This is my project for Hossein Diba's Character Sculpting class. I decided to make Chris Pratt as Star-Lord from Guardians of the Galaxy. Still a long way to go on this but thought I would start sharing my progress on here:
Here's an older image of the anatomy. The vast majority of it will be covered up with clothes so it was more of an anatomy exercise for me.
More updates on Chris Pratt as Star Lord. Reworked the likeness but still want to give it another pass. Did his pants, belt, shirt and got a rough start on the jacket.
@Mateus Thanks man I appreciate it. I have beefed up the hands cause they were definitely too small like you said!
Here's a quick update for my thread. I've been doing some work on the jacket but it still needs some work. Otherwise I started doing some polypainting and more facial details
Spent some time working more on Star-Lord's jacket. Applied surface noise with Noisemaker and a custom made alpha with UVs. Then went through and polypainted it as well. Still polishing a lot of this as I go through it so still a lot that needs to be done!
Set up a Keyshot scene cause I got tired of fiddling with BPR lol Did some more likeness adjustments but it's still not there yet. Especially want it to catch from a distance.
One thing that helps with likeness studies is to post shots with your model right next to your reference photos, same camera angle. This will help people give better critiques on your progress.
The lighting seems odd to me, it's black under his brows. This makes it look like you're using a single light source with no bounce lighting, which is very old-school CG. I think it would help to learn about portrait photography lighting techniques. I collected some lighting resources here on the wiki, might help you: http://wiki.polycount.com/wiki/Lighting
@Eric Chadwick Thanks for the tips! I will post some shots with different angles and references tomorrow when I have some time after work. I'll definitely check out that lighting wiki as well. Lighting and rendering is always a challenge for me so that's a big help
Heres some screens of the head from different angles compared to reference images. I will say some features I modified really slightly so that they read better from a distance. I originally had his eyes a bit more squinty but it didn't look as good when I zoomed out. Maybe with better lighting as recommended above that wouldn't be an issue so I'll experiment with that.
Also looking at these screens again I'm noticing just how long his face is. I tried fixing it before but it snuck back up! If you guys see anything else that stands out to you I would love feedback
Starting to pick back up on this project just in time for Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 Starting with overhauling the likeness as I wasn't too happy with the way it was before. Hoping it's moving in a bit of a better direction now.
I did a really simple traceover based on your ref photos, you can easily see what needs to be amended.
From all the views, the head is too stretched/thick which is really throwing off the measurements. Step down a few subdivs and push in the skull and neck. You can set viewport perspective to 10 and use projection's overlay to do quick checks.
It is also important to use refs that are similar to the expression you want. If he is going to have a slight hint of smile, you need to have refs consistent with that. Other expressions will just mess with the likeness.
Thanks for the feedback! Revieiwng what I posted again, I believe I accidentally took the screenshots with Dynamic Perspective turned on rather than normal perspective mode. Turning that off definitely helped alleviate some of the issues.
I didn't have a ton of time tonight, but here I tried to start incorporating some of your critiques. Will get to polishing it more and post more angles as the week moves forward
Hey man, great job so far! Looking good. I would recommend when trying to achieve a likeness taking it really slow and steady before getting to high of a polycount. Doing this will help your shapes and structure feel more solid. I would also say you should work with asymmetry earlier on just after having the characters facial proportions blocked out. Keep at it man. It's looking good so far and I'm looking forward to seeing the complete piece.
Looks good. I dont know if you are using ZB's seethrough slider. I found it really handy to have the film of the character close by on a second monitor, and slide the film under ZB to check different angles. For this kind of stuff I dont use ortho, but maybe that is just a personal pref.
Thanks for the feedback guys I've finally decided to refocus on this project once again and have been really trying to grind out this likeness as best as I can. It has been bothering me a ton so I really want to get it right. Here's my latest update
Replies
The likeness is getting closer but I still have more work to do...
More updates on Chris Pratt as Star Lord. Reworked the likeness but still want to give it another pass. Did his pants, belt, shirt and got a rough start on the jacket.
I have the impression that the hands are a little small.
I know what you mean hehe
Here's a quick update for my thread. I've been doing some work on the jacket but it still needs some work. Otherwise I started doing some polypainting and more facial details
Good to see you here too! Thanks man! Im still gonna polish it up a bit more later on
Right now Im revamping the face a bit more. Here's an update!
The lighting seems odd to me, it's black under his brows. This makes it look like you're using a single light source with no bounce lighting, which is very old-school CG. I think it would help to learn about portrait photography lighting techniques. I collected some lighting resources here on the wiki, might help you:
http://wiki.polycount.com/wiki/Lighting
Heres some screens of the head from different angles compared to reference images. I will say some features I modified really slightly so that they read better from a distance. I originally had his eyes a bit more squinty but it didn't look as good when I zoomed out. Maybe with better lighting as recommended above that wouldn't be an issue so I'll experiment with that.
Also looking at these screens again I'm noticing just how long his face is. I tried fixing it before but it snuck back up! If you guys see anything else that stands out to you I would love feedback
Old on the left, new on the right
From all the views, the head is too stretched/thick which is really throwing off the measurements. Step down a few subdivs and push in the skull and neck. You can set viewport perspective to 10 and use projection's overlay to do quick checks.
It is also important to use refs that are similar to the expression you want. If he is going to have a slight hint of smile, you need to have refs consistent with that. Other expressions will just mess with the likeness.
@Joao Sapiro
Thanks for the feedback! Revieiwng what I posted again, I believe I accidentally took the screenshots with Dynamic Perspective turned on rather than normal perspective mode. Turning that off definitely helped alleviate some of the issues.
I didn't have a ton of time tonight, but here I tried to start incorporating some of your critiques. Will get to polishing it more and post more angles as the week moves forward