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[New portfolio] Lo

interpolator
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Popol interpolator
JANUARY 2014 UPDATE

Added my work on "Fighter Within" and my latest character.

jan_update.jpg


Hey Polycounters!

I dumped my carbonmade portfolio to make a new one myself. I wanted to make something very simple and straight forward.

I'm looking for crits on both the website itself and the content.

Here's the link (http://loicpaulus.com/) and here's a preview of my work

portfolio.jpg

Replies

  • Popol
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    Popol interpolator
    Bumping this because I could really go with some advices =/
  • Popol
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    Popol interpolator
    Hi Dustin, thanks for taking the time to give me some feedback.

    I have to admit, my texturing process is not far from what you described. Most of the time I find it easy to add color variation on aged and worn material but on outfits that have to look "new", like the red shirt, it most of the time end up looking "dirty". I guess I should check more refs.

    Thanks a lot for the tips about coloring the AO. I used to do it with a gradient map, and only on the skin.

    The creatureBox pice is definitely gonna go. I already began a new big piece and am gonna start a thread as soon as there is something interesting to show.

    About the black outline, I really like it on Amon as I find it works well to make it look closer to the anime. But not so much on the CreatureBox piece.

    And again, thanks a lot =)
  • Popol
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    Popol interpolator
    Haha, I think we end up using these "shortcuts to make a render cool" because we sometimes feel like we HAVE to add something like this, but a nice background and a good lighting can be enough.

    I can't wait to get to the texturing phase of my next piece to put these tips to use =)
  • BNielsen
    Alright, I've got a few things:

    First: The site looks great - clean, simple, effective.

    And the models...
    I'll start with the one I have the biggest problem with - The shark
    It looks like a 30-60 minute speed model that someone slapped some poly paint on and called it finished...
    And I'm a little unsure if it's supposed to look dopey, like a clown character, or scary...
    His silhouette is strong, but it looks like a bit of a filler piece

    You can tell that story in animation and voice... But a truly great character model you will know its purpose and ability just by looking at the model. This is especially important when only showing stills.

    I'm glad to see in a later post you said it's going to go. Things like that are good practice, but you have to show your very best in a portfolio.

    The man: I believe this is from somewhere? I'm unsure...

    Either way: He has too much clothing to properly show male anatomy. I'm sure you have some knowledge of it, based on your female model - As female is far more difficult.
    I'd like to see a model that proves this though.
    He is also lacking a silhouette - Take a render on a white background, push all colour into black, and take a look at it. It lacks a bit there. (silhouette is important! This isn't a preference issue)

    Textures: I like the hand-painted look... But it looks really flat - AO baking is great - but it's not a substitute for texturing flat areas. I'd like to see some wear (i.e. dirt, leather cracks, maybe a touch of fading on the shoulders, etc)

    The woman: LOVE this model - Like I mentioned earlier - The story is told by the model, the silhouette is broken up, looks great.

    A few things: Your hair alpha cards... Aren't fully opaque. That was the only physical issue I had

    Technical issues: Your image sizes look large - This isn't a huge issue, being a character - but if your clothing maps are larger than 2k... Try reducing them if that's the case. (They look like 4k to me, if they lost too much detail, leave them)

    TOPOLOGY! You need to research topology flow around the knees/shoulders/elbows. To get hired, you MUST have this knowledge, or you're as good as useless to a studio.


    I'm not saying scrap any of these models (except maybe the shark) - And DEFINITELY keep the woman. But keep in mind for future modeling ventures: Topology flow, texture detail(not just AO), prove anatomy knowledge(male specifically)

    Things to consider in the future: Maybe try to find a technical artist/simple rigging tutorials, and pose the characters? It's a powerful tool as well. I'd like to see the female posed - the problem doing that... You're going to have to redo the topology on the body.

    I really like the woman though - Try to strive for that.

    Also: take note of the feedback in previous posts, I tried not to touch on them too much, especially about face colour (red, yellows, blues in undertone, maybe a touch of pore detail to break up skin? Maybe a scar on a male character(can tell a lot about the 'story' of a character too!)
  • Popol
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    Popol interpolator
    Hey BNielsen,

    thanks for the in depth feedback!

    About the shark creature, the design was made by CreatureBox. But you're right, it was initially a speedscult that I refined a little to put in my portfolio. My goal with this character was to show that I can also do cartoon stuff. But it brings down the whole quality of the portfolio so it has to go.

    Now about the man, Amon. Again this design is not mine, this is a fan art from the show "The Legend of Korra". I wanted to stick to the style of the show as much as possible, like "What would Amon look like if he was in a video game?"
    I agree with you about the texturing. I'm collecting every advice I've been told about my texturing to apply them on the character I'm working on currently.

    Glad you like women as this design is mine.
    All textures in the portfolio are 2k, I never work on 4k textures as my computer can't handle it, haha ^^
    I'm quite surprise by your critic about the topology. Is it more about the male or female model? The topology of the female character is very close to the one we used for characters in the studio where I did my internship.

    my conclusion:
    - I've just began a new female character, I'll make sure to apply everything you told me to make it into an outstanding piece.
    - I'm considering now making a male anatomy study to show my understanding of the male body (but that's gonna come after the new female character)
    - I'll add a description for each character in the portfolio as you thought all the designs were mine. I already credited the design by putting a logo on the beauty shot but it can't hurt to write it too.

    Thanks for your time, you were very helpful!
  • Popol
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    Popol interpolator
    JANUARY 2014 UPDATE

    Added my work on "Fighter Within" and my latest character.


    jan_update.jpg
  • DWalker
    The font for the body text feels very large, probably twice the size you need.

    On the elf, the armor - especially the white sections - looks more like plastic than metal (or enamel-painted metal). The ends of the fur collar partially clip into the flesh around the collar bone; it would probably be better to bend the ends in towards the center, meeting at the collar. The upper curve of the breast should be smooth, rather than the current crease.

    The thumbnail for the character within doesn't match the content of the page. I suppose the untextured clothes on the black model is to highlight what you have done, but it feels odd and unfinished.

    The blue highlights on the other models in CW are really out-of-place, especially on the horses.

    Cobras don't have rattles, and don't raise the tip of their tails. The cobra also seems rather short, more like a timber rattler than a cobra.
  • Popol
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    Popol interpolator
    Thanks for the feedback DWalker.

    I changed the font size and the thumbnail for "Fighter Within".

    I was not planing to make any changes to the elf because I have spent enough time working on this character and I think it's time to call her done but I really appreciate your critics as I didn't notice these problems.

    However I don't see the problem with the blue highlights on the highpoly animal sculpts. They help bring out the shapes of the sculpts that are not shown by the primary light and they add a little bit of color to the image that is otherwise all grey. Or were you talking about the lowpoly animal? If this is the case, the strong highlights were not my choice (This is what they were supposed to look like ingame) but I don't have access to these models anymore so I can't change it.
  • BARDLER
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    BARDLER polycounter lvl 12
    The armored elf women has a really heavy translucency on her skin that makes her look like a wax figure more than believable skin. Also her hair has a weird seam in the middle that looks like a shading error, I am not sure exactly what it is, but it is really distracting. The materials on her armor do not read properly and I am not sure if that is suppose to be steel, iron, or porcelain. Would you mind posting your texture flats for her?
  • Popol
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    Popol interpolator
    Sure, here they are.

    With the critiques you just added, I'm starting think I can't leave the model like that and make these changes.

    body_flat.jpg

    head_flat.jpg

    hair_flat.jpg
  • Popol
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    Popol interpolator
    OK, so I fixed the super strong translucency and the seam in the hair.

    BARDLER : Would love to hear what you think about the metal from the texture flats. What I was going for when texturing the white metal is making the spec for a regular metal surface but whit a dark white in the diffuse.

    skin_fix.jpg
  • Snader
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    Snader polycounter lvl 15
    Just wanted to pop in and say that that one large hair plane on her really ruins the model because it's super straight, goes against the grain of the other hair, and in general makes it look like badly intersected geo or a texture seam. And the head is quite a focal area so it's got a big impact.

    I think adding a couple dozen polies to make it a tad zigzaggy, and maybe add a slight volume ridge (because our follicles are mostly perpendicular to our skin) near the parting line, would go a long way.
  • BARDLER
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    BARDLER polycounter lvl 12
    For the metal you need to have a darker diffuse, like below 50 on the RGB scale, including the gold. Metal is defined by the spec and gloss, with little to no detail in the diffuse by itself. More scratches and tarnish in the spec will really help sell the metal look as well. Here is a quick and dirty mock up to show you what I mean.
    5fyk.jpg
    u4sl.jpg
    *Diffuse on top, spec in middle, gloss on bottom.

    The spec and gloss are the same for both, but I made the diffuse for the right cylinder like you did. Hope this helps.
  • Popol
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    Popol interpolator
    BARDLER : That helped a lot thanks! Here's the new maps and what the metal looks like now. I also darked a little the gold and white metal in the diffuse.

    Snader : I fixed the hairline. I didn't make it took zigzaggy as it looked weird to me but it's not straight anymore. Thanks for the tips, it looks more natural now.

    elf_new_metal.jpg




    elf_new_metal02.jpg
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