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Stylized "Space Marine" Suit

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Dmellott greentooth
Hello folks. I wanted to share the piece I am currently working on. It's a space marine type suit. My main goal for this piece is to diversify my portfolio and get more practice with stylized pieces. I also want to get better at understanding and implementing PBR into my pipeline so I will be texturing this piece in Substance with PBR in mind.

Alright, let's get to it!



I started with a rough sketch. I was mostly inspired by sci fi art from the 80's. I looked at a bunch of older space suit art pieces and I really liked the spherical shapes that were apparent in that era of sci-fi art. I also referenced Megaman and Blizzard's classic space marine design.

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  • Dmellott
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    Dmellott greentooth
    I immediately jumped into Zbrush and began blocking out my forms in Dynamesh.
    Throughout the modeling process I constantly checked the silhouette of the armor just by simply turning the material color to black and redrawing the mesh.

    It really helped me get an idea of how the overall shapes looked and how this character would look at various angles.


    Early Dynamesh

    uq6vOYq.png
  • Dmellott
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    Dmellott greentooth
    Further iteration. The feet were blobs for quite some time and in this iteration I wanted to focus on fleshing out the feet and exploring how the joints would work.

    I etched in some rough thigh pieces and knee pads. I also put in simple panel lines and cut in some plates to break up the larger forms.

    a6KkScx.png
  • Dmellott
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    Dmellott greentooth
    I wasnt really digging the way the knee pads were coming out and I nixed having them sorta built in to the shin piece and opted instead to making them separate and more akin to actual knee pads.

    I also squashed some of the proportions, especially for the feet to try and push the stylization more. I also refined the back of the neck a bit more and cut the outer shoulder plate inwards.

    Still experimenting with various shapes at this stage but after receiving some much needed feedback, I realized that someone needed to be able to enter and exit this thing and there was really no way for this guy to be able to bend his arms!


    rF1DaOW.png
  • Dmellott
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    Dmellott greentooth
    I changed some proportions around again and started defining the hand guard. I also seperated the joints a bit and etched in an undermesh of sorts to give the joints more flexibility.

    I also started polishing up some of the pieces I was happy with, still Dynamesh at this stage.


    xlDdX7F.png
  • Dmellott
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    Dmellott greentooth
    I got another round of feedback and made some larger form changes. The knees and forearms were not working well and I wasn't happy with the shapes so I started some pieces over from scratch. I call this Version 2.

    I opted for making the knees part of the shin again and sectioned off the back of the calf. I retopologized the pieces I wanted to keep along the way.

    I also cut the hand guard down the middle and made it a larger shape and more interesting (I feel). Added a backdoor and a flame thrower barrel for good measure as well!

    VU4ztQZ.png
  • Dmellott
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    Dmellott greentooth
    Now to the good stuff! At this stage the model is still a Dynamesh, I had collected reference to do the detailing but I really wanted to be able to see what the detailing would look like as a whole so I began details into the Dynamesh.

    I got some suggestions to reduce the number of vents on the back of the jetpack and that this guy should probably have a helmet of sorts so I added that in the next iteration.

    The proportions were not quite where I wanted them to be. He was feeling a bit too skinny in some areas and I was going for more bulky shapes.

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  • Dmellott
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    Dmellott greentooth
    This is the final mesh with all of the parts retopologized and all of the detailing in place.

    I am currently placing my UV shells onto my unwrap and will begin my bakes very soon! I'm going to be texturing this piece using PBR in Substance and doing renders in Unreal, pretty stoked to be working with new tech!

    xNq6RpE.png
  • Dmellott
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    Dmellott greentooth
    I'll post renders of my bakes hopefully within the next 24 hours provided everything works out! Please feel free to drop me any comments or critiques you might have! This project thus far has been a big learning experience, especially when it comes to adapting hard surface parts to organic shapes!
  • Brian "Panda" Choi
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    Brian "Panda" Choi high dynamic range
    Shapes are definitely there. It feels stubby and chunky overall.

    Design wise, you should pull back on the dimples. It just makes the character overall feel flat.
  • Dmellott
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    Dmellott greentooth
    Hello JadeEyePanda! I don't quite understand what you mean by dimples, do you mean all the little punched holes and such?
  • Dmellott
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    Dmellott greentooth
    Update on the bakes and texture. Giving it a first pass on color scheme / palette. I'm not so set on the look of the middle orange plates, looking forward to exploring it more over the next few days! If anyone has suggestions on the overall palette and scheme it would be a big help!

    RFwqRMw.png
  • Brian "Panda" Choi
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    Brian "Panda" Choi high dynamic range
    Yeah, I was talking about the punched holes.
  • Dmellott
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    Dmellott greentooth
    Thank you for the feedback Panda, I really appreciate your comment! I can definitely see what you are talking about with all the dimples, perhaps I went a bit overboard on that regard.

    Again, thank you very much for the feedback!
  • Dmellott
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    Dmellott greentooth
    Another update, I think I am finalized with this color scheme and palette. I'm going to do a thick black glass for the helmet piece. Still have a few parts I need to fix the normals for.

    0kUfhKf.png
  • Dmellott
  • Dmellott
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    Dmellott greentooth
    Texture updates!

    [IMG][/img]jjhQfgF.png
  • Dmellott
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    Dmellott greentooth
  • Finalhart
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    Finalhart polycounter lvl 6
    I think the metal is too shiny considering it has a lot of dirt and damage. As for the design, i think the mesh is too noisy with very small details. I'm not into stylized models but i always see they have very simple shapes but are very appealing with a good color palette. Check at this image from the new Disney movie "Big Hero" to give you an idea:

    Big_Hero_(film)_poster_003.jpg
  • Dmellott
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    Dmellott greentooth
    Thank you for the feedback Finalhart. Panda made similar comments about the mesh being too noisy with the smaller details. I feel this piece is sitting somewhere in the middle between stylized and realistic. The proportions come across as stylized but the design and detailing feels realistic.

    At this stage, I am going to continue through design-wise as I want to move on to other projects.

    I really appreciate your comment and your feedback Finalhart. Thank you!!
  • Dmellott
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    Dmellott greentooth
    Updates, on the final stretch.

    [IMG][/img]6MD8MFY.png
  • Dmellott
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    Dmellott greentooth
  • AngryMindtricks
    Hey Dmell,

    First of all.. Kudos on the consistent posting without replies lol... secondly, the models looking good but my input on the most recent render is that the damage on the model is a little too plain. It's just too evenly distributed... and also some areas on the model where it has damage doesn't seem convincing either e.g. neck area/feet, it's a bit everywhere... Just have a rethink of it and have another try at it... it's also looking a little too noisy.. like when something has been repainted with a black or white low opacity brush several times.

    Keep going though, shows promise *peace sign*
  • Dmellott
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    Dmellott greentooth
    Hello AngryMindTricks,

    Thank you for your feedback, your points about where the damage is located made a lot of sense especially when it comes to the next and head area. As for the noise, I have gotten several comments confirming the nosiness of the mesh. I tried going back in and painting some of the noisy divots out in my normal, curve, and AO but it was giving me some nasty looking reflections that I just couldn't get rid of unless I started over again from scratch.

    I think considering that I am far along in the texturing process I am going to wrap this model up to the best of my ability and move on to other projects. This particular piece was a very big learning experience, especially when it comes to design which is definitely one of my weaker skills.

    Thank you again, I really appreciate your words of advice and encouragement. It really does help me better myself as an artist and for that I am thankful!
  • Dmellott
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    Dmellott greentooth
    For this update I went through and really tried to clean up a lot of the scratch detailing I had in the earlier renders as I felt that was one of my main causes of noises. I have also went in a applied decals for more variation to hopefully keep your eyes off of the noisy divots.

    My next step in to finalize his skin and get him posed and move on to final renders.

    [IMG][/img]CcQdegG.png
  • LRoy
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    LRoy polycounter lvl 14
    Looking better but I think the proportions still feel off. For example his fingers are too small to be useful at gripping anything. If he curled them and made a fist he'd still have 90 of his palm empty.
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