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Elf chick -- Rendered in THREE dimensions

polycounter lvl 9
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Shiniku polycounter lvl 9
EDIT: Here's the most recent update for this:
Presentationsho_web.jpg

fullturnaroundweb.jpg


Started work on my next character, figured I'd post up every step of the way on here to maximize my feedback and maximize the awesome.

This is based on a concept by Brian Menze, who is pretty awesome.
0aelf_chick_by_Brenze.jpg

I want to do the outfit on the right to practice some more hard-surface stuff, but I'd like to do the one on the left too. Or would that be too much on my plate? I dunno.

Anyway, I chopped up his concept and made this:
0elf_chick_brenze_orthos.jpg


And so far, here's my work on the model. Basically just roughed in anatomy and proportions at this point.

2screenshots-1.jpg

Critique away!

Replies

  • boebi
    I must say I really like the cloth design. I'm not really trained in zbrush nor know anatomy well enough to critize the sculpt but I am looking forward to more progress :)
  • spiderDude
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    spiderDude polycounter lvl 8
    good progress so far, personally I would go for the concept on the left...to me it feels like it would give you more once you complete the whole character compared to the concept on the right. Looking forward to more progress :)
  • Razgriz
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    Razgriz keyframe
    Your topic title was so crazy and interesting, I just had to click!

    Like I said, looking good - the only things that I take note of, even given my terribly amateurish anatomy knowledge, is that the scapular seems a bit round and blobby, and the clavicle is too protruded/pronounced - maybe a little more subtlety could help it.
  • akacg
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    akacg polycounter lvl 12
    I like your progess so far and i do like the concepts. Im not an anatomy expert and it may just be me but her ankel looks weird to me.
    Keep it up yo!
  • praetor187
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    praetor187 polycounter lvl 11
    I love the designs I would like to personally see a melding of the two (for example i really like the armor design except for the crotch plate but the lower part of the cloth design looks awesome so maybe you can combine them) the proportions look good so far but as akacg said the ankle is off, and I think you could widen the hips some more too. but keep going I cant wait to see what you have in the end:).
  • Jessica Dinh
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    Jessica Dinh polycounter lvl 10
    You picked a really nice concept. I prefer the one on the left, the costume design is just fantastic, but either one would do! (but you should do both. heh 8]...) Nice sculpt so far! Butt seems kinda high/lower back sorta small or something, but I could be wrong. Looking forward to more
  • KyleJensen
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    KyleJensen polycounter lvl 12
    Ooh I like this concept. I'll be keeping my eye on this. Sculpt is looking good so far. Keep goin! :)
  • laurentwauquier
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    laurentwauquier polycounter lvl 7
    praetor187 wrote: »
    I love the designs I would like to personally see a melding of the two (for example i really like the armor design except for the crotch plate but the lower part of the cloth design looks awesome so maybe you can combine them) the proportions look good so far but as akacg said the ankle is off, and I think you could widen the hips some more too. but keep going I cant wait to see what you have in the end:).


    A melding of the two would definetly be interesting.
    I did a lame layer copying paint over.. but I honestly think that the design would greatly benefit from the fusion of the two.

    http://imageshack.us/f/408/0aelfchickbybrenze.jpg/

    ( Polycount's attachment manager isn't working for me even with a 1k / 200 kb pic :( )
    0aelfchickbybrenze.jpg

    I'm not that trained/experienced in ZBrush and anatomy but the sculpt looks good to me!

    Looking forward to this one ! :)
  • Shiniku
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    Shiniku polycounter lvl 9
    Alright, thanks for the feedback guys!

    I'll definitely fix 'dem ankles and stuff, and probably do another pass on the whole thing before moving on.

    Consensus seems to be for the left one or both - and I agree, I like the left concept best too, so I guess.. I'll do both!
    Hmm, that does look pretty cool. I still think I'll do both outfits in their entirety, but I could experiment with combining them after the fact too.
  • achillesian
    wait, what? THREE? hold the FUCK up? THREE?!
  • The Scrub
    wait, what? THREE? hold the FUCK up? THREE?!

    We need to go deeper

    Elfception
  • Shiniku
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    Shiniku polycounter lvl 9
    Update! With 100% more metal panties

    3screenshots.jpg

    3midshot.jpg

    critique away

    I'm definitely going to go back and tighten up the face, hands, and mid section, since those are the parts we'll actually be seeing, but since the rest of it will be covered in armor, this is probably about as far as I'll take it. Unless there are any glaring problems pointed out, of course.

    I'm thinking ahead a bit and I'm not too sure how to proceed in regards to doing both the outfits. Here are my ideas:

    Go ahead and do a low-poly and texture for the naked body, and then have two separate meshes and textures that could be swapped out over the same body with the different costumes. But, i think this would be a lot of wasted polygons since not that much bare skin is showing, and also it seems like a pain to rig and not end up with a lot of clipping.

    My other idea would be to still have 3 textures, body and armor, body and robes, and face+hair. basically there would be two models that reference the same face texture.Does this sound better? Or do you guys have any better ideas?
  • Ron.S
    Sorry this has to be said, awesome model and the anatomy is heading in the right direction but, I was expecting a penis some where, and sadly I have not yet to find one. Other then that great work so far buddy can't wait to see more.
  • nicafornica
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    nicafornica polycounter lvl 7
    nice ass. great metal panties, which it was more thong like but that'll do. cool concept by the way.
  • Shiniku
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    Shiniku polycounter lvl 9
    Hey guys more progress! Essentially I've got all my pieces blocked in, waiting to be detailed.
    4_screenshots.jpg

    I've also switched over to Zbrush because I get better performance, it's working out pretty well. Is there a way to get bigger screenshots than what you can prnt scrn?
  • Tenchi
    Nice progress. Might look better to increase the size of a those chest cones ...overall she's lacking that feminine slender feel from the concept, but it might just be the pose you have. Looking forward to seeing it fully three dimension rendered! ^^
  • PaulP
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    PaulP polycounter lvl 9
    I agree that you should concentrate on getting that feminine look. Try and work on the torso armour around the ribs, looking from the front view it looks too rounded. If you look at the concept you'll see how the subtle changing the curves, especially around the bottom part of the torso armour, helps define the feminine shapes.

    Anyway nice work so far, looking forward to seeing more!
  • Shiniku
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    Shiniku polycounter lvl 9
    Thanks for the feedback guys! I've adjusted the torso and cones a little, hopefully in the right direction. It's already a part I've spent the most time on, I guess the struggle shows, it's still not quite right.

    She is bulking up more than I would have liked. I'll still go back and fix this some here and there. Part of what's doing it is the legs - they were much longer in the concept, but when I sculpted out the base anatomy it looked a bit ridiculous. But now with the armor on, she definitely needs the longer legs.

    Anyway, update:
    5_screenshots.jpg

    I'm probably being a bit heavy handed with damaging the armor, which should still appear mostly smooth - but I've found when using zbrush I really need to exaggerate to get any details to show up in the normals.
  • Ged
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    Ged interpolator
    You are right about needing to exaggerate the overall proportions a bit, long legs thinner waist/ribcage etc that breastplate is going to need some work to get it to fit the proportions and to have the right flat planes to catch the light like in the concept. Really tricky to get those big nipple plate things to look good :/
  • praetor187
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    praetor187 polycounter lvl 11
    I think the progress is looking great. but I think your right about the damage on the armor. Right now to me anyway it looks like the armor and clothing looks too similar, I think smoothing out the armor some more can make give that distinctive look but its coming along great keep it up.
  • Shiniku
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    Shiniku polycounter lvl 9
    Thanks guys, tried to address the problems. More progress.

    6_screenshots.jpg
  • Shiniku
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    Shiniku polycounter lvl 9
    More progress. Started on the low-poly, it's about 3,200 tris thus far.
    7_2.jpg

    And some more work on the face.. still in progress
    7_1.jpg
  • Shiniku
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    Shiniku polycounter lvl 9
    Hmm, I hate to triple post, but I've got more progress, and would really appreciate some feedback.

    More on the face:
    8_4.jpg

    More on the low-poly:
    8_2.jpg
    8_1.jpg



    But uh, now I've got some serious questions. I'm having problems with the hair, it's always the hardest part for me on a character. I reference a lot of other people's work and work flows, but I can't seem to replicate it. And when it comes to replicating this hair style, while staying relatively low-poly, I just don't even know where to start.
    8_3.jpg

    I started with something though I will probably start over. I'm trying to prevent the geometry that will have the alpha maps from inter-penetrating, as I've heard that is important. But it's really difficult, especially when trying to achieve this kind of hairstyle I think.

    If anyone with any ideas or expertise on the subject could point me in the right direction, or just fill me in with more info about this sort of thing (like how important it is to avoid interpenetration) I'd truly appreciate it.
  • chrisradsby
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    chrisradsby polycounter lvl 14
    I kinda feel like the eyes should be a wee bit further apart, she "stares" too much as well I'd say, dunno if you're doing that on purpose for rigging or not though. Maybe a little more "squint" to the eyes so that you don't see the whole iris.

    Other than that, good work! Looking forward to more :)
  • mr_ace
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    mr_ace polycounter lvl 9
    not sure if anyone answered your question, but to get bigger and better screenshots from zbrush, go to document, then go to the bit where you see half and double, and has parameters you can change manually underneith. Put whatever size you want the renders to be in here (i usually just hit double unless i need a specific size), then also in document, theres a zapplink button, hit that and it will take your current screenview and take it into photoshop, with the foreground and background as seperate layers making it much more versatile. hope this helps...
  • PaulP
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    PaulP polycounter lvl 9
    If you bring the top of the eyelids down a bit (like in the concept) it should give a more natural look. Some people, when modelling the eyelids, will model them partially closed and do their UV mapping and detail baking in this pose. This means that there will be less texture stretching during animation. Its not necessary, but its something to think about. Btw how are you getting on with the hair? Have you tested the tetures & alphas yet?

    Anyway, I like what you've done so far, keep it up!
  • Shiniku
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    Shiniku polycounter lvl 9
    @mr_ace: thanks for the info, will definitely come in handy!

    About the yes.. yeah, I've noticed she was looking a bit 'surprised', was planning on just fixing that once it's rigged, though I get what you're saying, definitely would have made more sense in terms of texture quality if I had left the eyelids shut more.

    As far as the hair goes, I've made some progress but I'm still hoping for some wisdom so I haven't really nailed anything down yet. i decided to keep the hair on a separate texture sheet, that way being stuck on the hair won't slow down the rest of my progress.

    Here's the low-poly with normals baked, and the normal map. The bake is pretty rough, lots of tweaks need to be made, lots of little errors to fix.
    9_1.jpg
    9_normal.jpg
  • Shiniku
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    Shiniku polycounter lvl 9
    Quick and dirty base colors and spec:
    10_basecolors.jpg
  • PaulP
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    PaulP polycounter lvl 9
    Looking nice so far. I know these are just base colours, but make sure you get some of that tasty emerald green from the concept, its lacking colour atm. Also if you use some burnished metal colour as an overly it might look quite nice.

    As for the model, the top of the shoes seem a bit weird from the front view. Is it supposed to be jagged like that, or is that a seam or normal map problem?
  • Shiniku
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    Shiniku polycounter lvl 9
    @ SCB: Thanks for the feedback! Yeah, I only had about 4 colors on at that point, don't worry I won't lose sight of some of the finer details like the green gem. And yes, I've noticed a few normal map errors.. I fixed the foot problem (partially, hopefully) but I'm still working on a few others.

    Made more progress on the texture, but still got a lot of work to go on it. Also started on the hair, but obviously nowhere near done. Feedback welcome:
    11_texes.jpg
    I know she's looking a bit old, and definitely surprised. Trying to work on that.


    Also, someone gave me a critique and I wanted you guys to weigh in on it. The critique was that the breast-cone things just looked weird, shaped wrong, breast wouldn't fit comfortably in there, and also the way the tip of the collar was hitting the breast armor was creating a tangent and looked weird. I agreed with this, and even thought these things myself while creating it, but I was just trying to stick to the concept because it was done by a pro. But, if it does look wrong I guess I should try to fix it. So, in the next picture first we see the model how it is now, and then the picture below some quick and dirty edits based on that feedback.
    12_problems2.jpg

    So what do you think is better? Or can you think of better ways to address this feedback? Also, I'm trying to edit this without having to redo my UVS or go back and edit my highpoly and re-bake, although if I have to do that, I will.
  • Shiniku
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    Shiniku polycounter lvl 9
    It's been awhile, got busy with work and school and stuff. Anyway, some progress.. hoping to wrap this up pretty soon. Let me know what you think

    13_1.jpg
    13_2.jpg
  • Shiniku
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    Shiniku polycounter lvl 9
    14_crazyface2.jpg
    14_woot2.jpg

    Did some rigging on her. Still gotta fix a few weird places, and also make it looks less like her hair's falling out.
  • PaulP
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    PaulP polycounter lvl 9
    Looking cool, I like that crazy close up you gave her! Its good your doing some more work to the hair, it looks very cg compared to the rest of the model.
  • Fid
    Brilliant! Love the crazy face. I think sticking to something like that would do a lot for your showing off of the character versus something more placid.
  • uncle
    yes, metal panties must be comfortable :)

    I dig the textures really, but also think there is a problem with hair.
    Eyes are still too close to eachother.

    Good work overall. :thumbup:
  • [Deleted User]
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    [Deleted User] insane polycounter
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  • Pikey
    I am really enjoying this wip. Like your work!
  • Dylan Brady
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    Dylan Brady polycounter lvl 9
    I like it, jsut want to say maybe go a little lighter on the teeth outline. its better to let the gap between the teeth disappear
  • Shiniku
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    Shiniku polycounter lvl 9
    Thanks so much for the feedback guys! I tried to apply some of your critiques. I think the hair and teeth are looking much improved.

    @Uncle
    Thanks!
    Haha, yeah, the outfit is highly impractical. I mostly picked this concept because it would give me practice in some areas I wasn't so strong in.. and to that end it's worked out great, although I do seem to get a lot of comments about how ridiculous the armor is, I'll definitely pick something more believable next time.

    @TeriyakiStyle
    Thanks a lot, very helpful feedback! I tried to apply some of what I saw in your paint over, although it's pretty subtle. I think your feedback will definitely help me when I go to create my next character as well.

    Alright, some next screenshots, plus texture flats.
    15_1.jpg
    15_2.jpg
    15_textures_web.jpg
    15_textureshair_web.jpg
  • eazy
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    eazy polycounter lvl 9
    hot daayam, man. awesome work! i especially love the facial expression :D
  • Shiniku
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    Shiniku polycounter lvl 9
    Here's my most updated turnarounds
    fullturnaroundweb.jpg

    And here's a final presentation shot, with some photoshop post work done
    Presentationsho_web.jpg


    There are things I could fix, but I think I'll call this one a wrap for now. Thanks a lot to everyone who has critiqued/helped along the way. This model was a great learning process for me, and I think my next model will show a lot of progress thanks to what I've learned.
  • Dim
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    Dim polycounter lvl 10
    Looking pretty nice. Having a really hard time getting past the useless armor though...

    She may be too realistic to have such blatantly absurd clothing.
  • PixelKD
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    PixelKD polycounter lvl 9
    This is cool as hell.
  • dukedunn
    Dear Shiniku, hi my name is Mike D I am a blackmith. I found your amazing art work of this elf. I don't know anything about this site but I would LOVE to try and make this outfit out of metal if you would permit me? If that is ok with you please email me at dunn34@gmail.com thanks and again your work is incredible! 


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