrong side. How do I fix this?

You don't have to use B, you can press C and it creates a scalable circle you can select with.

I started out modeling a lion. Ended up with a cat. Cant go wrong. Still an animal.

My note to anyone watching 2019 or later, do NOT start out with an animal with hooves. SPECIALLY double pointed ones like on a boar. They ain't easy! Or at least for a beginner

Thanks for the great tutorials!!

thank you so much, this is the first tutorial i've seen explain the issue with a mirror modifier, it's been driving me mad and caused me to abandon projects. subbed!

Guys if you don’t already know the basic hotkeys of Blender, this video is not for you. Go watch a donut making video or something and then come back, yeesh. Great tutorial by the way, it does help making basic shapes of animals easier to understand when making it low-poly like this.

i have actually never modelled anything in blender and i now need it for my indie game and this really helps thanks!

Image reference used in this video: Side view: www.myelomacrowd.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/elephant.jpg Front view: maalums.files.wordpress.com/2013/03/3250-elephant_8_2_11.jpg

Lovely tutorial, thank you. I've been going through these things, and as you say, with a basic understanding of the techniques involved, it all comes together!

Useful tutorial. I need little help regarding creating model. I add reference image, start making the side view very good way adding points and extruding but after adding the mirror im confused with the vertex and the full model get disturb. And the model look odd. What precaution or points i have to take in mind when go to front view and match the reference image. Is there any video im really confused plz help.

This tutorial is faster paced than a lot of other tutorials, which is good if you're like me and already know some things about blender, but want to learn how to quickly model an animal while avoiding the more basic explanations. Although I will agree that the part after 7:20 goes much too fast, and I would have liked to know more of what was going on.

This is not for begginers !

Excellent content. I actually like how helpful this is. What's great is also that this guy prompts us to think for ourselves and use what we are learning. Props.

The ears are really difficult, damn.

I was listning to spotify while watching this and africa - Toto came on during a timelapse.... my heart melted (just a heads up listning to spotify on a reduced volume while watching gabbit works perfectly)

I have tried just about everything and I can't get the mirror to work

This video was great, definitely not something to start off with though. I came here off of your monster and man on the street video series and I understood everything perfectly (It was slightly difficult to find stuff as blender has moved it around). You're really good at making these, thank you and keep it up.

Great video Grant! Nice and clear!

My coding is on point but my drawing skills.... Even my stick figures look like scribbles. This taught me to use reference images for low poly images and now I can create a whole island of sickly looking creatures! lol

For low poly, is it okay to have triangles in the model?

I'm so glad my bear-walrus looks exactly like yours!

not for beginners. it was fine at firs for me but when he started speeding up i didn't get it. I started making an elephant but ended up making a prehistoric animal that looks like an elephant.

At 3:33, you don't delete the faces you have selected, you delete the faces you just extruded from. Otherwise you get the inverse of what you want. He skips this for some reason. I did it by selecting all the "inside" faces with shift-click and then hitting X -> Faces.

jesus this is frustrating

IMHO, adding the Mirror modifier (time: 3:55) will NOT yield the result seen a second later. The tutorial is missing a couple of steps: 1) The extruded object must be moved to the right of the Y-axis (green line): Initially, the plane and its faces are on the Y-axis, and are extruded in the " -X" direction (opposite the direction of the red arrow). The result is an extrusion to the LEFT of the Y-axis (green line). However, the video shows the object being to the RIGHT of the Y-axis. Consequently, if the object is not MOVED to the right of the Y-axis, adding the Mirror modifier will result in a back-to-back shape, not the result presented at time = 3:55 - 3:58. 2) The face normals are wrong, they need to be recalculated in order to obtain the image at time = 3:34 (this is a more advanced topic). While this won't pose a problem with the Mirror modifier, it will create ugly artifacts on the model's surface.

Now I know my A-B-Gs...

Thank you so much! First time trying using blender and your tutorial was easy to understand and made it an easy process, helped me understand how to use blender and will help with future projects i mess with in blender... Your awesome!

4:43 wtf just happened

Just moved from Maya to blender, saw a triangle, now I'm spooked...

I made a lion i.imgur.com/Sv2AWxx.png Thanks for the tutorial!

This is amazing! Very helpful, mainly because it gives me a starting reference, but more importantly a workflow. Thank you!

I lost you when you said Ctrl click.......done giving up. not specific enough

From a cube to elephant in 10 minutes, well done!

1.30 min in and im lost. You should really try to explain what you do, like "rotate it at the y"... well damn how do i freaking rotate? dont skip small steps, youre making it more confusing than helpfull

This process is good but not without it's flaws. I find the best way to be using a mirror modifier after creating the outline of the upper part of the animal with just edges and then extruding to make it the shape in other views a better way.

pokemon

The thing with this is that you can use it to make high-poly creatures, as well. I'm using it to make a cat for my game. Some subdivision modifying and hard edges, and you've got a proper realistic animal, just the way anyone would do it.

5:17 Worst voice crack ever? Who knows....

Rotating, moving and scaling is a lot easier than selecting the individual vertices.

You got a like and sub from me, sir! c: Because it's not just a ''creat an animal'' tutorial, but a Blender basics tutorial for beginners too, you explained things good and simple :)

Super cool, mate! Will try that out, everything was explained well and it was chill to watch, thumbs up!

Quite a challenge when modeling something with legs that aren't directly under such as a frog but never the less a great tutorial!

This is the first tutorial that's actually helped me render! Thank you!

It helped a lot, please make a tutorial for a basic low poly human, that would be very helpful

I love this guy's tutorials, btw 5:19

Yesterday I made a giraffe in just an hour now I’m just gonna rig it and program the animations all day long cuz it’s really fun to do

youre an amazing human giving this away for free

Elephant in the room, I see what you did there! :D

Very helpful tutorial, I'm just coming back to blender and I really appreciate the low poly ideas.

I expected this to be hard but it’s actually easy!

Watching blender tutorials is very motivational

Real fun to do. I follow the video sequence as it is shown on your website so i did not need to see the shortcuts on your screen because you already showed them in your previous lessons. But i can understand that if you did not see those earlier videos it is hard to follow without the on screen commands.

This is unreal. I found the exact same side view image on google and when I pressed 3, it looked just like your video. I wasn't sure which was which for a second there.

to make it high poly just add a subsurface modifier

I have been looking for this for soo long thank you soo much finally i can start making my own 3d models from mirroring pictures

So helpful, wish I had watched this tutorial first , months ago. Brilliant tutorial thanks.

Personally the mirroring step near 4:00 or so did not work well for me. Blender would mirror the object to the other side. I discovered 2 methods of fixing this issue. Method 1:Line up your object until the vertices are perfectly matched. (Though this is very complicated and you will most likely get this wrong, therefore resort to Method 2.) Method 2: Go into Edit mode by pressing Tab then press Ctrl+Tab, and select vertex. Press "1" in order to face your animal or simply rotate. Press Z for wireframe mode, Then press B for box select and select the middle (or the left in this case) of the vertices. (This should select all of them) Now press Shift+S and click "Cursor To Selected." Now exit Edit Mode by pressing Tab once again. And finally, press Ctrl+Alt+Shift+C and press Origin To 3D Cursor.

This was so helpful!! P.S. did anyone else notice the horrifying picture of the snake eating the elephant on his google image search? Cannot unsee.

Very good!

Another tip you guys could do is start messing around with the subdivision surface modifier, this will help if you are looking for a bit more realistic looking elephant.

I lost it when the "artistic" part began. Great tuto tho

3D rotoscoping! awesome :)

For all Americans and HP Users alike, it is Shift-A, not Control-A. I spent thirty minutes figuring that out.

1. It took you more then 10 minutes 2. You could use the skin modifier at optimize it... way easier

Great video. It would be awesome if you did one on texturing too.