My 3d stuff - Learning Maya and Zbrush.

Tomseas

Instead of making a new thread each time, I thought I'd store it all in one place. I'm still learning Maya and Zbrush and have only dabbled a little bit into texturing.

You can look at the previous few things on my artsation: https://www.artstation.com/artist/tomseas

Any comments and critiques are more than welcome!

Here's some maya practice, a candlestick phone using a mix of ref.


Wires:


If I want to present my wires in a better way, can I do it in keyshot/marmoset? Or do I have to use vray/mentalray? I haven't found a way to get a smooth previs in anything other than maya (understandably).


Most recent WIP/work:

Maxilator

Seems pretty solid modeling wise, The base is way too small though, If you compare the dial to the part you talk into you see that the base should be about 175% of it's current size. Chord looks too thin as well, easiest way to adjust that would just be to move vertices along normals. Good job so far!

Tomseas

@Maxilator: I didn't know you could move verts along their normals. It's pretty cool. As for the size of the base you're totally right. I had it bigger first and it looked funny so instead I tried to fit the size of the dial to the smaller base. Guess I shouldn't have, or more of a middle road.

Some more Maya practice, a nazi dagger. Should've split the sheath into parts instead of keeping it all one piece. And maybe not done the inner part since it's kinda useless. Also looks like I forgot to soften some edges q.q

Maxilator

It's a pretty handy tool, you just set axis orientation to normal in the tool settings on the move tool and use vertex selection.

Tomseas

Death knight shield wip with fitting meme

Loren Broach

Nice! For not knowing much about ZBrush I think this is a solid start!

I would recommend for the shield choosing a direction.  Either try and make it realistic or stylized.  The front has a World of Warcraft feel with the simpler shapes and cracks.  But the wood and handle on the back side have smaller micro details that make it look more realistic.

If you happen to go the stylized route I'd exaggerate the cracks  and wear detail and lose the micro detail.  Orb has some great brushes I'd recommend.  
https://www.artstation.com/artwork/9kwVo

Anyway, it's looking good.  Good luck!

Tomseas

@Loren Broach: I was aiming for the more realistic side of things. Sometimes I look at a sculpt and it looks simple (no micro details and all) but the textured end result looks realistic. As I don't know how to texture, I keep thinking wouldn't this or that simply work through a texture and look ore convincing (so why try and sculpt it)? Not sure if this makes sense.
The idea is to learn texturing, but I got that planned in about a month so in the meantime I'm stuck in this in between state of "should I really be doing this".

Loren Broach

Yeah you could definitely get away with Texturing the wood and not bother sculpting.  programs like NDo and Crazybump can give you the same effect.  It's ultimately picking the right tool for the job that will give you the best result.

You could get away with mainly just sculpting in the planks (big details), but leaving the micro detail out and do that part in texture.

Apocrs1980

There are a few advantages to sculpting in detail, mainly making normal maps if it is every to be a low poly application.  But really depends on what the object is being used for and how close up your audience will be. You can also achieve a lot of realism with poly paint and alphas.
If the object is viewed from afar some of those fine details get lost but upclose you can really push the 3d definition with detailed sculpting. Thats just my opinion though.

Tomseas

Loren & Apoc: thanks. I should start exploring texturing in the coming weeks and that'll help me get a better idea of what I can and can't do.

Still trying to grasp zbrush basics. Critiques are welcome !

BucketOfNuggets

Stuffs looking good, I'm pretty useless with Zbrush but I did notice on your latest shield that the wood looks amazing but the metal parts are lacking in detail. 

Also a shield that has been hit enough to cause massive chips in the side should have some pretty crazy scratches and cuts on the wood.

Tomseas

Bucket, thanks. Yeah I keep getting a big divide between the wood and the metal. On the one hand I try and make it close to the ref (so like same cuts) but part of wants it to be realistic so I spend too much time on the wood and in the end it looks all funny. I'll revisit soon as I start to texture.

As I'm going back to school next year, I decided to make a study of some school work. After doing the low poly blockout I decided to push some parts further and make a medium poly (no smoothing but a lot would have to be baked for it to be low poly). I'm currently learning vray basics, and will start learning basics of texturing in the coming weeks so I can hopefully finish this before September. So this is basically still early WIP.
https://sketchfab.com/models/cee186477ac2400b9ae504ffe21e8b8e?utm_medium=embed&utm_source=website&utm_campain=share-popup

Tomseas

Last Wotlk shield concept. Yet another WIP (forever wip until I can texture). The metal's pretty mild and I've learned some things the last few days so It'll be revisited when doing the texturing. I also finally understood why people avoid the default zbrush matcap. That backplate supposedly has leather alphas all over (as if different skins were sown together) but as soon as I switched to another matcap/material I couldn't see a thing. Lesson learned.