Ok, now I HAVE TO STOP mucking about with this fella and start some work on something else. I`ve gone as far as I can go without having the lighting style totaly sorted. The neck dosen`t even work properly and there are no rigging controls on any of it! I`ll do a big section on the rigging later, hopefully with some movies!
These pictures are well crap, but i`m not going to be working on this for awhile now so this is as far as I am right now.

Material action today! I`ve classed all the different parts of the robot together and set up a script so I can change the materials from a colour coded set, to a diffusive set, and finally to a specular/reflection set. These are the basic render layers i`m planning to use on the character. I`m getting a bit ahead of myself though as I need to work out exactly how the light rigs are going to work before I can set up the materials properly! Heres a funny colour-coded picture of the task so far! Don`t he look pretty!

Right then! Time to set up some reflectivity. Up to now i`ve only been using a diffusive material, a maya blinn with all the specular controls at 0, don`t know why I wasn`t just using a lambert, but there you go! I`ve now set a bit of reflectivity and specularity. The whole head is covered wih the same material which is why it looks a bit wierd. I`m not using a HDR map yet, just 1 area light casting raytrayed shadows and emitting photon(hard left of the face) and a point light casting no shadows up high. Theres a bounce card to the right of the face too.

Ohh baby! Check out the GI on this warrior! You can`t beat a good lighting session! I`m only playing around really, but I set up a simple box to bounce a bit of light off and try to get real soft light. I`m rendering at a gamma of 2.2 to try and achieve a more natural spread of light ranges. It`s really nice! Look here!

 I`ve been playing with contrast a bit today, rendering at 2.2 gamma and activating a bit of GI. I`m trying to see what the lighting is going to look like if it is all coming from the far end of the room. It`s a poor test as I had to open the window shutters a bit to let enough light in and there is a big gap in the roof! I refined the tracks the shutters move on too. Still real early days. I want to try a combination of this soft atmosperic light and some harsh, local lights to pick up small patches of specularity. Excuse all the artifacts on these images, they are just for testing. 

Oh dear, please ignore this image! I was just testing out the scale of the objects in relation to the splats on the floor. Please belive me this texture isn`t even started yet! Why I had to plug it into the bump channel is anyones guess! Accept my apoligies to your eyes! I was pleased with the contrast i`m getting under the tables though!

Here’s a quick update! The volume and shape of the face works for me from the front, the side still needs some work! I’m going to have to look at the neck hydraulics though, the range of movement on the neck is pathetic!

Ok, this image is just to illustrate my idea for lighting the shack. I need the lighting to be able to react to different moods, but still come from sensible places. So i`m going to pre install two dynamic light rigs in the set. First off is the natural light rig. To achieve that, the shack is covered in these huge shuttered windows which can be raised or lowered to allow more or less light through from any angle. They are also on the roof so i`ve got huge control over the angle natural light is entering the shack. The second light rig will be a huge selection of un-natural light, flouresent tubes, spot lights etc. I`ll get to that later. The combination of the soft natural light and the contrast of the harsh interior light and the ability to fade between them at will is the first step in working out the exact look of the film.

You can expect some of the images on this thread to be so dull tears will form in your eyes. This here is a table, two chairs and three calor gas cannisters! Good Lord! Call George Lucas right now! Get the Wackowskis on the blower! Come on Peter, you`re going to have to do better than King Kong now LASTOUTPOSTOFSANITY is here! 

and wait for it! For some reason I did a version that was red. Look at that table top material! Hoo Hoo Haa Haa! Reflections ahoy! I must learn to control them a bit better!

Hah! I had a quick 10 minute stab at the neck hydraulics and getting an effective mouth rig. Oh dear! They both suck! Rather than open in a scream, the jaw geom looks more like it`s un-attaching from the rest of the head! Rubbish!
I`ve started blocking in the tongue, and got some of the springs to work. The idea with the springs is that they look more like tendons when they strech and add a more complex motion to a simple one.