My first attempt at a high poly head.

KevinCoyle

I started this Hi poly head tonight. He's a scientist for my demo reel story. It still needs alot of work, I'm nowhere near done, I just wanted to get some feedback before I moved further. From the side, the head is shaped funny, I'm aware of this, just haven't gotten to shaping that better yet. Also I didn't model much chin detail and under the nose above the lip detail because he has a beard and I'm not sure how I'm going to handle that yet. Any suggestions on the beard will also be appreciated. Thanks

Daz

Are you just using the sketch for ref? It feels a bit naiive. Like you've been making it up out of your head. No problem for Bay Raitt but the rest of us have to look at humans as we model

Immediate thoughts:
Front of the neck should slope the other way, back into the body.
Ear is funky
A lot of the edges are too sharp. They need relaxing.
There's something really odd about the upper eyelids.
Post unsmoothed wires for better analysis I think.

Stick with it!

John Warner

yah, Daz is totaly right. every time i try and model something out of my head, there's lots of areas that turn out to be waaayy to generic. strangely shaped, just kinda funky. get some reference, and try to match some of the curves (like the eye, the 3 quarter profile, etc etc etc) that being said, you've done a pretty good job none the less.

my only serious crits, aside from the shape of the head and the stuff Daz mentioned, are the eye and the mouth. the eye isn't shaped at all like a real eye. it's not too bad, but get some ref, and im sure you can make it look awesome in like 2 secconds.

you might have a hard time animating that mouth. first of all, i'd suggest always building your mouths closed. it's so much easier to get a proper shape of the lips, and to get that dimple on the sides of the mouth. too many times people bring their mouths into a point on the side.. that's not good, because when the mouth opens, i'll look strange-- pinched in the corner. you should have at least 3 edges comming away from the corner of your mouth, and have some width to the side. here, a pictures worth a thousand words, so i'll render and upload some..... hopefuly i have an old model on this comp that doesn't suck...

okay, yes, the model sucks, but the line flow will illustrate what i'm talking about:



see how the mouth doesn't collapse to a point when it's opened? thats what i'm talkin about.

anyway, nice work, keep grindin away hehe

KevinCoyle

Thanks for the suggestions. I've been using a drawing book for reference which may explain why certain areas are coming out looking rather generic. I'm going to collect a more useful set of photo references and along with both of your suggestions, work to make it look better. I've made some changes already and its looking a bit better. I'm at school now but I'll post some new pictures tonight.

Also, any suggestions on how to approach the hair/beard?

KevinCoyle

Here are a few more images. I worked on the eyes a bit and the ears. Also made several changes overall. I'm still not happy with the ears or the nose. and something is still bothering me about the eyes too. They seem to bulge to much or something, but I can't put my finger on what it is exactly. I haven't got to fixing the mouth yet, but definatly will soon. Here are two images plus an unsmoothed wire.

poopinmymouth

Anatomy issues aside, the way you are constructing your high poly mesh is wonky. You have areas of sparse edges, then areas where they are right next to each other. That's why you have so many angular creases in his face. Try to keep a fairly homogenous flow to the details. There are creases in a real face, but not in as many areas as you have them. I think your control cage needs to be a bit denser myself, so you have the edges you need to make the details, but you aren't forced to change the surface direction so dramatically.

StrangeFate

I'd go back to the drawing board and look up some other head wireframes on the more common way to build them and proper flow of loops. The actual mesh is unnecessarily dense.

Also, if it's your first head i'd recommend working off some photos and then tweak it to the look you want. That sketch barely gives you any hint of proper anatomy, starting with proper lips.

KevinCoyle

It's not my first head, but for all practicle purposes, it's my first Hi poly head attempt.

I agree though, I think I jumped ahead a bit on this one. I'll consider it a first practice run, I'm not going to work on this model further, it's really odd looking to me and I don't think it's salvagable. I'm going to go back with a new anatomy book I just got and really take the time to study and get a better understanding of both the face and body, do some life drawing, gather the proper references and then come back later down the road to go at it again. Thanks for the feedback guys

ShadowM8

Well, for the first attempt it's rather good start.
Here's the first tip that shall help you a great deal. It is a common practice to have minimum of 3 line going out of the mouth and eyes, right now you have only 1 which makes your lips and eyes look totally weird and pinch horribly.

There is a lack of loops going around the mouth, and eyes can use a few more as well.
The line flow for the nose should flow inside the nostrils eventually.

What helps me most is just look at the line flow of other artists and trying to do exactly that, it's the best way to learn the correct techniques.