Elton Hulk - Male character for portofolio
polycounter lvl 4
Objective :
First of all, I want to apologize for lurking around a lot. I think I registered 2 years ago, and still didn't manage to post a single comment... Sorry
Why am I doing this ?
This might be boresome (my life blah blah) and I don't really know where to input it yet, but I feel having the context is great to anchor the feedbacks. Please do not read the drama, if you don't care, and if this stuff don't belong here, tell me
My former working experiences were as 3D digital artist and web designer. With a 2 years formation on 3DS Max, Maya, Motion builder, Adobe suite (mainly After FX and photoshop) and some HTML / FLash tools,I worked on some industrial and/or commercial video production (3D, comp, etc), and as a website manager. Worked for companies and as a freelance. Feeling pretty unhappy of non bringing myself into the video game industry I took back studies for 2 years, and got a Master Degree equivalent on a Game Art and Management course in a french school. Felt good to achieve this. During this course, I mainly focused on the managing aspect.
Had worked for 2 years as a junior producer in a little company in France ( ~10 persons) for Serious Game produciton. The company beeing small, I've been on a lot of differents tasks. Project management, game design, graphic pipelines and assets requirement on Unity, (well in fact a lot of Unity
- such a nice community around this tool) and a little bit of graphic production.
6 months ago I quit my job. In the end, I was feeling really unhappy and empty. It took some time to really point on why. I think after all I was still runing after myself. I've always been drawing (well more sketching than drawing) and during my last 2 years I really enjoyed the graphic work on Unity more than the project management.
For now, I really want to dedicate all my working time on the graphic production. On the long term, I want to work more and more on characters. After all, I've always been drawing a lot more dude and girls than landscapes... On top of that, I still want to put my 2 feets in the video game industry, and Serious game felt more like one feet to me.
Problem was, like I said, during my 2 years course on game art and management, I really went on the management aspect. I had openned Zbrush and Mudbox for like, 8 hours. Beside that, even if I sketch a lot, I never went on some deep work and studies, like understanding human anatomy. Always have been more feeling than knowledge, every drawing.
So during the last months I went on a deep anatomy course, and threw myself into Zbrush. A lot scared at the beginning, I found myself working more than I ever had. And feeling happy, a lot !
My objectives are now to achieve 3 main characters for my portoflio while starting to look for work as 3D (character if possible) artist : A male human, just to pin down my anatomy studying, a creature, and a female character (with maybe more flat surface and / or animal aspect to it). I know it will be hard for me to find work as its a tough place with a hell lot of awesome and skilled people, but that's what I wanna do, more than ever. Or else I will never meet all these people.
So here is the first work in progress and feeback needed post from me, the Elton Hulk !
Actual State :
Marmoset Viewer Link
Here. Hey, is it possible to embed the marmoset viewer on a polycount post ? Didn't manage to find an answer on that matter :S
Full body
Face close-up
Feedback Needed (Pretty please)
2015-08-09 : I'm off my working computer for 10 days, and though it was time to confront reality. I think feedback is the most important part of art production and I need some thoughts, look, criticizes on the general anatomy look and feel of the character.
I've posted my work in a walk-through manner and will describe each step, because I think feedback on the pipeline would be usefull too.
2015-08-17 : As it is my first post on polycount I don't really know what to expect for feedbacks. Didn't get one in 10 days ? Maybe the works is advanced enough ? Maybe I need to get myself into others work first ? What's the best ? Will work on my website and resume experience during this week so have some more time to get (and give) feedbacks.
PS : Sorry for the horrendous english, will correct it as mush as I can, french guy here, baguette fromage !
First of all, I want to apologize for lurking around a lot. I think I registered 2 years ago, and still didn't manage to post a single comment... Sorry
Why am I doing this ?
This might be boresome (my life blah blah) and I don't really know where to input it yet, but I feel having the context is great to anchor the feedbacks. Please do not read the drama, if you don't care, and if this stuff don't belong here, tell me
My former working experiences were as 3D digital artist and web designer. With a 2 years formation on 3DS Max, Maya, Motion builder, Adobe suite (mainly After FX and photoshop) and some HTML / FLash tools,I worked on some industrial and/or commercial video production (3D, comp, etc), and as a website manager. Worked for companies and as a freelance. Feeling pretty unhappy of non bringing myself into the video game industry I took back studies for 2 years, and got a Master Degree equivalent on a Game Art and Management course in a french school. Felt good to achieve this. During this course, I mainly focused on the managing aspect.
Had worked for 2 years as a junior producer in a little company in France ( ~10 persons) for Serious Game produciton. The company beeing small, I've been on a lot of differents tasks. Project management, game design, graphic pipelines and assets requirement on Unity, (well in fact a lot of Unity
- such a nice community around this tool) and a little bit of graphic production.6 months ago I quit my job. In the end, I was feeling really unhappy and empty. It took some time to really point on why. I think after all I was still runing after myself. I've always been drawing (well more sketching than drawing) and during my last 2 years I really enjoyed the graphic work on Unity more than the project management.
For now, I really want to dedicate all my working time on the graphic production. On the long term, I want to work more and more on characters. After all, I've always been drawing a lot more dude and girls than landscapes... On top of that, I still want to put my 2 feets in the video game industry, and Serious game felt more like one feet to me.
Problem was, like I said, during my 2 years course on game art and management, I really went on the management aspect. I had openned Zbrush and Mudbox for like, 8 hours. Beside that, even if I sketch a lot, I never went on some deep work and studies, like understanding human anatomy. Always have been more feeling than knowledge, every drawing.
So during the last months I went on a deep anatomy course, and threw myself into Zbrush. A lot scared at the beginning, I found myself working more than I ever had. And feeling happy, a lot !
My objectives are now to achieve 3 main characters for my portoflio while starting to look for work as 3D (character if possible) artist : A male human, just to pin down my anatomy studying, a creature, and a female character (with maybe more flat surface and / or animal aspect to it). I know it will be hard for me to find work as its a tough place with a hell lot of awesome and skilled people, but that's what I wanna do, more than ever. Or else I will never meet all these people.
So here is the first work in progress and feeback needed post from me, the Elton Hulk !
Actual State :
Marmoset Viewer Link
Here. Hey, is it possible to embed the marmoset viewer on a polycount post ? Didn't manage to find an answer on that matter :S
Full body
Face close-up
Feedback Needed (Pretty please)
2015-08-09 : I'm off my working computer for 10 days, and though it was time to confront reality. I think feedback is the most important part of art production and I need some thoughts, look, criticizes on the general anatomy look and feel of the character.
I've posted my work in a walk-through manner and will describe each step, because I think feedback on the pipeline would be usefull too.
2015-08-17 : As it is my first post on polycount I don't really know what to expect for feedbacks. Didn't get one in 10 days ? Maybe the works is advanced enough ? Maybe I need to get myself into others work first ? What's the best ? Will work on my website and resume experience during this week so have some more time to get (and give) feedbacks.
PS : Sorry for the horrendous english, will correct it as mush as I can, french guy here, baguette fromage !
Replies
Maybe I need to get some more work done before asking for feedbacks ? Tell me guys, my first time getting involved here. I'm planning to give me so daily time to review and involve myself on all the fantastic work I've been peeping on here for so long. The monthly contest looks like a good way to get into polycount too no ?
I dont think Elton John and the Hulk are really a good mix as a design choice (if that is what it is). The Hulk is already a tough one because it has been done so well in the past and using Elton wont make the concept expressive or attractive because it is a visual oxymoron and is probably better suited to a cartoon style. You have some nice stuff going on in the anatomy but it isnt yet developed enough to make it expressive. I think you should hop into developing your anatomy knowledge. Try and make a quick study of an idea (like a concept sculpt) to test out characters here, this will save you putting loads of time into something that has little appeal.
Hope this helps
Cheerio
To be honest, I really just wanted to put on the table all I have just learned about anatomy and Hulk was really obvious, though not really artistic, must admit. I've always thought Elton John had pretty much a real life chubby Hulk head, so went on with that, will put on some sunglasses to improve the funny look. I think this visual oxymoron is expressive.
But like you said, I can get a better visual translation of this, and will work on making some fat pads and maybe do some more muscle design on the shoulders (to have a vertical oxymoron - muscles on top, fat on belly) on top of the funny head for a hulk.
The objective here for me is to finish it, as it will be my first and only piece of work for my portofolio for the moment and start looking for some work... will keep the production for potofolio on the rail (next project is Chtulhu)
So I will practice and get some concept before working for Chtulhu, I think you are totally right by pointing me I will involve more people if I bring them on at the start of the project, on the concept phase.
But I really need to close this one first, even if its seems a bit more cold, in artistic perspective. And I just needed some thoughts on the anatomy, since it's my first piece of work after studying, I'm a bit unsure and shaky.
Thanks again for the reply
so anatomically I think this is very good. I like how you're unifying the muscle with think fat layers. Proportion wise I'd increase the side of his lats so you can see them from the front a little more. If you ever look at a bodybuilder when they flex or let their arms lay, they tend to have more mass and definition. Careful with the toes, they all appear to be the same size from what I've seen. The mass of muscle that runs along the tibia, the tibiaslis anterior and other local muscles at the front of the tibia roll down to the top of the foot. Right now it looks to ver a little too in.
Something that caught my eye with his back. I don't know if it's his posture or if it's the design you're going for. The hulk tends to have a trunk like torso that is very square. So it may not apply as deeply as say your average person.
A couple of landmarks to look for are the lower back muscles. Particularly the erector spinae. The human body has a lot of natural curves in it. One of those natural curves in the back when you look at its profile. The erector spinae runs vertically (mostly straight) along the back but when interconnected to the gutles and upper portions of the lats it creates a S curve. A natural convex shape appears in the shoulder blade group of muscles. The trapezius and shoulder blade are excellent land marks to pull out mass and commnicate the curves of the back.
Now this may not be as curvy so to speak. Depending on the person that curve can be less pronounced due to lifestyle choices. Most average people have a more subtle curve.
The last thing I noticed is the face to body relationship. If this is indeed a mash up of the two men then unifiying the design may be in order. His face has a lot of fat in it as does the actual Elton. But fat mass in he face relationship to the body says two different stories. If is a mashup ask yourself. How much does he workout? How much skin sags and where? How much muscle mass would he have? How much loose skin would he have through his body? He could be ripped but gravity still takes a toll on the body. Things like that. The relationship between the characters anatomy/the context.
Sorry if this is too winded D;
His cheeks are kind of strange tho, he looks like a baby, and those thigh gaps are insane,
the lower body needs some work I think, the upper legs need to be much closer together mainly