Sword Singer: Wage war like water [Blizzard Char. Student Art Contest 2014]
high dynamic range
Hey Polycount:
So, I've made a decision, I'm going with this theme:
Shaia Podders, Sword Singer: Unlike many warriors of the Horde or Alliance, Sword Singers concentrate more on form and technique as opposed to the size of their sword or brute strength. Some remark they flow like water when they fight. And those brave enough to challenge these wandering Sword Singers usually find themselves outmatched after their first strike.
Inspiration/Reference: [ame="
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HRDG6np1GlA"]Syrio Forel, the First Sword of Braavos [Game of Thrones][/ame]
Planned Pipeline
Thumbnails > Concept > ZBrush rough sculpt > Final sculpt > Retopo > UV > Bake > Texture
Definitely humbly requesting that people hit me with feedback and critiques. This one's going to be a rough ride.
Current WIP:
Sword Singer WIP 09
Texturing! Any critiques?
So, I've made a decision, I'm going with this theme:
Shaia Podders, Sword Singer: Unlike many warriors of the Horde or Alliance, Sword Singers concentrate more on form and technique as opposed to the size of their sword or brute strength. Some remark they flow like water when they fight. And those brave enough to challenge these wandering Sword Singers usually find themselves outmatched after their first strike.
Inspiration/Reference: [ame="
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HRDG6np1GlA"]Syrio Forel, the First Sword of Braavos [Game of Thrones][/ame]Planned Pipeline
Thumbnails > Concept > ZBrush rough sculpt > Final sculpt > Retopo > UV > Bake > Texture
Definitely humbly requesting that people hit me with feedback and critiques. This one's going to be a rough ride.
Current WIP:
Sword Singer WIP 09
Texturing! Any critiques?
Replies
Any one of these stand out as a good, effective silhouette?
Anything without the big capes and flowing cloth bits. While it might look cool, I just get the feeling that a proficient swordsman wouldn't want capes and stuff getting in the way. I like the idea of a very tight fitting leather, showing of a very athletic form. So it looks graceful and deadly rather than having capes and chains and ornaments everywhere.
Also, I don't know the rules of the contest, but if it's Blizzard I guess it's lowpoly, so all those little details you put on some silhouettes are useless and won't be in the 3D model, they are just disturbing.
Do you already have an idea/ref of what you want to do ?
For me it's kind of a mouse warrior..? If so, I'd strongly suggest looking at some of the redwall book covers, excellent covers in and of themselves, but pretty relevent if that's what you're going for.
Couple of examples:
It would appear (unfortunately) that finding decently sized images of these covers is nigh on impossible, as is finding any images of some of the covers I remember gawking at in the library as a kid, which were unfortunately some of the better ones, and as I remember them more relevant to you than the ones above
But if you are going for one of those 'animal warrior' things, I always thought that redwall did it best. And as luck would have it seems that this person does some pretty decent fan art for the series, chichapies.
Anyway, hopefully something there helped.
I'm going to take a dive through this guy's deviant art page.
Any one of these looking the best?
Greyscale rendering of the final concept in progress.
Taking a LOT of confidence and inspiration from The Witcher with their reference to medeival western europe armory and garb.
Thoughts?
If you look at the body types of WoW characters, they each more or less have some form of cartoonish exaggeration. I kinda think that the cart is being put before the horse in this scenario.
You're trying to introduce a new race to the WarCraft lore. What does the level 1 version of this thing look like? Scratch that, what do these things look like in their skivvies?
My advice: First, silhouette studies of "naked" WoW characters - 1 male, 1 female from each race. Figure out where they're being exaggerated and why. Next, use this information to inform where and how you will exaggerate these things.
Then, ask yourself more about the culture of these things. How and why is it that they have come into a reputation of "flowing like water?" Who formed the tenets of their society? What are the tenets of that society? What virtue do they hold above all others? What is their greatest vice? What is their preferred weapon? What professions/classes do they exalt and/or abhor?
Find the answers to these questions, and THEN ask yourself how their armor would look.
But, that's just what I think.
EDIT: fixed messed-up idiom...
Just thoughts.
I'd be honest to say I'm at a loss for what culture to roll with the WoW hasn't done. for this character.
What about a desert antelope. You already have slight touches on that "dune"-like look in the above concept (tight fitting with wrapped scarf around the neck).
/ps I know that taurens can wear plate armor in game and can also equip finest elven weapons, but their selling point was in the very first WoW intro, and its kinda sticks, no matter what.
Medieval Turkish can go towards crusaders or traditional middle-eastern themes, up to you really. Just a matter of building it out. You shouldn't need to change the build of the character too much, just add some distinguishing features (coloration, horns, etc). There's a couple of different desert species so look about see what you like.
You can also go saharian if you want. Might also want to look at mountain antelope or goat for other variety. With Tauren they definately took a lot of influences from a lot of different bovine for the horns and overall coloration.
(I agree on the armadillo, I edited it out of an earlier post because it wasn't that important.)
So with suggestion and brainstorming you guys have done, I'm pushing this towards a Persian/Turkish inspired design, and changing the species to an Anthropomorphic Antelope.
I'm feeling confident about this, but time is short. Hopefully the silhouette here is crazy enough.
The value scheme isn't refined, I'm still blocking armor and clothing before I do value checking and adjustments.
Thoughts?
I think I am close. I know the silhouette is still not super crazy, but I hope the artists on the World of Warcraft team might see this silhouette as serving a lithe and nimble figure isntead of the player armor sets of huge and epic.
Am I ready to go and sculpt, Polycount?
Starting rough body sculpt. Moving onto rough armor and clothing sculpt.
Rushing down the pipe, should get to UV's soon once I figure out the afghan, additional topology edits for limbs, etc.
I think I'm happy with the sword geo. I wanted to keep it simple anyways, like Needle from "Game of Throne."
Anyone see anything stand out to fix in terms of wireframe or topology?
Free-view the model here.
- Agree with above folks that forms could be more exaggerated. The places where pieces of the costume overlap could have the overlapping edges pushed outwards more to make it look more chunky.
- You might want to show more of the upper thigh pads (the things under the skirt) because the striped pattern on these in your concept is cool so you might as well show them off more
- I'd make the chest jewel a little bigger, and maybe add geo for the metal pieces around it to give them some form and make the chest plate area kind of a focus
- You have the trailing neck sash in the back - you could also drape part of it over the front of the chest plate for some asymmetry
- Maybe make the head smaller? It seems a bit too beefy for an antelope
- Just throwing this out there, I know your plan was to go for a straight rapier for the sword, but I think it would look cool if the sword mirrored the curving shape of the antlers. You could repeat that motif elsewhere too, like maybe curve the shoulder pads outward a bit or something.
Texturing! Any critiques?
Also I feel too much noise in the kilt and chain mail. WoW tends to simplify many tiny things into fewer chunkier forms. Consider chains like these, or even scales.
just my 2c. I can't wait to see the final!
Cool start though, keep going and make sure you finish!