Desert Wanderer (WIP)

davidmlally

Hey all!
This is a WIP character that I've been working on in my free time. He's a scrapper and a wanderer, picking up parts of things to equip himself with throughout his travels. Once I get this base idea done, I'd like to add more trinkets and things along his belt. This is being done in Maya, ZBrush, and Marvelous at the moment. Thanks for checking it out --C&C more than welcome!

Final Update ( 9/8 ) Thank you all for the C&C along the way!
Turntable Video: http://vimeo.com/74034014


Update (8/25) Texture & Material Setup


Update (8/10) w/ Low Res Cloth


-David

Mischievous

Nice work, but I have to say that when I first glanced at this, I immediately perceived his red loincloth hangy thingie as if it's the red cape showing between his legs and made me a bit confused at first as to how perspective goes. The two accessories just blend together so well, that I would usggest somehow adding a clear border on the loincloth. Like maybe a silver outlining and some shadow behind it on his legs or similar to show the viewer that it's a separate thing. Other than that it seems very nice, I also like the cape wrinkles, keep it up

davidmlally

Thanks for the comment! Yeah, I'm not really sold on the color choices just yet at all, and I'll be sure to watch the loin cloth. I want it to feel like all of his pieces are either hand-made or gathered/stolen from other people. I was thinking that having differing colors with various insignia from various regions in this world would help show that he's 'been around' and doesn't belong to any one place. Just a thought! Thanks again-

davidmlally

Some minor updates. Added some cloth folds to the boots and minor detailing elsewhere. Oh...and hands!

davidmlally

Some more detailing updates! I've temporarily removed the coloring to focus more on the overall form. The legs were feeling a bit long before as well, so they've been shortened and re-positioned slightly. Hopefully more to come soon!

garriola83

Good start man. Something about those boots, how it transitions from the shin to the foot...it bothers me a bit. It's too clean and it tapers in way too much. There should be some compression from the shaft of the boot pressing down on the ankles thus giving it wrinkles. And it shouldn't taper that much. Here are some examples that could help out.



also boot toes tips flip up a bit

Good luck!

davidmlally

Great note, thanks for the photo references too! I'll take a pass at this.

davidmlally

More progress in ZBrush on the Desert Wanderer. Attempting to detail some cloth folds on the boots and some cloth detailing and damage detailing on the arm bracers and shoulderpads. Tried to address some of garriola's notes but may have to take another pass.

davidmlally

Revisiting some of the notes from this thread (namely boots) and forging on to detail some other areas of the character (bracers, belts, high freq detailing). I have some other details I'd like to add but I'm getting close to moving onto a retopology stage for the lower resolution character, prior to some texturing. Any other comments & critiques are welcome though! Thanks!



-dlally

davidmlally

Hey all, I've made some updates on the Desert Wanderer character. I've started to lay down some base colors to help give myself an idea of what the final product will look like when I paint the low-poly. I've added some high freq details, and am also trying a new look by giving him more of a mask and scar across the face. Some things are still pretty IP, such as the brooch emblem, and general damage details. Comments and crits are always welcome, thanks for taking a look!

davidmlally

I've started to decimate certain regions and take them back into Maya as I begin to plan the retopology. Since I still have the pattern for the cloak and hood, I will potentially be re-simulating those elements in Marvelous Designer after posing the body of the character. I still have some other refinements to make and I haven't really done many finer detailing bits just yet (especially on the pants, belt, and so on. Here's the latest though --all comments and critiques welcome!

davidmlally

I took a pass at fleshing out some of the details of the face before continuing as I've decided to lose the mask and show more of an angry expression in the final pose.

davidmlally

Some of the latest render tests of the decimated version. Some details are coming through too sharp in the decimated real-time view of Maya, so I might take a pass at softening a few things and relying more heavily on texture details when I get there. I think I'm going to call this base done soon, re-topo, then come back around to add some smaller trinkets and maybe a weapon along the waistline. Thanks for checking it out!

davidmlally

I'm trying to see how far ZRemesher and other auto-retopo tools will get me before jumping into Topogun. Some results are better than others, but the output is definitely salvageable.

davidmlally

Hey again guys! The last pass at retopology wasn't really favorable for a good polycount so I decided to combine more pieces and take more manual control in Topogun where needed. I still have a ways to go but I thought I'd share some progress! Thanks for checking it out. -dlally



Also, here's a visual breakdown of an experiment using ZBrush's Dynamesh and ZRemesher together for retopology:

Nirvana

Hey David,

Nice work mate. you nailed the boots pretty nicely, and ZRemesher is sweet. keep it up.

davidmlally

Hey Nirvana, thanks for the comment!

davidmlally

Hey again all! I've finally completed the low-res retopology for my Wanderer character using a combination of Topogun and ZRemesher (which has been fantastic). I've posed the character and baked most of the high-res details back into the low poly mesh. Here's a look:



With this pose, I've created a lower resolution collision body that I'll be using in Marvelous to create a more dynamic pose for the cloth. I still have my 2d cloth patterns from the last go round, so the new cloth work is more about posing with added wind fields, etc.

Here's a look at setting up the collision body using Dynamesh and ZRemesher:


With this, I've been able to go back into Marvelous to generate much more dynamic poses for my cloth meshes. The hood, scarf, sash, and cloak will all be simulated, poly-reduced, and included in the final turntable for this character. Here's a preview of the cloth work so far:



Thanks for taking a look!

davidmlally

Latest update with the low-res cloth. I'm hoping to clean up some of these baked maps today, then start laying down some base colors.

davidmlally

Hey again Polycount,

I started to lay down some color on this character and took a first pass at applying some materials, using Marmoset to preview everything. Here's where I'm at so far:



Thanks for taking a look!

thepapercut

Nicely done.

davidmlally

Hey papercut, thanks for the comment!

davidmlally

A bit grainy, but here's another view from Marmoset as I start to play with some better presentation parameters and make additional shader tweaks.

DEDE_pig

I feel that you need to work more on the face in term of texture.
The face feel flat in term of colours.
Look at those face close-up, the face actually have a lot of different colour's temperature.

The eyes of the face is the most important of the whole face because it tend to attract people attention first.
So you might wanna work more eyes too, like adding AO or some fine details like the corner of the eyes.

The pants need more work around the crotch area in term of folds.

And lastly, keep the works going !

davidmlally

Good note. I'll certainly be taking another pass at the face texture. Thanks for the comment!

Dimfist

That hood is bugging me. I feel like its not draping properly on the head, there are some weird wrinkles and folds. Basically it would be as heavy as the wrest of the cape but to me the way its draping feels like its a very thin material, almost papery. I'd also paint in some more his on it to create some contrast. You got a lot going on, just make sure you have some AO in there to help separate pieces and materials as well as some texture to make them pop.

davidmlally

Cool, good note. I'll see if I can simplify that a bit and revisit the texture for additional contrast + separation. Thanks for the comment!

davidmlally

Here's the final VP2.0 renders of my 'Wanderer' character. I've reached the end of my free time set aside for this character, addressing the notes that I could, and it's time to move on! Thank you so much to everyone that gave C&C along the way. Much appreciated!

Turntable Video: http://vimeo.com/74034014



On to the next one!