The Beast - Anti knight

BrianDolan89 · Feb 2016

Polycount Character Art Contest: "The Beast" - Brian Dolan submission

The Anti Knight
Story: A mighty but reckless knight who only cares about winning regardless of the countless lives lost, is cursed by a gypsy onlooker who witnesses her family be slaughtered by the knights militia. The knight is cursed and changed into something hideous of the supernatural. His soul must guard the gates descending earth to challenge the glory of future passed warriors. He’s been given the title of Anti Knight and is forced to watch, as every soul he defeats is lost to Hades. Only the heart of a true hero can defeat him and save the souls of the damned. (99 Words)

Beauty Shot 01 (full frame) -All Images Rendered in Marmoset Toolbag 2-

Beauty Shot 02 (close up)

Full Frame Wire Shot Character Tris: 35,778 (without swords 33,278) Pedestal Tris: 2994

Texture Sheet (all 2048x2048 maps) All textures from Substance Painter

Extra:
Turn Around

Turn Around Wireframe

Close Up 3:

cybuster · Feb 2016

hmm, this will be interesting.

I'd love to see how this one will come out.

BrianDolan89 · Feb 2016

I decided to change my idea and go with a more humanoid approach instead of a monster. I wanted to toy around with a knight concept and I ended up running with it. Here is the low retopologized base I made to start my character.I ended up picking the metal skull helmet instead of a more historical helmet design.

Here is some of my ref material

KingKellogg · Feb 2016

You should tryout haveing the armor fusing with the body. I think it could look cool, your armor looks pretty dang sweet, very sleek and Dark Knight like.

fantasymaster · Feb 2016

Diging that armor. Looks cool

BrianDolan89 · Feb 2016

Thanks @fantasymaster and @KingKellogg
I added a little detail to give a better idea of how the face will look. Before I go crazy on detail I'm kind of trying to just block out a little bit on the whole character first so I can test out designs and the feel of it. I plan to add smoke coming from the helmet like my ref material at the end though.

BrianDolan89 · Feb 2016

Just going to post as I go. Still working out a little detail on the subtools.

KingKellogg · Feb 2016

Armor looks great.

BrianDolan89 · Feb 2016

Taking a break from the character to block out his weapon. Im still going to add detail to his cleaver but for the most part I just wanted to get started on it. I plan to add similar Victorian decal like the characters armor on the blade towards the hilt. Since the character is a bit smaller the typical "Beast" I wanted to give him a much bigger sword.

BrianDolan89 · Feb 2016

Almost finished doing the base out and then ill go into really detailing it.

BrianDolan89 · Feb 2016

I wrote a little backstory for my character. :

Time Frame: 1300’s Europe

A long time ago, a mighty but reckless knight who only cares about winning regardless of the countless lives lost. Is cursed by a gypsy onlooker who witnesses her family be slaughtered by the knights militia. The knight is cursed and changed into something hideous of the supernatural. His soul must guard the gates descending earth to challenge the glory of future passed warriors. He has been given the title of Anti Knight and is rumored to have challenged Odin himself and lived. He is forced to battle and watch, as every soul he defeats is lost to Hades. It is said that only the heart of a true hero can defeat him and save the souls of the damned.

Here is some more progress photos as well.

lotet · Feb 2016

Pretty Cool armor, I think the helmet looks better in the blockout though, for example the skulls lower jaw is really tiny, it looks like he has a giant overbite ;/

BrianDolan89 · Feb 2016

@lotet I actually didn't make a lower jaw. lol Its just the top half of the skull extruding out of the metal mask but if it looks like that to you then I'll def fix it because I'm sure others might think that as well and now that's all I see lol. Thanks! You're the first to give a critique lol.

luxxo · Feb 2016

Nice progress Brian. It reminds me of a classic fantasy movie from the times of my childhood- the Willow (I recommend this movie to every fantasy fun as it is a must see

). There was this evil character that was really fearsome- general Kael:

Image: http://providermodule.com/Administrators/S.D./analysis_bv/skull_kael.png

Image: http://i42.servimg.com/u/f42/13/52/98/71/75534610.jpg

You could add a bit more depth to your helmet cause it looks very "flat" now. There is almost no place for shadows.

BrianDolan89 · Feb 2016

@luxxo Thanks! That's awesome reference too. I'll have to check it out. Alright I def will add depth. Thanks!

fantasymaster · Feb 2016

good work so far! the eyes of the skull looks a bit strange. not skully enough maybe

Tadow · Feb 2016

nice detailing on the armor

BrianDolan89 · Feb 2016

I'm looking for more of a shape preference. I still need to finish detailing. or any other suggestions.

KingKellogg · Feb 2016

I like A, though B could look more creepy if they teeth were less human and the brown was angrier looking., though I should point out the upside down cross thing isn't actually an evil thing. (popes use it)

BrianDolan89 · Feb 2016

Hey @KingKellogg I actually think I'm going to go with A as well and just fix it up and make it way more menacing and skull like. It works better with the armor. Thanks

Lol and about the Inverted Cross, I chose that because of its in relation to St. Peter. He asked to be hung upside down and hes associated with two symbols. The inverted cross and the keys to heaven. The keys to heaven symbol was much more elaborate and chunky so I went with the inverted cross. The keys to heaven fit more with my story of the knight how he guards the gates of earth so warriors cannot enter Heaven or Valhalla but I chose to just pick the more modern association with the inverted cross and made it evil. Even though its origins are not evil I decided to go with a more evil viewpoint I guess? Hopefully that helps explain it.

tushar · Feb 2016

Your stuff is looking awesome. For mask A is looking much better then B.

BrianDolan89 · Feb 2016

So I ended up going with more of a combo of the two but took away the mouth entirely and made more of a "ZOOM" look from the flash. I loved the menacing looking rips in the mouth and it fit better. This is a rough that I threw together to give an idea. Now to detail it.

BrianDolan89 · Feb 2016

@tushar Thanks!

This community is great

lotet · Feb 2016

ur definitely on to something with that last one! my only crit is the entire mouth/jaw area is maybe a bit small.

BrianDolan89 · Feb 2016

So I'm kind of messing around with some armor adjustment ideas. Trying to make it a little menacing but at the same time I don't really want to take away from the character with outlandish unnecessary things added. I'm not really sure about the teeth cowl but its an idea. @lotet I agree. Ill have to lower it a bit. Thanks!!

Sorry for the quality. I took the photos with my phone

Zielarz · Feb 2016

I really like the idea about this character. Nice thinking about helmet. I think that Luxxo gave you great reference for skull. Also you might look into Arthas as Lich King.

Image: http://www.blizzplanet.com/wp-content/uploads/sideshow-arthas-the-lich-king-polystone-statue-300069_press03.jpg

BrianDolan89 · Feb 2016

Quick decimated render of what I have so far. I probably wont post for a little while until there's a significant difference but feel free to comment or give any opinion and I can change things etc etc. I'm still working out proportions and testing out different ideas with armor and whatnot. Trying to keep a slight Victorian feel while also giving it a bit of an evil touch. I still need to add battle damage, decals and more wear while also working on his giant cleaver. I'll post some color swatches for suggestions eventually as well. It's a little hard to see but his hands only have armor covering the back of his hands. The rest will be actual skin and bone. Cheers!

BrianDolan89 · Feb 2016

@Zielarz Thanks! That's great reference. Super skully but I love the details.

fantasymaster · Feb 2016

Cool. The feet are to simple. Adding some spikes like on the gauntlets may help.

BrianDolan89 · Feb 2016

Oh thats a good idea. Thanks @fantasymaster

lotet · Feb 2016

you are a true hipster @BrianDolan89, taking photos of your screen instead of screenshoting it, but no Instagram filters??

BrianDolan89 · Feb 2016

@lotet hahaha I don't know why I didn't just do that. I think at the time I was texting someone and just snapped a pic to send to them and ended up just using them. lol

leslievdb · Feb 2016

Hey brian just saw your message, overall i think its a cool design . I`m super biased towards more stylized stuff so my advice would be to push the silhouette a bit and make some of the shapes a bit more chunkier and give some of those plates thicker borders.
did a quick overpaint to show you some stuff i would personally do with it but thats up to you

gl!

BrianDolan89 · Feb 2016

Thanks so much @Ravenslayer I really appreciate it. All really good suggestions I'm going to apply!

tushar · Feb 2016

Nice update @BrianDolan89 .. keep it up

BrianDolan89 · Feb 2016

Thanks @tushar .I'll have something new soon.

BrianDolan89 · Mar 2016

I'm really stuck with the color palate. I don't want to make it too contrasty but I also don't want it to be simple grey and boring. I've tried black armor but it really didn't work well so I chose to just go with a darker grey. right now I'm kind of just testing out colors, nothing concrete while I lay out the uvs for the rest of the body. I'm totally open to suggestions. I also wasn't sure if I should leave the horns part of the armor or make them actual horns to break up the metal grey texture. Maybe like realistic colored rams horns or something.

melli06 · Mar 2016

I think the colored metal bits should be a bit brighter to contrast just a bit more with the armor, or perhaps make the red shinier? I would definitely say the red fits an anti knight. You could even try doing two variations of the colors on the different trim pieces (I don't even know if they are called trim pieces lol). Making the horns a different color would prob be best too. I am just throwing Ideas around I guess. I am a bit of a noob so take what I say with grain of salt. Good Luck To All!

Avelyne · Mar 2016

This looks great, really nice design!

I like red the most as well, it seems very fitting for this character

BrianDolan89 · Mar 2016

I haven't posted in a while but this is kind of where I am at. This is a quick thrown together paint job but I wanted to get a feel for where I was going with this. Definitely wanting to keep the dark rich red vibe with cold lighting. I have a lot of texturing left to do and then Ill pose him. Please ignore the sword. He dual wields two of them but I haven't really touched them. (Not the correct size) With life happening I don't have a ton of time to go back and rework sculpting but if there is any texturing suggestions I'd love to hear them as this is my first real attempt at a PBR Substance Painter workflow. This is the low version of my beast. I feel like the normals turned out not too bad for the most part.

fantasymaster · Mar 2016

Looks cool. Only one thing I can see there are some artifacts on the schoulder pads.

borodin · Mar 2016

seems to looks good but i can see nothing really

BrianDolan89 · Mar 2016

Update Time

So I still have a ton of work to do on this and this is "NOT" the pose. Just testing out how the rig is working that I made for him. lol Still have a ton of paint weighting issues and texturing to fix/do. Polycount is 35,778 Tris.

OBSTEG0X · Mar 2016

I really like what you decided to do with the horn texture on the helm. This turned out looking really fantastic. Good Luck!

BrianDolan89 · Mar 2016

Thanks man I'm glad you like it! @OBSTEG0X . Took me forever to figure out a direction to go with.

BrianDolan89 · Mar 2016

Trying to figure this part out. I don't want it to be a drastic change but also not too subtle where you wont notice.

fantasymaster · Mar 2016

Make his eyes glow, like the whole skull is glowing from inside. Looking good. How did you did the retopo?

BrianDolan89 · Mar 2016

Hey @fantasymaster . I did all the reto in Zbrush. I cloned each subtool. Selected a zsphere. Went under the rigging section and selected my high mesh and then went to edit topology and redrew all of the geo based on the high. Seems like it would take way longer but I find it to be extremely fast compared to Maya. I probably will do a glow from inside the mask. It just seems like the best option right now. I made a ton of changes so Ill post again soon. Thanks for the feedback!!

BrianDolan89 · Mar 2016

Was trying to test the GIF option on here but I couldn't get it to work and there doesn't seem to be a way to delete posts. Sorry about that. Wasn't trying to bump.

BrianDolan89 · Mar 2016

Polycount Character Art Contest: "The Beast" - Brian Dolan submission

The Anti Knight
Story: A mighty but reckless knight who only cares about winning regardless of the countless lives lost, is cursed by a gypsy onlooker who witnesses her family be slaughtered by the knights militia. The knight is cursed and changed into something hideous of the supernatural. His soul must guard the gates descending earth to challenge the glory of future passed warriors. He’s been given the title of Anti Knight and is forced to watch, as every soul he defeats is lost to Hades. Only the heart of a true hero can defeat him and save the souls of the damned. (99 Words)

Beauty Shot 01 (full frame) -All Images Rendered in Marmoset Toolbag 2-