Sketchbook: dGreenberg
polycounter
Hey everybody, my name is Dave! I'm an aspiring character artist, and am currently attending Gnomon School of Visual Effects. I wanted to start up a sketchbook on Polycount, to keep myself from posting each individual projects on the 3D Art Showcase Forum (and so I can hopefully follow my own growth and progress a little easier).
As I post my work, I'm always more than happy to hear any suggestions or critiques, so if you see anything that looks off and have something to say, I'd really appreciate it.
To get things rolling, I'm currently working on a mech / robot type of character, based off of a concept by Ariel Perez. This is my first hard-surface character, and I had no idea how much more difficult it would be (for me) to make this, compared to a more organic character.
HIGH POLY SCULPT:
As I post my work, I'm always more than happy to hear any suggestions or critiques, so if you see anything that looks off and have something to say, I'd really appreciate it.
To get things rolling, I'm currently working on a mech / robot type of character, based off of a concept by Ariel Perez. This is my first hard-surface character, and I had no idea how much more difficult it would be (for me) to make this, compared to a more organic character.
HIGH POLY SCULPT:
Replies
The shell might be a little too shiny. Might try to dial that back and see how it reacts. I also want to work more on the Unreal lighting and setup. Should probably get something better than a flat cylinder in there.
I ended up adding a new base as well, but I think I'll change it to something else. It doesn't flow as well with the rest of the character.
I think I've been able to get the textures to a comfortable place, but I want to push this guy the last 10 % to make it a possible portfolio piece. I'm going to try my hand at UE4 particles, and try and make the shadows pop a little more on the base platform. Maybe I should dial back the platform gloss as well. Probably only one or two more posts regarding this character.
Okay, so this isn't the last post after all. Just trying to see how GIF quality looks. I'll probably include a vimeo file for the final post.
Starting with the high poly first, I wanted to sculpting out as much of the character as possible in ZBrush (with more of the hard surface stuff modeled out in Maya).
HIGH POLY SCULPT:
There are a few straps, buckles, and misc items that I want to finish sculpting, but to switch things up, I started the retopo process in Maya. I'll also be doing some of the sharper or smaller details with Quixel, once my maps are baked and everything is unwrapped.
RETOPOLOGY:
With any luck, I'll be done with the retopo over the next 2 days. Then I can unwrap it, and make all of the little details shine through.
TEXTURED & IN ENGINE:
At this point I have the character in Unreal, and I think I'm just about ready to move forward from the texturing stage. Up next will be setting up the rig and posing him with a simple animation. I really want to get this all done by the 29th, so I'll post stuff here once I get some more progress out of the way.
I liked the presentation lighting for the characters in the Paragon Tech & Techniques video, so I wanted to try for that style when presenting my own work (for the time being).
Keep it up the good work ^^
I'm thinking that the scorcher is pretty much where I plan on keeping it. I have an emissive map for some hot embers on the end of the branches, but I'm still getting those to work in Unreal. Matinee is a huge pain, but I plan on getting a recording of the animation out of the UE4 engine at some point, so that will probably be the final updates for this dude (unless something else comes up).
For the mercenary, the only thing left for me (at least what I'm planning) is to get Matinee to record his idle animation.
I'm always happy to hear critiques and thoughts, and I can't wait to get these finished up and able to start on a new character.
So I've uploaded the characters into Vimeo, and I think it's just about time to move forward to a new project. I might go back to the cat adventurer that I started, and just do a few tweaks before then, but I'm really pumped to start on a new character. I'll make sure to upload all the stuff onto my Artstation ASAP.
CAT:
A bunch of updates to follow soon! I'm done with the mercenary, but I want to finish up a few last touches on the scorcher before I post both of them.
SCORCHER SCREENSHOTS:
MERCENARY SCREENSHOTS:
I'll try to jump back in on the sci-fi girl that I started as soon as possible!
BASE MESH BUILDING:
BASE MESH REFINING:
FACE AND PROPORTION REFINING:
BRINGING FACE CLOSER TO CONCEPT:
I was getting tired of the brown material at the end, so I changed it up to give my eyes a different color to look at. More to come!
Working on the right arm things went much faster than the left. I hit my stride a little more with working on hard surface stuff, so that's always a bonus. That being said I think the shoulder piece needs a lot of work (in terms of design or positioning).
Moving on from here, I think I'll pause on this character so I can participate in the Artstation Challenge.
I'll go ahead and upload the WIP images here as well as the final results for future viewing.
WIP IMAGES:
HIGH POLY W/ MATERIAL IDS:
FINAL IMAGES:
I'm not sure if I'm abandoning the previous sci-fi girl or just pausing on it. I'll be posting here though whenever I figure that out! Maybe I'll work on some stylized head busts instead... Stay tuned!
I haven't started in on the eyes yet, and everything is still symmetrical, but I'll be sure to update it as I continue to work my way through. I'll also be making hair geometry, and probably some cards (a first for me) for the fly away hairs.
I learned something new! I usually don't need to try and match the character to a picture exactly, so I never really messed with the focal length of the camera. Working off of a perspective setting of 28 (not sure the unit of measurement here), I had to bump it up to a FL of 60 mm in Maya, and 90 mm in Marmoset. Interesting stuff, but I'll see what I can learn about proper camera setup to save me a little bit of the struggle for next time. Just the texturing and presentation (going to try and get everything as real-time) is left, so here we goooooo~
Regular camera settings (Focal Length is at 28.97 mm) . Face isn't broad enough for Frazetta!
Updated face with a focal length of 90 mm:
Hopefully I can pull the textures off. It's one area I'm still really lacking, so I gotta give it my all.
Painting work is done in Painter with a follow-up in Photoshop. Really think learning 3Dcoat will help me with future pieces similar to this.
Here's the concept:
Starting with the base mesh, trying to nail down the proportions:
Reworking the face to nail down the likeness as close as I can get it:
More attention and refining the face. Working on the shirt and jacket as well:
Getting closer with the main body:
Fixing the proportions. Working on the sheath and sword, and started putting everything together:
I still gotta get that hair to look more polished (maybe with Dylan Ekren's hair brush) and add the hair ties before I move into the low poly. I'll also be updating things here since I'm hoping for any suggestions or advice I can get to make things better.
Retopo is up next!
Question about the hair, its just a solid mesh yea?
Best of luck when you decide start in on your next model! I think it's always fun but challenging to get a new character started.
sidebar- sorry for responding so late. Thats really useful info, Ive always ran into trouble retopoing/baking hair like that. I've also never tried just creating the topology in chunks so that'll pr probably help. I gotta say I really like option c. The blue looks better imo. Which is your favorite?
No worries with the response timing either. I'm glad the info can be helpful in any way! This was kind of my first attempt baking the hair like that and I expected that I'd have to clean up a huge mess in Photoshop afterwards. I'm not sure if it was luck, but I'm glad it turned out the way it did. Once you've retopoed everything in chunks, you could even try to stitch the UVs back together again if that's the look you're going for. I wasn't really able to do that because of the pigtails though. Too much going on.
Since last time I've finalized the textures and have been working on the lighting, but I'll show my image process from where we left off.
Textures without the weapon:
Wondered how she'd look without glasses after all this time.
From there, a good animator friend (Taylor Whitsett) was willing to work on the rig which ended up being a huge help.
I still had some cleaning to take care of on the mesh and texture, so I went in and moved some verts and repainted some details here and there. Once that was taken care of, I worked on the blood splatter and started playing with some different lighting setups. I figured it'd be good to have one light setup for showing off the model, and 1 or 2 mood passes to play around a little bit.
I tried another setup with the head position, and I'm currently trying to figure out which works better for the character:
I'm nearing the finish line with this character, so the next few updates will probably conclude NEXT girl. Really excited to get the character all fancy and presentable before moving onto something new.
Through working on this guy, I want to:
- practice and improve my anatomy (stylized but not over-the-top exaggerated);
- finally attempt to make some low poly hair cards;
- create a flow map for some anisotropic hair shaders;
- create some blend shapes (ZBrush > Maya) for a few facial expressions;
- make a full body rig (maybe minus the face) so I don't have to stick with one or two poses;
- create the main part of the jacket in Marvelous Designer;
- get that fancy-shouldered jacket to deform with some type of cloth simulation physics in Maya;
I also have a WIP thread over here to see if I can get some other suggestions and input to help me along.
Starting out I sketched up an orthographic for the guy (minus the jacket and clothing).
From there I've been working on the blockin.
Then I tried to fix up some of that anatomy and attempted to match his concept proportions a little further.
In the most recent update, I dialed back some of the more distracting anatomy details and blocked out his face shapes a little further.
I've also started in on his chihuahua, which is actually a great change of scenery from the human figure. I feel if I start getting burnt out from working on one, I can refresh myself with the other character.
He looks way too much like a cat right now, but I'll change that moving forward.
I'll have to take a step back to rework the head topology for the blend shapes, but I think I'll tackle that after the rest of the high poly is done.
Tried 2 variations on his butt-flap thing too.
Also added a "relaxed" expression for helping with the blendshape stuff later on. Right now he looks like a cross between a zombie and some shocked Guybrush Threepwood-type character, but I'm hoping I'm on the right track with that. Added a high poly version for the mouth, eyes, and tongue.
Continued to fix doggo's anatomy and silhouette before putting him in a suit.
Then I saw you had a chihuahua as his pet...Now I love it.
I like the cute simplicity of the first one but I'm trying to straddle that line of something realistic / identifiable but still stylized to match the guy character. Hopefully the final result will cover both areas. I'll be working on the guy some more for the next update, but please let me know if you're able to send some of them chihuahua pics my way!