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The Bi-Monthly CHARACTER ART Challenge | August - September

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  • OniRice
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    OniRice polycounter lvl 5
    Hi everyone, awesome stuff so far! Can't wait to see more and be apart of this.I'm going to jump in and work on the Anubis. Here's a a quick breakdown and a start to the anatomy. Just blocking in the forms and wondering how im going to approach the head... Im late but I'll be trying my best to wrap this up.
     
  • bkost
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    bkost interpolator
    @OniRice Hey man, I'm really digging your body build. It looks as if you built your muscles as seperate subtools then dynameshed them together, I've been messing with that workflow. Anywho, your's looks lovely! Keep at it!
  • alibaba17
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    alibaba17 polycounter lvl 5

    my latest progress, that's the end for the hipoly, and moving on to building the lowpoly. Sculpting cloth is a pain and i know it doesn't look like what is in the concept.

    I see alot of new challengers, welcome to the party!
    @OniRice i like your anubis body shape, just the lower arm kinda "fat". Anyway, it's a nice start
    @9lg you might need to longer the lower arm, if not when you put in the wrist armor it will feel even shorter (which is in my case)

  • OniRice
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    OniRice polycounter lvl 5
    bkost - Thanks! I am using separate subtools for the body and then will dynamesh and further detail. It's really helped me with controlling the forms when sculpting, though its a lot slower... 

    alibaba17 - Good eye, I have attempted to address the issue... You're model is looking great too! I would say that with the clothes look a lot baggier in the concept. 

    My critique game is really bad. Hopefully that will improve as well. 

    I've been working a little bit on the anatomy everyday and added in a quick dog head study. Will update on the weekend when I have more time to work on this bad boy. :D




  • Babuira
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    Babuira polycounter lvl 4
    Hey guys! So im having this issue regarding topology and Zremesher. I was wondering what is the best way to create sculptable topology, to be able to get it to a final stage. I did a couple Zremesher experiments before going into Maya to retopo. The best i could come up with is a relatively dense mesh that has even polys so its quite sculptable and clean, but its not perfect by any stretch. My question is, is it really worth it to Zremesh something to get sculptable clean topology, or is it just better to go in Maya and topo myself? I feel like if i dont use Zremesher im missing out on a feature designed to meet my sculptural needs, but at the same time i feel like i could just create my own topo and it would work alot better.
    My concern is the lack of Zremesher implementation into my pipeline. I feel like i could get the sculpture to final stages using it, and then just retopo in maya and reproject the details.

    So what i want to do is -->
    1. Block out from Dynamesh or base mesh
    2. Zremesher to get clean, sculptable topology
    3. Get sculpture to final stage
    4. Retopo in Maya


    OR should i do -->

    1. Block out from Dynamesh or base mesh
    2. Retopo in Maya to get a clean, good and sculptable mesh (may be actual game mesh as well)
    3. Get sculpture to final stage.
    4. Re-wrap the base mesh so it matches the high res.

    So what i want is to be able to finish my high res work all inside Zbrush, then move on to Maya to retopo.

    Heres the Zremeshed mesh.
    It looks fairly dense, but i've already blocked out everything and its low enough that i can smooth it effectively. Going for pixols here.


  • carvuliero
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    carvuliero hero character
    You will have hard type sculpting with such high res lvl 1
    I can give you workflow using Zremesher is it pretty fast and dirty but its good enough 
    requirements :
    Will be a good idea to retopo when you have your major forms blocked out 
    steps :
    -duplicate your sculpt , that's important !
    - if sculpt is made of more then one part you will have to move them a part(zremesher have hard time with fingers so better chop them off and rebuild as simple rectangles after zremesher , also for face features few guides will help) then fuse with dynamesh clean connection repeat till everything looks nice - this will give you better topology - smooth is better here 
    - zremesh - if there are some weird things smooth and remash again till happy with result 
    - here is where you add fingers and fixting things manually - zmodeler or maya 
    - for small thing that need round edge loops like eyes mouth nostrils belly button nipples can use zmodeler to extrude some then smooth repeat as much as you need
    -repose you new topology to match your sculpt 
    -reproject
    -done 

  • bkost
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    bkost interpolator
    @OniRice wow, I'm really digging your head study. It looks great! I'm not so sure about the angle of your ears.. Going off of Ibizan dog ref, the ears seem to point straight forward.

    @Babuira Yes I'd recommend incorporating zremesh as much as possible. As zremeshed pieces help hold angles and flow. My typical workflow for keeping resolution and improving topo flow is similar to @carvuliero.

    quick example breakdown for a head goes...
    --duplicate
    --zremesh (if necessary paint density maps to help with resolution on certain parts.
    --project orig mesh.
    --divide zremeshed to begin another level of detailing

    ----------------------------------------

    Here's my work so far... cheers
     


  • JoseGR
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    JoseGR polycounter lvl 5
    @Babuira I follow the exact same workflow as said before: to sculpt the major forms, to duplicate the sculpture, to make the retopo with Zremesher or QuickDraw in Maya (great tool) and then project the details from the original sculpt onto the new one in Z.

    @OniRice great work so far. Like so much how the head is looking. I would only suggest making a bit thicker the arms, right now they look too thin in my opinion.

    @bkost keep it up! Its anatomy is looking good so far

    Haven't posted in a while because I couldn't give so much time to challenge so haven't made^^U Anyway, I got some free time this morning and worked a little on the face. I'm not totally happy with it, I think I should make her look a bit more "cocky" (not sure if that's the right word, I'm not an English native^^U)



  • jewski-bot
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    jewski-bot polycounter lvl 4
    With all of these great looking WIPs, I'm pretty sure that I'm out of my league, but I did say I wanted to give this a try when this started.  Sorry for the delay, my first attempt wasn't too good as I was trying to sculpt Anubis with Zspheres and everything seemed to be a bit wonky, so instead I'm attempting to go by a single Dynamesh Sphere for the body with the exception of the eyes.

    I know that there's a lot of work that still needs to be done, especially with ironing out some of the proportions, and tightening up of the muscles (after I get the forms down that is).


    I want to say that the above is about 5 hours of work, but keep in mind that this is the second attempt at Anubis, not the first.
  • bkost
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    bkost interpolator
    @JoseGR Nice work man, for the "cocky" attitude maybe you could look into pursing her lips.

    e.g. 

    ===========

    @jewski-bot Hey dont let other's works let you down, I usually try not to compare my work to others instead compare it to my last project. One big thing I notice in your piece is the "lumpy-ness". You're working in too high of a subdivision too early in the game. Try to slowly build up forms, blocking out major masses then work your way into more details. Look into zremesh and multiple subtools
  • jewski-bot
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    jewski-bot polycounter lvl 4
    bkost said:
    ===========

    @jewski-bot Hey dont let other's works let you down, I usually try not to compare my work to others instead compare it to my last project. One big thing I notice in your piece is the "lumpy-ness". You're working in too high of a subdivision too early in the game. Try to slowly build up forms, blocking out major masses then work your way into more details. Look into zremesh and multiple subtools
    Thanks for the feedback! I typically do hard surface modeling in modo; the last zbrush sculpt I tried was a head bust of Michael Keaton as Batman and that was over a year ago.  Vehicles tend to be more my thing, but I wanted to expand into sculpting so if I need it, it's there.

    I think that the most difficult issue I'm having outside of lumpy geometry is determining the necessary resolution for details that are carved in via standard or damian standard brushes.

    Another thing is that I tend to focus on building up individual parts rather than the whole of something.


  • carvuliero
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    carvuliero hero character
    I think that the most difficult issue I'm having outside of lumpy geometry is determining the necessary resolution for details that are carved in via standard or damian standard brushes.

    Another thing is that I tend to focus on building up individual parts rather than the whole of something.


    Hey there @jewski-bot
    I might be able to help you with resolution problem you have 
    For example if we take standard zbrush sphere , you can use 32/64 res for big shapes and up one above for details , its roughly 2-300k for a full nude body at least for me 
    I do not advice using standard brush for anything else then stamping alphas , try move/claybuildup combo or move/trimdynamic , for a broad changes use move elastic 
    Also a good practice is to work from big to small or whole to parts not the other way around 

  • jewski-bot
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    jewski-bot polycounter lvl 4
    I think that the most difficult issue I'm having outside of lumpy geometry is determining the necessary resolution for details that are carved in via standard or damian standard brushes.

    Another thing is that I tend to focus on building up individual parts rather than the whole of something.


    Hey there @jewski-bot
    I might be able to help you with resolution problem you have 
    For example if we take standard zbrush sphere , you can use 32/64 res for big shapes and up one above for details , its roughly 2-300k for a full nude body at least for me 
    I do not advice using standard brush for anything else then stamping alphas , try move/claybuildup combo or move/trimdynamic , for a broad changes use move elastic 
    Also a good practice is to work from big to small or whole to parts not the other way around 

    Hey there!  To give you an idea as to how I started off, I began by deforming a dynamesh sphere at the default resolution (32, I believe) and began trying to sculpt the muscles as related to the torso until I was relatively happy, resetting the poly flow via dynamesh as needed.  Next, I would start extruding out the neck and into the head, and gradually trying to define muscles and crease lines.  In order to preserve the details, I would increase dynamesh to 64, then 128, then 256 (I'm currently at 512, but I think I can redynamesh at 256 since I haven't noticed anything substantially change).

    I then went to extrude out the ears, arms, and legs, feet, hands, and fingers, attempting to work from the torso out.

    The brushes I have been using have been primarily standard, move, clay buildup, damian standard, and flatten.

    I suppose I could just cheat and do the body parts IMMs, but I'd rather learn how to sculpt properly.

    I might consider trying another scratch build tonight if it makes more sense than to work with what I currently have.
  • carvuliero
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    carvuliero hero character
    Just a little example to show you how little you really need to make something look like a human , few lines here and there 
    My suggestion is to keep resolution at low till you have something like that (legs not fused of course) and only when you need extra for small details to up res . Working just in silhouette early on can save you a lot of time later (this is actually how some traditional sculptors work so they have somewhere to place their measurements )



  • jewski-bot
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    jewski-bot polycounter lvl 4
    @carvuliero, that's an interesting method for hitting all the major shapes and I haven't thought of using silhouttes.  I've been relying on some of the nude model photographs and anatomical illustrations found in the book, "Anatomy for the Artist".  Before using ZBrush, I would attempt to trace over model sheets and build base meshes in Maya or 3DS Max (though those days are LONG gone) and experiment with the sub-D previews for getting the smoothing right.

    I might try to back and attempt a third iteration focusing on more gradually developing the body, though I'll admit it'll probably be an exercise in patience.  Let me ask, does it make more sense to sculpt nearly everything out of a single dynamesh sphere, or should I have major parts as separate subtools (torso as one subtool, head and neck as another, arms yet another, and so forth...), and then attempt to union them / dynamesh them together for when I'm ready to do the more subtle details?

    Thanks for your continuing assistance!  
  • yav_yen
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    yav_yen polycounter lvl 5
    Hello everyone! Loving all the comments and progresses here. I haven't had much time to work on the model. I changed the facial shapes a little bit and added some detail to the clothes. 


  • carvuliero
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    carvuliero hero character
    @jewski-bot There is not rules , its about your personal choice and what you are most comfortable with . If you don't know yet try them all : single sphere , multiple  pieces , base mesh , zspheres , mannequins , what ever else you can thing of   . I personally use last 2 methods , you can build some proportion early one also adjust them to match what you are working on , after that I spit in groups with dynamesh(dynamesh group option) which separate each group but keep them as one model  (I have attached an extreme case of this strategy , normal;y do just arm so they doesnt stick to the body then dynamesh )At this point you can separate each ground and apply different resolution if need more details (you can see in the picture her body is not as dense and her hand/feet )
  • bkost
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    bkost interpolator
    @yav_yen Great progress! I'm liking your armor detailing, how did you go about that? It seems the ornamental detail is a separate subtool. One thing I'd consider is checking out the proportions of her face, in the concept it looks for "oval-ly". Whats your plan for the dreadlocks?

    Here is my update, I've been working in marvelous designer for the clothing and have been using a 3d scan of my friends dog to reference for Anubis' head. I screencapped a few angles, I hope it is of some help for ya'll.

    -----------------------------------------------------------------------------




  • JoseGR
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    JoseGR polycounter lvl 5
    @bkost great progress. Really like how the clothes look. Just realized that the ears might be too rounded. They remind me two horns in the front view.

    Haven't made so much progress but here it is. Tried to make the outfit using Marvelous Designer but didn't work out so I'm sculpting it eventually.




  • CocoaCup
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    CocoaCup polycounter lvl 6
    Hi everyone! 

    Amazing concepts this month :) I picked Anubis, unfortunately I don't  have much free time to work on it. I have started blocking of the character, but there is lot of work to do. 



  • JoseGR
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    JoseGR polycounter lvl 5
    Update! I've been working this morning on the outfit



  • bkost
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    bkost interpolator
    @CocoaCup Hey! Your block out is coming along nicely. Few critiques I have for you.... Check out Anubis' torso and the shape of his ribcage, right now the curve is too obtuse. The knee anatomy is also looking wonky, check out some anatomy reference for that.

    @JoseGR I can understand why MD isnt working out in your favor. Her clothes are skin tight! Nice progress so far, one thing that I immediately noticed is the length of her jaw bone. Either shorten that or bring the neck a bit forward...

    ----------------------------------

    Here is my update so far, I've got the Cloth n Gold all unwrapped onto one map. Next up is unwrapping the Torso, Head, Legs, and weapon.
    Then onto texturing!



  • alibaba17
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    alibaba17 polycounter lvl 5
    Here's my lastest WIP, lowpoly with texture and about 33k tris. Next is do a simple rig and pose this guy.



    @CocoaCup  Welcome to the challenge, you can always continue to finish it even the challenge time is over, as long as you learn something from it. The upper body is quite big from my opinion, and the ear shape is not smooth, anyway, good start.

    @JoseGR I like her body proportion, have some style in her. I notice she missing some armor pieces on her right shoulder and the "ring" on her right wrist should it be same with the left one?

    @bkost  Is this hipoly? I'm asking this because I'm wondering isn't it very difficult to create lowpoly from a posed hipoly, since he is not symmetry.
  • bkost
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    bkost interpolator
    @alibaba17 Hey there, this piece has multiple subdivisions in Zbrush. I made sure to have nice topology when I zRemeshed to Low Poly, then divided up to sculpt in details. As for posing, I have no plans to rig this piece so he'll just be a static mesh. For UV'ing I'm just going to layout the full body and legs instead of mirroring

  • JoseGR
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    JoseGR polycounter lvl 5
    @alibaba17 I wouldn't say the bracelets in both of wrists are the same, they look different in the concept.
    Great work! Looking forward to see it posed. May I ask which software you'll use for posing? Rigging is not my thing actually and I'm still looking for a software to always use for rig.

    @bkost is her neck looking better? I didn't really understand what you meant by "either shorten that or bring the neck a bit forward". 
    I'll be calling this done soon^^ I guess that this week I'll finish her shoes, belt and hair. Btw, does somebody know what kind of hair she has? Bubble braids?







  • alibaba17
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    alibaba17 polycounter lvl 5
    @bkost I see. So there will be no sharing uv right, since all mesh will have their own uv island and they are not symmetrical. 

    @JoseGR My bad :s I'm using maya to rig and pose, since this is the software i am more familiar with. This is the first time i rig and pose a character from zero, so this will be a good learning time for me. 
  • bkost
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    bkost interpolator
    @JoseGR Hey there, your model is coming along nicely! Are you close to texturing yet? Yes the neck looks nicer, and the neck piece sits nicely. Yea her hair is a little funny, but if I were creating her hair I'd grab reference of dreadlocks.

    @alibaba17 Yes that is correct. and I also have two different UV maps. One for the Cloth & Gold and the other for the Skin.
    ---------------------------------

    I'm now working on developing the textures, focusing on just the Cloth and Gold. I used Substance Painter for the texturing process, I'm getting there but not too happy with the results at the moment. Somethings wrong but I cant nail it



    (What do you think of my head model? It seems pretty large and not too sharp)


  • JoseGR
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    JoseGR polycounter lvl 5
    Hi there!

    @bkost I guess I'll go after the dreadlocks... The problem is that I can't imagine how her haircut would look in real life; plus I wouldn't say she has dreadlocks when I look at the concept, I don't know, I'l figure it out :/  Yes! I'll start the texturing process soon, I only have to add some more straps to the girl and the high poly will be done.
    Those materials look awesome, I really like the fabric material. I would try to add a bit more of "dirtiness", like simulating sand or something.
    With respect to the head, I agree with you about the size of its head, right now it is a bit too large yet I would not say it needs to be sharped

    I'm so happy to say that I've finished the cloth "ornaments"  :)  So, as said before, the high poly is almost done. I might work on her haircut later on when the texturing is done.





  • bkost
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    bkost interpolator
    @JoseGR Hey man, your model is coming along nicely! I eager to see what you have planned for the hair. What program do you plan to use for texturing?

    -------------------

    Look Dev...






  • Torch
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    Torch interpolator
    Wow the guys on the Anubis sculpts are really nailing the concept, looks great (I need to catch up XD )

    I like that separate subtool method of placing anatomy too, learned that from Matt Thorup's anatomy tut, it might be slower but when learning anatomy can take a lot of the guess work out. Anyway cool stuff look forward to seeing  more!
  • JoseGR
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    JoseGR polycounter lvl 5
    @bkost I'll use Substance Painter, it's the one I always use^^
    Now your Anubis is looking way better :O

  • Sunray
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    Sunray polycounter lvl 7
    @bkost really liking the texture work man nice cloth the arms muscles could be a bit more shredded tho.
  • yav_yen
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    yav_yen polycounter lvl 5
    Hey everyone,

    I couldn't share most of my progress recently mostly because I wasted a ridiculous amount of time on the hair, re-doing it over and over again. I learned so much about game-ready polygonal hair but still, I am not very satisfied with how it looks at the moment. I also worked on re-topologizing the body and clothes. And, lai
    d out the UV's. There is still too much work to be done, and only little time left. So, I am calling this done for now. If I ever get the chance to work on this again, I will share my final result. Below are the wireframe, low-res and high-res images.


    @bkost Thanks! I used a pretty simple mask and extrude method for some parts. And for some of the ornamental details, I duplicated the cloth subtool, subdivided it, masked the details and created a new polygroup out of the masked area, polished by features, isolated the new polygroup, deleted the hidden polygroup and finally remeshed everything to a point where I didn't lose much of the volume. Thanks for bringing that issue with the face. For the dreadlocks, I created a simple hair-like planar shape and created some basic UV's. After that, it was all about duplicating the UV'ed shapes. 
  • bkost
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    bkost interpolator
    currently working on the skin material... having quite a bit of trouble making it somewhat realistic. Any tips on skin shading for the whole body? 




  • JoseGR
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    JoseGR polycounter lvl 5
    Hi there!

    @bkost sad I can't help you out. I started from the skin material in Substance and made some changes^^U

    Working on the textures at the moment. I just made a quick Marmoset scene to check out whether the textures are working or not and that's how it's looking so far. The hair is still a blockout. I think I should start posing the character.

  • Alemja
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    Alemja quad damage
    Hey everybody a new challenge is up!
    http://polycount.com/discussion/192011/the-bi-monthly-character-art-challenge-october-november/p1?new=1


    You guys have been doing great so far! I hope you guys keep working on your models
    What to do if you haven't finished this challenge and want to continue:
    • You can continue to post in this thread, it will just no longer be stickied
    • Or you can make your own thread and work on it from there
  • JoseGR
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    JoseGR polycounter lvl 5
    Well guys, four days late but I can say that I eventually finished Zeal B) Would be great to get some feedback^^
    You'll find more screenshot in my Artstation profile https://www.artstation.com/artwork/RdvEv

    See ya on future Challenges  ;)





  • Alemja
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    Alemja quad damage
    @JoseGR I have some feedback for you! Keep in mind some of it is subjective:

    • The material feel is very similar across the whole model, the skin has the same roughness as the clothes
    • A slightly more dynamic pose like the concept would help make it look more interesting and sell the character more.
    • The hairstyle you have is very different than the concept version, both in color and look. The concept's hair is darker and is made up of chunky braids
    • Front of her feet where the toes would be are very narrow.
    • The gold bracelets on her wrists should be a little thicker.

    There is currently a new challenge up, it would be awesome to see you join! http://polycount.com/discussion/192011/the-bi-monthly-character-art-challenge-october-november#latest

  • JoseGR
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    JoseGR polycounter lvl 5
    @Alemja thanks! I know the hairstyle is quite different from the concept but I had some troubles making it, like I didn't picture it on my mind... Finally I did something like that in order to finish the model kind of "at the deadline".

    According the roughness of the clothes, what's the common setting for them? I kind of get lost with it^^U
  • Alemja
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    Alemja quad damage
    @JoseGR For skin the roughness tends to be on the whiter side, as skin is generally not that shiny unless it is wet or in specific areas (like the lips) For cloth, the roughness can vary greatly depending on the material, and this is where some research is going to have to come in. Clothing almost always has some form of threading that will break up the roughness as well, you would definitely apply it even if the character is stylized, it would probably be on the more subtle end.
  • JoseGR
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    JoseGR polycounter lvl 5
    @Alemja thank you! I guess the problem was that I wasn't able to picture all those things^^U I'll bear them in mind for future works
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