Birthstar: Marine Hi-poly

retleks

Hi everyone, long time no post... still intimidated I guess. This is the hi poly for a marine in a game I'm working on. It's final for the most part, but I would still love to hear thoughts and suggestions so that I might apply it to future work.





Thanks
Ben Eoff

MoP

Looks pretty good. Proportions are good and I like the hands.

However the armour design seems boring... there's nothing new or interesting there ... it looks like a facsimile of the Doom3/Quake4 style normal map armour.
The upper chest area in particular seems very plain and uninteresting.

The mesh looks pretty well made, although you might do well to separate more sections out into different meshes. Might make it easier to work with - but it's up to you.

The cloth folds could do with some work, they're not as defined or appropriately directional as they could be.

Also the leg and arm armour segments seem kinda random and not really "designed".

In general I think "technically" you're doing well, you seem to have good mesh control and understanding, but the design really needs work. The silhouette is incredibly generic, and the armour design really isn't very coherent.

Good luck with the game, and keep on practising and working on those skills!

Jerome

yeah, some boring parts. I would add some clip like things holding some of the armor together. some more of those rivet hole things, maybe smaller, different shapes. put like vent things too on his back. those plates on his back (teh square ones) seems odd. those may need some lovin too. it is getting there so keep at it, or as a dumb redneck (poor person from where im at would say) "git er done!"

lol

retleks

I appreciate the honest comments, thanks. However, it is unfortunate that I can't really go into too much detail as to why certain design choices were made. I'll be the first to admit that I'm not the best designer, for me I love modeling and creating a good meshflow. Although I started out just doing concept design, I found that my designs usually were boring in nature, but now that I have modeling, unfortunatly all I have are those boring concepts.

On the design. It is a very generic sillouette, which is what you will always find on characters where the design criteria reads something like "almost like a wetsuit, but with these kevlar like pieces imbedded in it... very form fitting and flexible, needs to cover as much area as possible." Now this is of course not the first design I did for this guy, nor is it the first model (god that was horrid), but this is the one where the lead designer said "that's it, get started." The basic premise is that this is 600 years in the future, this faction is a no frills type, functionality over "cool." As such I had to keep rethinking how I would design something and cut out all the "cool" bits (granted they were probably still unoriginal and boring). Alas, this is what we end up with, something where every single piece has a place in the design doc, a function, and I don't think it is anywhere near being "bad." But it's not groundbreaking design or something you may have not seen before, which imo isn't something I've seen anyone do in a long time. Also, it's not a personal work either, so it isn't really expressive in any way. Do you see people posting there basketball player models in here for EA? Probably not.

Sorry for the arbitrary drivel. And if this sounds like I'm defending myself too much, sorry for that as well, just trying to put it in context.

MoP

Oh, yeah, I understand that totally. It's not "bad" really, but like you said it's not really expressive.

However I'm a strong believer that you can make even plain ideas look interesting with a bit of thought.
For example, you said this was 600 years in the future ... if you consider how far the design and construction of body armour has come in the past 100 years from WW1 up to modern combat body armour, I would expect the next 600 years to demonstrate some revolutionary techniques and ideas that might considerably change the appearance of body armour.

Similarly you can take ideas from historical armour but use modern/futuristic materials to put it together. Either way it will create something that seems plausible but still interesting.

Basically my main complaint about this guy is that the armour padding is placed in what seems like an entirely random manner. There's no cohesiveness to the way the arm or leg pads are shaped or placed. In 600 years of futuristic armour development I'd expect people would come up with innovative ways that the panels slot together or interesting designs that are reflected across the whole suit.

Just some thoughts

fritz

i agree with what you are saying. but MOP brings up interesting points as well. however i would like to point out a couple of things i have noticed...that you may want to take a look at: 1). i highly recommend you either get rid of, or break up that plate that covers the guys lower abdominal/upper pubic area. right now...it would be difficult to bend over and near impossible for the dude to sit down. 2). you should really think about showing something to connect the kneepads to the leg...the pads look as tho they are just slapped on. and it's just not very convincing.

the execution on the model looks really nice!

ebagg

Is the armor supposed to be flexible? Theres pieces that go from the forearm, over the elbow to the tricep, and another that goes from the calf, to the back of the knee, and into the inner thigh. Even flexible armor would be a bit cumbersome going over those joints. Seems like a design flaw.

The edges arent very hard on the armor, making it all look a tad soft. I work in some smaller details to make it more interesting.

Otherwise it's very clean and the proportions look good, the suit needs a few changes but looks well made.

steady

very cool model retleks, you shouldn't ever be intimidated to post, so please do more often!
However I would imagine that in 600 years in the future hopefully we will have discovered how to project forcefields or wear some crazy plasma suits that absorb kinetic energy... but hey its up to you !

oliver

Hey guy, let me say you one thing: dont be intimitaded...when you reach this skill level in modelling, you really dont have to be intimidated by ANYBODY. Your character armor is very very good imo.

retleks

Okay, I didn't catch these last few post, but I'll try and make this quick. Thanks for the crits again and I'll try and post more deffinitly. My lead corrected me, it's actually more like 300 years in the future instead of 600. And yes I agree even making that statement is about as arbitrary as Gates making another million. The armour is very flexible indeed, but even then I can agree with you on the combersome issue. I think in my head I just really wanted to do it this way probably because I thought it looked more unique than not doing it this way. Perhaps when I get permission and when it is done I'll be able to post the final low poly version here. Thanks again, I'll deffinitly post more as I've learned a lot just from these few replies.

vahl

I think you can add more "depth" to the character by giving a function to that outfit, now it just looks like...a suit...nothing terrific yet (although very well executed)

maybe adding accessories, like ammo, knives, grenades, all that stuff that will give a story to your character. The design should reflect what your character has been through, his job (space marine, space miner, deep sea diver, etc).

a weapon can help a little too IMO

you have some void areas on the design ( upper chest, elbows, backpack) add some (logical) stuff there to make everything flow a bit better

also the big bland parts look like they could be some kind of rubber/soft kevlar stuff, if so, maybe making some edges to make them look wider, etc

I do understand that you still want a clean design, but clean can be detailled aswell, as soon as every detail has a purpose.

keep it up man ^^