BabyLuigiOnFire's Chicken Scratch

[Xiahou Ba]

Okay so the third-in-command isn't the only one who's allowed to have a pretty render and a history of all renders I ever made. Here's someone less stupid than Ray Trace, Redshift! He usually acts as the "straight" person to keep Ray Trace in check, and for a good reason: he's more powerful than Ray Trace is being the Lieutenant Commander of the Protectors. While Ray Trace commands people to respect him, Redshift is far more humble than he is and respects people. While Ray Trace is likes attention, Redshift is more reserved.

Anyway, I had too much fun rendering Ray Trace and using what I knew to churn out better and better renders, so I really want to render the rest of the main cast of the Protectors. Wanted to make Redshift first because he's really a sweetheart, but when I first conceived him, he wasn't really that sweet.

Recolor Roots Similar To Luigi! Except Red...

September ‎1, ‎2016 was when I made a recolor for a Dark Light in Super Smash Bros. Brawl (this was done entirely with Spore Galactic Adventures, and that's all he existed as. Back then, he didn't even have a name. He literally was supposed to be a recolor of Dark Light. And this facial expression would become the basis of his personality, being serious, committed, loyal, and just overall has a lot of integrity to boot.

He Got Luigified A Bit And His Armor Got Refined.

Eventually, Super Smash Bros. for Wii U came around which prompted me to return him and the other two recolors, Blue and White. This was made in April ‎13, ‎2017. His pose is a little stiff because like Ray Trace, I intended to crop only the face portion of him for use as a battle portrait. The prior render and this render as well as earlier depictions of him look like he's hot headed and ready to twist your arm off or beat you up in a battle. Of course, the texture work is very very limited and bad, using only solid colors and his armor then got a much needed facelift thanks to Substance Painter...but not an actual facelift with an original modeled face until later.

When We Mean "Refined", We Actually Do Mean Lots of Wear and Tear

Here I actually posed his body and I intended to make him look serious and threatening, walking towards you with his swords out, facial expression focused and meaning business. The first picture was rendered in 3ds Max's mental ray in July ‎3, ‎2017 while the latter got the Substance Painter treatment for textures and redone, rendered in November ‎16, ‎2017. Textures mean a whole bunch, they can bring characters to life easily, and with a program generating proper maps like Painter does, you can truly make good looking things with little input, I strongly recommend using as it helps speed up work flow compared to relying on other image programs to get your textures.

Anyway, around this point, I actually drew the Protectors, but I figured, they shouldn't be recolors of Dark Light indefinitely, they're extremely hard to distinguish without any color. While Ray Trace did get a new outfit, Redshift and the others went straight to redesign territory, without that awkward immediate stage so I did this.

Taller, more elegant, and getting fat.

This was rendered in 3ds Max in ‎April ‎27, ‎2018 for use in Super Smash Bros. for Wii U to replace the earlier Redshift, the next was rendered in Source Filmmaker, May ‎14, ‎2019. He uses the same pose as the prior Redshifts, the intimidating walk but he pretty much gets an overhaul to his design. His head and hair is heavily edited from Baby Luigi's, the old armor parts persisted like the rest of the Protectors, his eyes are distinctly round from the others as well as getting thicker eyebrows, and his body was newly modeled from my recently acquired modeling skill. I remember liking this render back then but now, his face is too pale (lack of subsurface scattering is the reason), the pose is a bit too stiff (the legs especially) and the camera should perhaps be a little bit more dynamic. The SFM Redshift was him being less intimidating, I toned down that serious attitude by a lot; he's still a no-nonsense character but he's gotten very soft and gentle over the years.

A Neat Wardrobe Change And A Neat Program Change

The first image was rendered in ‎March ‎7, ‎2020, the second in February ‎29, ‎2020. Like Ray Trace, I was increasingly unsatisfied with the Redshift model so I just redone it (the coat like others lacks detail, and it doesn't have the little frill thing from the coat I inspired from came from as well as the textures needing more work, the boots need more detail) and I eventually fully modeled his head, which is still in use today. Of course, the head may change in the future, the ears still lack the necessary ridges and that rings true for the other Protectors as well. These were two early Marmoset Toolbag renders, as I was still gawking at how much I love the output, but these could definitely use improvement. The lighting is sunsetty for some reason, the poly count lets you see jaggies, and the texture resolution is too low, and the running Redshift's lighting on his body is too dark. Still don't hate how the poses look today, however. Which leads into the next one...

Killing Peter Griffin and Homer Simpson in a Nintendo Game Changed Everything

Smash is always the catalyst for these renders huh? Well I render things when I have a drive, in ‎December ‎14, ‎2020 that is, and this is one of them where I'm required to render a high res picture to replace appropriate portraits with. This is the first time I've tried out 4k textures and upping the polycount up in a program, and rendering Redshift once again to be this super serious guy, because he's in a combat environment of course! I'm still quite satisfied with how he looks currently, maybe his blades can glow a bit more but I really wouldn't change much about this. In fact, this render gave me inspiration to render the other Protectors in a similar quality and then, they came too.

By the way, I did make a trunks variant of Redshift but because Smash Ultimate doesn't have any space, I can't put him in. I also didn't render him yet, but maybe some point in the distant future, when more characters are made and everyone gets a trunks outfit.

 

[Xiahou Ba]

Time to talk about my third render! This is focused on Ultra Violet, Vi for short, the surly and disagreeable member of the Protectors. While he has loyalties to the Commander, he doesn't really enjoy listening to other Protectors who tell him what to do. While he is sneering and cynical for most of the time as well as having a befuddled backstory (this explains why he's considerably more grungy in appearance than the other Protectors), he does have a heart of gold and he's the type of guy who'd find an abandoned animal on the street and nurse it back to full health.

In fact I made two renders for him this time. I did the first one last night, but I wanted to make another render where he is less proactive, less smug, and more standing there to be in line with the first two cast members, so here you go.

Oh, fun fact about Ultra Violet's renders: his textures use so much detail that his file size is considerably larger than the others, and I can't upload him here in his original size, so here are shrunk down variants instead.

Just like Ray Trace, he was created later than Redshift, Kontrast, and Bluminescence are. So he has less renders than they do, but that doesn't mean I didn't take a crack at rendering him as a Dark Light recolor.

Name's Ultra Violet. But don't worry about learning it, 'cause I ain't sticking around long.

This was the first time I ever rendered Ultra Violet, in ‎July ‎5, ‎2017 and November ‎16, ‎2017 respectively. Because Nick from Left 4 Dead 2 was a direct inspiration for him, his personality pretty much mirrors him, which explains why he's snide, cynical, and distrustful of anyone else, and the renders mirror this with his rather disgusted facial expression. He uses simple purple colors, both the reddish purple and a bluer purple, though the reddish purple would become his primary color scheme. Oh, also, because he's a Dark Light recolor, his features are identical but more unique things to his design won't come until his redesign. The second image is after I installed Substance Painter and modified the textures I made for the rest of the Protectors. Fun fact about the Protectors: their little armor they currently wear nactually has different types of wear and tear rather than being pure recolors, and it's dependent on their personality. In order to render them properly, you need their own map files rather than use another Protector's. For Ultra Violet here, he has a more corrosive-looking armor, as his element is poison and it reflects his surly personality.

I normally go solo-but under the circumstances, I'm thinkin' we stick together.

Shortly after he established as a main character of the Protectors, he and everyone else received redesigns. For his design, I decided to go with simple perpendicular slits for eyes and eyebrows and I think it communicates his personality very well. Hence he needed a remodel. The left image is rendered in May ‎18, ‎2018 in 3ds Max, and he was the last Protector to get a redesign. One thing that I changed in his transition to the more recent render on the right, rendered in ‎May ‎16, ‎2019 (nearly a year later wow), is his hair color: it used to be brown but I changed it to black to better match Nick. Anyway, his suit is directly inspired from Nick, and that's why his clothes uses a lighter lavender purple color scheme than a darker, more saturated purple, though his helmet retains the reddish purple color scheme he got going on. In addition, his cape and his swords received tweaks to their design to distinguish him from the others: Ultra Violet's sword is more hooked and his cape is pointier, his bracelets are thinner than the others, and his wings point more down compared to the others where their wings are more parallel to the floor. I also included rings to his fingers because Nick wore them.

I think the little guy's onto something. Let's give it a shot.

Ultra Violet hasn't had much since I made his render though that doesn't mean he's been completely neglected, as I've done plenty of Gmod screenshots with him and I've drawn him with the others, sometimes he, Kontrast, and Bluminescence star in their own little misadventures as the bottom three Protectors. Soon, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate came around which led me to make a render of him specifically for the game. He got a revamp and a remodel meanwhile and received a major upgrade in his textures, but changing the rendering program to Toolbag heavily improved his presentation and gave him the appropriate grungy look I was looking for, especially in his face which is considerably more worn down than the others. His face is fully modeled, edited from a template I use for the Protectors (originated with Dark Light or Redshift I believe) which would persist into Kontrast and Bluminescence. His grunge, despite being brittle and worn down, I feel is very pleasing to look at when done correctly, and sometimes I just take my time staring at his detail in the program itself. Here in this render, I didn't upper count the poly in some of his pieces which I now regularly do in 3ds Max before I export them for rendering in Toolbag, and it heavily helps improve the presentation.

 

[Night King]

This is actually really cool! I love seeing how the designs for the Protectors changed.

 

[Xiahou Ba]

Next up is Bluminescence in his rotund glory! Not only is he super cute, but he's extremely friendly and outgoing to boot, a stark contrast to Ultra Violet and...err Kontrast. While he is formally called Corporal Bluminescence, he is completely fine with anyone casually calling him "Blue". He isn't the best fighter of the group, but who needs fighting when you can make friends instead?

Fun fact about him regarding him in the boards, he's @Magolor04726 's favorite Protector. Who doesn't like his lovely personality?

This is the time I ever rendered him with a closed mouth as I wanted more variety in the facial expressions he makes and the relax tool of vertices really helps making smiles look better. He can't be energetic and cheery all the time, can he?

One Of The Original Four

Bluminescence was one of the original four Protectors: Dark Light, Redshift, him, and Kontrast, made in that order precisely. Back then, as with them, he didn't have a name but he served to be a blue variant of Dark Light. I made unique renders for all the recolors because I wanted them to have a bit more flair than just recolors, and it was extremely easy to recolor in Spore Galactic Adventures anyhow. This pic was made in September ‎1, ‎2016, it was a simple bust render of Baby Luigi in that armor because at the time, I was focused on making the battle portrait which was more important to me than say the character select one as I see it more. This facial expression proved to be the groundwork of his personality later on, and today he still likes opening his mouth to express happiness and joy like Mario characters do. It's a complete opposite perception to being blue is, isn't it?

Even Happier With More Tools

Bluminescence then followed the same story as Redshift: the armor got fully modeled that would later prove to be Dark Light's regular model, and thus the pose was made in ‎March ‎31, ‎2017. Fun fact about this iteration: this was actually made before Redshift, and Bluminescence was put in the game before he was, mostly because he was supposed to have the French dub of Nick's voice from Left 4 Dead 2, as French is more familiar to me than Spanish. At the time, it still felt Redshift was more of a second-in-command than he was; in fact, one of my earliest depictions of him showed him to be some rival of Dark Light; Dark Light's water weakness came from dreams and he was the color blue, fitting for a water type. However, this sort of trait didn't stick around, and what we got instead was Ray Trace being made and put over him because I decided that Ray Trace was more of a fitting third-in-command than he was in terms of combat prowess, but that doesn't mean Bluminescence doesn't pull his weight around...figuratively speaking of course.

A Better Rendering, Texture, And Pose System Makes A Guy Happy!

Cue ‎July ‎3, ‎2017, and I've upgraded this variant of Bluminescence by simply using a better rendering output than the base 3ds Max one, which I believe was called mental ray (it's currently depreciated). This really helps bring out the shininess of the armor than the prior renderer, plus I've gotten a far better pose for him, which sticks true to his cheerful nature especially him running and greeting at people. The next image was rendered in ‎November ‎16, ‎2017, after making improved textures with Substance Painter. His armor has less wear and tear than the other Protectors, in that I wanted to say that he has seen less combat situations than the rest of the Protectors.

Look! Check out my new outfit guys! Isn't it just great?

This was around the time Blue got his makeover with the rest of the cast, in January ‎2, ‎2019. The next image, I rendered this in a group shot in ‎October ‎6, ‎2018, so it technically came after this image. And finally, the third image was a Source Filmmaker image rendered in ‎May ‎16, ‎2019. The first two images look pale because the lack of subsurface scattering meant lighting up tan surfaces causes your model to give off this pale look rather than in real life where if a light shines in your skin, it reflects some reddish light because of your blood cells. There wasn't really a same effect in SFM I suppose since it's not really a render software. Anyway Bluminescence got fattened up, his face got fatter and his nose got smaller, which distinguishes him from the rest of the cast. Funnily enough, the decision to make him fat was my sister's decision, and I think it's a great one at that, as I think he's a positive depiction of overweight people and he just looks even cuddlier as a result. These models still use the the regular Baby Luigi face by the way, as I felt I wasn't advanced enough back then to use that really old Baby Luigi head (was one of my first models after all). This Bluminescence model seen quite some use after while until the next overhaul.

Prepping up for Smash! This will be a fun time!

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate came, and Bluminescence was the last character to join, where he was there alongside Blueshift. He was made in ‎March ‎9, ‎2022, but his model was available before his time in Smash. His head got an overhaul, being an edit from another Protector head. He was given fully black eyes to distinguish him from the other Protectors who have white highlights on their eyes and his nose is even shrunken further. His hair style is slightly different from the others and a lighter shade of brown, while his body got overhauled and features a better modeled vest, the little X on his belly, and shoes that actually have padding. In addition, the rings around his shoes changed color to better reflect my drawing of him (also having pure black eyes as well). Anyway, I still like how this render looks but this was before I upped poly counts of models and how to average vertices (Toolbag's upping verts function isn't the best).

Maybe one day I'll model that feather...

 

[Magolor]

Ok actually though, where could I get a plushie of this guy?

And I've now made a goal to do a "fanart" drawing or whatever of Bluminescene by the end of the year (will probably be one of those black and white sketches I typically do).