Scorched Lizard Character Model

ChiNguyen

Hello~ it's been a while since I've posted anything due to school but I'm free now and have all the time to regularly update.

So this is my character that I'll be modeling for the Cubebrush's Art of War 4 Contest. I hope to get lots of feed back.

So a little bit about this fellow is that he's a flaming lizard. He has patches where flames would just hang around and burn such as the top of his head, down his tail, on his shins and forearms. I didn't want to make his face a typical monster instead I opted for a more friendlier face. For the overall shape I went for circles and and triangles. His body will be have softer and more rounder shape to give off a more friendly feel and the triangles will be where armor, flames, and claws are.

The armor bits are made of lava rocks and has an emblem from the fire faction on his gauntlets.

The armor shape might change once it's in 3D and I'm open for suggestions. Instead of spartan themed armor, I thought about just making him into somewhat of a sumo wrestler and without armor but lava rocks scattered in patches of his skin making a natural armor instead. I'll have another concept version up soon.

Here's the mood board for this fellow.

ChiNguyen

Here's another iteration based around a more sumo theme. I kept his body proportions just about the same.

ChiNguyen

Here's body proportion sculpt.

ChiNguyen

so I scrapped the friendly look and just went the more intimidating character since war theme isn't friendly. I change the design again giving him a more intimidating look.

ChiNguyen

Here's another iteration. I've changed the spikes a lot and decided to go with 3 fingers instead of 5. I also took away the smaller spikes because it seemed a little cluttered and changed the color of the mawashi from white to red so it fits the color scheme better.

ChiNguyen

Update
I modified his body proportions a bit and changed the horns. Right now it's very symmetrical but I am exploring how asymmetrical I want him to be such as one broken horn, a bigger arm to indicated a dominant side, scars, etc.

ChiNguyen

Here's today's progress!

I played with symmetry and decided to break one of the horns off. Right now I'm working on the mawashi. I want it to be like one of those fancy mawashi made of hemp and the loincloth is just cloth. The patterns in front are rocks instead of cloth. Making the knot is a bit of a challenge.

Ashervisalis

Neat, keep it up!

ChiNguyen

@Ashervisalis Will do~

mpej429

I really like where this is going. Keep it up !

ChiNguyen

Update

Finally got the knot done. The tip still needs some clean up and adjustments. I think I have the body proportions fitting around the mawashi where I want it to be.

ChiNguyen

Here's today update!

Got some textures on him. I'm still working on the cracks and building more color layers. I'll be messing around with emissive maps soon. I also changed the color of the mawashi because it got lost with all the other red colors.

Torch

Just personal preference, to match the strong red for the body I'd go with an orange or yellow hue for that rope, purple seems a bit jarring given the color palette.

Blue or green would complement the red well, but not necessarily work given that you're going for a 'fiery' character. Looking great so far! 

ChiNguyen

@Torch that's a really good point. I'll play with the colors some more. Thanks for the feedback! 

ChiNguyen

Update

I added in the flames and started messing with emission maps. I tried out a few different colors for the belt and I'm leaning towards the top 3 more than I am the bottom but I haven't decided which to use yet.. I haven't added in his flaming eyebrows or whiskers yet so those are also on my to do list.

ChiNguyen

Here's today's Update

I changed up his flames a bit and added it floating rocks where the hands are to sort of resemble an erupting volcano. I decided to keep his belt a fairly de saturated for the eyes to rest since the rest of him is very saturated. I also added in his whiskers and eyebrows. I'll be moving onto posing very soon.

Torch

I quite liked crimson for the belt, however a dark charcoal grey works nicely too. Emissive is looking cool! 

ChiNguyen

Alrighty here's the final product. I have cut the project short since I won't have access to a computer for 5 weeks starting today but here he is~. He was quite a learning experience for me!

https://www.artstation.com/chinguyen

https://sketchfab.com/3d-models/scorched-lizard-e487c31a8aae40cd81ee156f858c6c81

Brian "Panda" Choi

Do you have any subtle off hues applied to the texture?

ChiNguyen

@Brian "Panda" Choi do you mean changing the hues instead of using brightness or darkness of a singular color? If so, then I did apply a little of that with my hues ranging from dark red to bright yellow.

Brian "Panda" Choi

More like adding colors that are NOT local colors to the texture.  In this case, blues, green, etc.

I remember realizing that softly easing in hints soft hints of that helped to give the texture more body and depth instead of the cleaner "mobile handpainted" that can come from the art direction.  Like if you look at some metals they have in WoW, there's "non-silver" hues here or there to help add depth to the material.  Also implies the indirect lighting.

You have the local colors and emissive play down, but it could stand to now use this post-processing subtlety.