Sketchbook: JST - Character and Asset Artist
polycounter lvl 8
Greetings and welcome to my sketchbook! I've decided to use polycount as a diary to document my path to greatness(/employment) just because lets face it, this forum rocks 
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Anyway! Quick bio; My real name is Joseph Samuel Taskis (JST - www.taskisjs.wordpress.com) and I have recently graduated from the University of Hertfordshire (http://uhanimation.co.uk/) studying 3d Animation Game Art. I'm not blowing my horn here but UH animation is probably one of the best schools in the country. A) because the lecturers are experienced and close to gods of their specialisation and
because of our industry connections. I've loved every second at University, but now I want to go pro. The only way I'm going to do this is by making a kick ass portfolio and showreel. The main purpose of this sketchbook is to test my work and show to you lot so you can comment and give advice. I would be so grateful for any and all feedback.
Enough about that. I'd like to document today as day 1. 21 August 2012 is the day I went pro. Here is my current showreel of the things I have worked on. I will place a breakdown of my work below this video:
http://vimeo.com/45298516
My first question is how do I embed a video here on polycount? I looked along the edit bar and can't find it :S.
Let's begin. Below are renders and breakdowns of my current work. Any and all improvements will be documented as they come.
Fallen Legend Project Brief:
Produce a real time Game Trailer. The game concept you run with will be chosen and developed in your group. You are asked to model, texture, light and produce a short realtime games trailer with sound and titles. The trailer should be a minimum of 1.10 minutes long and should be to the quality of a vertical slice.
To produce the characters, assets and environments for my part of this group project, I researched extensively from historical texts (in transcription), manuals of military practice, period paintings and collated this series of images as a starting point.
.Anyway! Quick bio; My real name is Joseph Samuel Taskis (JST - www.taskisjs.wordpress.com) and I have recently graduated from the University of Hertfordshire (http://uhanimation.co.uk/) studying 3d Animation Game Art. I'm not blowing my horn here but UH animation is probably one of the best schools in the country. A) because the lecturers are experienced and close to gods of their specialisation and
because of our industry connections. I've loved every second at University, but now I want to go pro. The only way I'm going to do this is by making a kick ass portfolio and showreel. The main purpose of this sketchbook is to test my work and show to you lot so you can comment and give advice. I would be so grateful for any and all feedback.Enough about that. I'd like to document today as day 1. 21 August 2012 is the day I went pro. Here is my current showreel of the things I have worked on. I will place a breakdown of my work below this video:
http://vimeo.com/45298516
My first question is how do I embed a video here on polycount? I looked along the edit bar and can't find it :S.
Let's begin. Below are renders and breakdowns of my current work. Any and all improvements will be documented as they come
.Fallen Legend Project Brief:
Produce a real time Game Trailer. The game concept you run with will be chosen and developed in your group. You are asked to model, texture, light and produce a short realtime games trailer with sound and titles. The trailer should be a minimum of 1.10 minutes long and should be to the quality of a vertical slice.
To produce the characters, assets and environments for my part of this group project, I researched extensively from historical texts (in transcription), manuals of military practice, period paintings and collated this series of images as a starting point.
Replies
In the meantime here's the breakdowns of my work so far. Below is my super soaker asset for use in a games engine.
Currently, I'm just tidying up the Diffuse and Normal maps and I will put this one to rest then.
Just as a note, I have scaled down the foot. I would love any and all critique on this peice as I want to make this a short and sweet showreel piece. I know I can do it, I just need pointers and guidance in the right direction. Once this part is complete, I will then build his Trench coat and Rifle.
I need some serious help trying to figure out what isn't working here. I feel I'm getting close to getting the head right. But there's perhaps some proportions that are off. It's an easy fix in Zbrush though (thankfully
I've made seperate wireframe renders of the elements of the Lo-Res, but I'll upload them tommorow
My brief is to create law enforcement and criminal characters from a dystopian background. We're assuming the time period is sometime around 2100 AD. We are taking references from Judge Dredd, The Raid Redemption, Blade Runner, and all other kinds of Sci-fi (The aim isn't to make the unit's too techy but I'm welcome to multiple ideas).
I have a flickr that I'm uploading to then linking to here (http://www.flickr.com/photos/102616756@N07/). Im sketching on paper and photoshop. I'd appreciate any feedback on my work and any idea's on where to get more reference from.
"But there's perhaps some proportions that are off."
Yep. Pardon the pun, but you're on the nose.
" It's an easy fix in Zbrush though"
Well, that's a different story. Instead of rushing through to the details, you need to make sure that your sculpt foundation is bang on. Details come later. If you focus on developing the planes first, you develop the likeness. Rush through that, and it won't matter what you do. In other words, done well, the likeness is evident even in really early stages of the sculpt. Overall form & proportion.
Don't take my word for it though - I believe in this guy: Phillipe Faraut
[ame="http://www.amazon.com/Mastering-Portraiture--Advanced-Analyses-Sculpted/dp/0975506560/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1391476969&sr=8-3&keywords=faraut"]Mastering Portraiture- Advanced Analyses of the Face Sculpted in Clay: Philippe Faraut, Charisse Faraut: 9780975506561: Amazon.com: Books[/ame]
My .02, worth price charged.
Yeah you are absolutely right. I have been quite busy with other game projects recently but I am definitely going to go back there and keep working on it
Cheers for the link, I'll check it out when I can. Do you have any other sources I could look at for guidance in Zbrush or general sculpting?
I need some advice on getting the proportions for this "Richard Sharpe" character right. I'm still only an amateur and need some guidance
Check this for comparison or do a quick google search
Any and all advice I'd greatly appreciate because I'm struggling here Like I've hit a wall of sorts.
This is a character Design Sheet I'm currently working on
Leaving this asset until I can get a fresh pair of eyes on it. I will be continuing on with the Richard Sharpe Character. Any and all crit is most welcome
Doing this quickly for a video game I'm helping build. thought I'd take the oppurtunity to get my head around mirroring UV's and the like.
1.4k Poly's
1024 Diffuse texture
and he has a tail ^^
Late last night I was just chilling out and sketching and came out with this
Crit all you like but this was really just me messing around. But if I take this further I'd aim to make it a nice character concept piece
Also in other news the flick knife is done and been rendered in marmoset with mirrored normals (Which I've got to work for the first time!).
Maaaaan I always struggle with applying colour
This character piece originally was for a competition that was posted up at Gamescom 2016 (something like, draw/cosplay as a character you want to attend Gamescom as) so I decided to create a super gamer/hacker with skills in programming, engineering, holographics and Parkour. Think Mirrors Edge crossed with Tony Stark (but not quite his personality) and a hint of Ghost in the shell. This character is a leading expert in multiple fields (this character would be some kind of super hero) including Holographics, Augmented Reality and Computer Science (I'm using basic terms here as I haven't researched into each subject with depth. I will do when I have the time). He has been able to create a holographic projector which creates a hologram (the blue floating shape in front of our character) which he controls via a Gesture UI (there will be special gloves on his hands which I will create when I have the hands right). He has also created a set of Augmented Reality Glasses, all of which link back to his computer which sits on his belt. As he is a parkour artist all of his kit will be shock proof. I imagine his Slogan would be something like "Super Nerd not Super Hero".
My goal for this is to actually FINISH a concept Art piece. I'm almost done with the Line work (although I want to revisit the hands and trousers) and then I will move onto some colouring.
This guy is a character in Idea which will be the piece de resistance of my career. His name is the sculptor. The easiest way to describe this character is a blend between a summoner and a bladesinger from DnD. There is a huge backstory for this chap and the society/community he comes from which I won't get into. I'm trying to create a travelling scholar and warrior. His goal right now is to travel the world and observe all patterns in nature (including in flora and fauna) and to apply his skills to help them. So I need to be able to create someone who is light on their feet, can survive in any weather but also who is a powerful "sculptor". I expect once I finish the clothing and equipment I will have to add some rugged and dirt details in places. But I think I will also place him into a scene as well, perhaps some dark dungeon or forest. His pose and face suggests he is sensing something dangerous so I'm gonna roll with that.
So this is my current progress on my 'sculptor' Character. For context, He's a support character in a game I want to start working on soon. In my game there will be a rare skill/ability called Sculpting. This is where you can control the building blocks of materials and change them into something else. You could say it's Alchemy from Full Metal Alchemist, but instead of, Circles, chants or Hand signs, the ability just forms in your mind naturally. This character is almost the "Jesus" of this skill. He is the one in a million of his generation. He can see so far into materials that he can practically see the atomic structure of something, break it down and reforge it into something else. This idea of "sculpting" needs further work, and probably a patent
So ive added some textures and shadows, but im struggling with the skin and the lighting. I'm pretty set on where the lights are coming from, But I just need to figure out HOW to present them
Worked on the lights. I think Im happy with them now. But Im goin to make an environment from scratch and any light bounces on top of that.
So now I've finished the Linework on this, can't wait to get cracking with the colour and background. #DigitalArt #CharacterConcept #Lineart #WIP #DareToDream