Steel Predater

J O T

Hi guys, here is something I've been working on and wouldn't mind showing it off and getting some feedback.
Firstly, its not my design. I found the concept in a d&d monster book. It was done with max and zbrush. Its a little heavy polygon wise, and for now I have placed an onmi just under the chest area. There is also some self-illumination in amoungst the chest, stomach and coming out of the shoulders there.
Hope yas like it.
and its done for the portfolio.

Cheers



I've updated this to what I hope is the final renders.

Kovac

I can definitely see why you chose this piece, you did a flawless job bringing it to 3D! I'm not sure if it's from the concept or not, but the torso, head, and tail seem a lot more crisp than the limbs. Also, the hind leg knee's seem a bit plain compared to that of the forearm elbows.

I like this design more every time I look at it, keep up the great work!

Mark Dygert

This looks great! It does seem to have a few too many polys in areas that are not needed. I doubt they would be used for anything and should be taken out and put into critical areas like the back knees and elbows.
Places like:
- The claws seem to have too many polys.
- The lower half of the back legs. The ankel joint seems to be weighted incorrectly and some polys are over hanging?
- On the shoulders there is a thin edge of polys that can easily be done by texture. Espeically since the detail on the back/side/torso is all texture work. This torso detail could be modeled if polys where stripped out of other areas.
Too bad that would screw up a ton of the UV work =/

But it looks really good, a very nice piece to have in your portfolio!

killingpeople

this is a fun creature!

arshlevon

really cool design, reminds me of simon bisley's stuff.

the palette is very boring and monochromatic tho with little to no contrast in values, as is it looks like the texture was started but never finished, and it is very wasteful on polies. the arms and legs are just overkill and the tail doesn't have quite enough. your target polycount might be fine, but i would definitely take some of those polies from the arms and legs and put them on the tail where they will actually make a difference.

but like i said the design is top notch and you obviously have the skill it just feels unfinished at the moment.

SHEPEIRO

more oily please,

is it an alien/predator cross breed from hell, jezuz those humans aint gonna survive this time!

Emil Mujanovic

Yeah... what's with normal maps and extreme specular highlights? It's like you cant have one without the other. Personally I think it looks shit (not your model, but a general statement on overuse of specular highlights)! Maybe tone down the spec a little, unless you want this entire creature to look like its made from metal or covered in oil as Shep kinda mentioned. But then again, maybe that's the look you were going for.
I like the character and I'd agree with some of the comments about the re-distribution of polies for the key areas.
Other than the shininess, great stuff.

-caseyjones

frostymoose

Pretty accurate to the drawing in the book. I'd make it darker and add lots of color in the spec map. Also I think you should shapen the details on the arms and legs.

J O T

Yeah, I agree with all the criticisms.
I would have liked and tried to put more definition into the limps. I'm still pretty green with zbrush and my machine has only 1 gig of ram, so I had problems getting meshes into max and rendering to texture.
I will do some more optimizing on the mesh, in some cases, like the plates above the head, I have left it in for now as they will need rebaking. The normals still seems to work when taking them out of the limps, so I'll get rid of more there and probably put them into the tail.
I need to sort the rigging abit more for angle, thanks Vig.
For the texture, I think abit more crisper detail is needed, I find it boring and not overly appealling, but I was trying to follow the concept. I think I need locate the detail more and get more variation coming down to the limps. The lights have also washed it out abit.
Thanks alot for your input.

EarthQuake

JOT: try xnormal instead of max for rendering normals, i can do about 5 million polys at 1024 or 2048 with 2 gigs of ram in xnormal if i import objs, so with 1 gig you should be able to get something relatively highres out of it. OR try spliting up your mesh into multiple peices and importing into max.

BoBo_the_seal

I love the rolling shape of his form. Very cool.

- BoBo

J O T

Tried to give the texture some more live and I managed to flood it with lights again. Anyway, its getting there.

I will check it out, thanks Earthquake. Though my problem is importing the obj, even in pieces. I'll also get some more ram.

EricElwell

I am totally dig'n this guy! I would make a crit though, I know you are going for an organic feel with the metal, but it's starting to get muddy around the edges of the plates, and the depth/thickness of the plates is getting lost, I did a quick paintover to help explain..

Original:


Edgy:

J O T

I really like the paintover Eric. I've been trying hard to give it more depth with the lighting and by increasing the spec at the end of the plates. The problem is, as you stated, that the plates have a bumpy, organic end to them. So it was hard to catch the light so easily. I didnt want to lose all that roughness, but I did some tidening up of the spec in that area. Cheers mate.

Goober

Just going to add really quick: you did spell it "predater" on purpose right? Otherwise, I really like just about everything you got going on in here.

J O T

Was it on purpose? Absolutely;) and that goes for any in the future.
Cheers dude.

madman

nice model, great style, good texture, but colour palette is too fairy for me ^^ and i like that soft edges, like old, rusty plates, good feeling for me

J O T

Gave it an update.

Cheers madman, the colours were eating at me also. Yeah much too fairy it was. I think you'll agree its now much more inline for his design. Thanks again.

More crits are welcome. Cheers

Joao Sapiro

agh now it looks too much next gen boring greyish brownish i like the previous colours more

EricElwell

mmm, I would have to agree. Though I do like this version better, because of the brightness levels; there's definitely room for some contrast, similar to what yo had with the blue underside. Increasing the color/saturation contrast would improve the piece I think. Still, looking great!

Goober

[ QUOTE ]
agh now it looks too much next gen boring greyish brownish i like the previous colours more

[/ QUOTE ]

Agreed, the "next-gen brown" look is pretty gross. Played through half of Gears of War and I needed to look at Mario Sunshine shots afterwards just to wash my eyes. The blueish color scheme on this guy was nice, maybe just tone them down instead of washing them out so much? Your model, your colors really, but it's just nice seeing soemthing with alot of variation and colorplay every now and again. Those little colors really caught the eye and added points of interest to the model, instead of just being more uniform and flat. Maybe I just miss the bright blue underside stuff...

Aleslie01

...wow

this model and texture is BEAUTIFUL!

J O T

Cheers guys.
I'm still convinced that this is looking alot better than the previous version.

I'm happy to let it die now, thanks.

MackXX

This guy kicks butt, great job!