Tutorials/Advice for character modelling before sculpting?
polycounter lvl 6
Hi guys,
Does anyone know of some good modelling tutorials for characters and character clothing/equipment/armor, or have any good tips on the subject?
I'm feel like I've learned a serviceable amount of what Zbrush can do in terms of sculpting, and I have no problems retopologizing (using 3Dcoat, it's great), my problem is my actual modelling skills were never that good, so I run into problems getting nice-looking subtools that work well when you're sculpting them.
I've made clothing using Zbrush extracts or even pieces starting from blobs or metaspheres, and sometimes it works but often they feel lumpy or pinched. I've seen, in Ryan Kingslien's Realistic Game Characters book, for instance, that you need to just model your belts or jackets or pants or what-have-you, but I'm not sure what the best way to go about that is to get everything to match work nicely in Zbrush and with whatever character model you have.
Just wondering if anyone knew of some good tuts for this kind of thing. I started with Cinema4D and am trying to move to Maya and I'm just kind of in a weird place modelling-wise. Thanks a bunch!
Does anyone know of some good modelling tutorials for characters and character clothing/equipment/armor, or have any good tips on the subject?
I'm feel like I've learned a serviceable amount of what Zbrush can do in terms of sculpting, and I have no problems retopologizing (using 3Dcoat, it's great), my problem is my actual modelling skills were never that good, so I run into problems getting nice-looking subtools that work well when you're sculpting them.
I've made clothing using Zbrush extracts or even pieces starting from blobs or metaspheres, and sometimes it works but often they feel lumpy or pinched. I've seen, in Ryan Kingslien's Realistic Game Characters book, for instance, that you need to just model your belts or jackets or pants or what-have-you, but I'm not sure what the best way to go about that is to get everything to match work nicely in Zbrush and with whatever character model you have.
Just wondering if anyone knew of some good tuts for this kind of thing. I started with Cinema4D and am trying to move to Maya and I'm just kind of in a weird place modelling-wise. Thanks a bunch!
Replies
I was wondering if anyone knew of some modelling workflows or tricks in modelling for character development. Maya-specific would be nice, but really anything, just to get an idea of how to approach it before going into Zbrush.
I don't know that it matters, but I am trying to do more realistic characters, not bulbous monster guys or crazy cyborgs or anything.
1. Make a Sculpt mesh in maya the mesh shouldn't have any topological flows. topological flows cause they cause problems while sculpting. Some artists just make a box and extrude a head and limbs then go to zbrush.
2. Make a mesh with dynamesh its more like sculpting with real clay and all you have to do in the end is retopo it to be animatable.
I prefer the former it helps control UVs and its easier to understand by looking at the topology where everything is.
All this said having a set facial topology is very useful. I use steven stahlberg's topology
I was looking at your work and what I feel about the clothing is you might have rushed through the subD levels if you do that it can become lumpy. You have to be sure that it looks perfect before you go up to another subD level to add more detail.
Also your sculpt topo needs to have proper spacing too close and there will be pinching too far and there will be stretch.
I took liberties to draw over your mesh I hope you don't mind.
The best way to visaulize this is to imagine every poly to be a pixel and that each one has to be of the same size. Avoid diamonds or triangles.
Here's a tunic I made recently by extracting from my human model in Zbrush and retopo'ing the subtool. You can see the quads are MOSTLY more even, except under the sleeves, but then I closed in the underside of the tunic and the sleeves, but not the neckline, hoping it would intersect the model. Just generally unsure of whether this is a good approach or not.
One question about your image, when you say "no topology", it looks like there is definitely edge-flow around the breasts, hips, hands, etc. Did you just mean it hasn't been retopologized yet?
Sorry for the late reply.. Your mesh looks good.
The edge flow is there because of reasons:
1. If you don't want it you would have to sculpt from a cube in zbrush subdividing many times this causes mismanagement of polygons and you will not achieve the highest detail possible.
2. Sculpting with edge flow helps.
Its easier to get the creases and flows of the sculpt. Like around the breasts it helps form a definite crease.
Marie Pepin explains more about the use of edge flows in zbrush https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x6z-iaAx1P4
For some types of clothing if you want to save yourself some hassle maybe use MarvelousDesigner? Anything with folds and wrinkles I'd prefer to do that way. You can do accessories that way too. For one it's much better to use UV's from a mesh that was flat to begin with (like a piece of cloth) and secondly if you want to change things or move the clothing around it's actually simulated and not just sculpted details.
Once you get the concept down the retopology can come into play and you can make some nice polygroups or whatever you'd like.