WIP - Game Character - Plague Doctor (image heavy)

capone

I'm currently casually taking part in a competition over at cgtalk. The challange is to take an known character or type of character and to reverse/change it. So for example cheerful darth vader, Mrs Mumra, medievil master chief or a futuristic medievil knight.

I'm going with a modern cyborg take on a 17th Century Plague Doctor.

Thing is my thread is hardly getting any comments so I'm posting here to get any extra feedback. I'll just post my progress so far which includes research, concept and modeling. At the moment I am about 50% on the texture pass, no spec or other fancy effects.

Panupat

I think that looks awesome...
I personally like the mouse in design 1-2-3 better tho.

Mark Dygert

Thats a great idea and an amazing WIP already, nice work!

Crits:
- UV stretching on the chin strap is turning the metal circles into ovals.
- The hat reminds me Ed Norton's hat in the Honeymooners, which kind of adds too much humor to what looks like a serious model. I can't tell if the chin strap connects to the hat or if it runs under it?
-The normal map is breaking apart and missed rays are turning up in quite a few areas. Either fix the cage by extending it. Or add geometry to the bottom of the model, bake it and then delete the extra part. So the tearing apart happens on an extra piece you don't use.
- The low poly model has some pretty messy geometry, quite a few triangles patched in here and there. I'm not sure if it was an attempt to control triangle count or if it was just messy modeling but I would urge you to try and work in square polygons whenever possible, of course there are times when tri's are needed and its perfectly fine to use them, but working in square polys opens doors to using edge loops, tris normally break edge loops and cause you to go in and select edges by hand which takes more time.

Looking really good so far! Hopefully you can work up some good body concepts before you jump into modeling. I know it feels like the concept time is done but it's easier to knock up a few quick ideas on paper then it is to try and alter a model after you started. Concept modeling can be time consuming and it looks like you have the right idea when it comes to knocking out a series of ideas.

Wells

I think you ended up going with the snout that makes the least amount of sense, for a cyborg. It's obviously hinged, so does it act like a mouth? does it open and shut when he speaks? In almost all your other concepts it is an integrated breathing apparatus, it makes 'sense' being part of a filtration system. Currently I don't think it reads as that any more, and now just looks like an odd metal muppet-chin, if that makes sense.

Your concept had a lot more interesting, sharp shapes, specifically dealing with the silhouette. The hipoly turned it into a very generic head-shape

The hat does look a little comically undersized.

capone

thanks alot, just want to say I really appreciate the crits.

stimpack

these are incredibly simple shapes. i think you would have gotten a much cleaner result had you modeled this in max or maya then detailed the organics in zbrush. everything looks very clay like and not solid like a hard surface should right now.

capone

I did start in max, made my 'medium' poly featuring all the main shapes. Then did a zbrush pass. Exported both a high and low version from zbrush. Edited and optimized the low zbrush export and placed that into the high zbrush export.

Bad method then?

capone

Added spec and then added patches, rips and stitches to cloak.

fogmann

I like this, quite interesting, but I think that you ended
up with something that looks like it could have existed in
17th century and doesn't look like cyborg, especially with
the latest update that makes the face mask look like it's
been hand crafted or forged out of some metal. I like that,
but then you might miss the requirement and your original
idea. In other words, nothing on the model is hinting at
high tech.

What Stimpack meant was that you shouldn't have sculpted the
face mask, since it is supposed to consist of mechanical
parts that you can better control with subd modeling in a 3D
app, as opposed to sculpting them with zbrush where they
assume more irregular shape. If it's hard to model those
shapes and easy to just paint them in Z, then perhaps you
could have taken the sculpted high poly of the mask and
resurfaced it in your 3D app, and then used the resurfaced
and then subdivided mesh to bake your normals. You would
have gotten cleaner result, but then that hand-crafted feel
would go away.

Zephir62

The mouth of the beak doesn't seem very mobile. It appears to be welded to the rest of the headpiece and yet it has a hinge. From a distance I'm sure it'll look fine in any game, but any close-ups will look awkward and inconsistent.

Emil Mujanovic

fogmann's onto it! No cyborg feel at all. Great looking model though.
I think its also the clothing that's losing the tech cyborg feel. It probably would have looked tech/futuristic if it were used in an 80s movie but not so much these days. I would lose the hat and do something interesting with the hood, maybe some wires or tubes, metal plating, things that scream out cyborg.
Great stuff, but you're not there yet. Just keep going and you should have a sweet entry.

-caseyjones

Illusions

Some inspiration/reference if you need it: http://arcipello.deviantart.com/art/My-Red-Tie-3006638

This is one of the things I thought of when I saw you're piece...the other was Spy vs Spy.

Lord McMutton

You could make the area of the hood under the mask open, and have a mechanical neck-like structure.

Jeremy Lindstrom

That reminded me of the "Spy vs. Spy" in MAD.

capone

Thanks for all these crits.

With regards to the 'cyborg' aspect. I think I was going in that direction with the following image,



but then I thought 'too star wars'. I'm certainly not wanting a really futuristic mech cyborg with this character. I find the idea of recreating a robot through older technology much more appealing.

As for the beak thing,the idea is that he pulls/lowers it to reveal a large vent/hole that releases chemicals/gas. This final design doesn't really get that across and thats one of a few things I regret about this design.

Wells

ah, that explanation makes sense, but your model isn't showing that. If the beak is indeed meant to be pulled down like that, why not make it a separate object so it can actually be animated?

capone

Update,

Joao Sapiro

im really digging the character! add a tad more pop on the specular like more colors , slight blues etc, for the metal, gives it more life

Mathorne

Really cool! I'm especially digging those ornamental details on the hat and face - adds a lot of character.

almighty_gir

i love it, it makes me think of terry pratchett...

dejawolf

love the coppery feel of the metal. spot on!

capone

done with it now. Here is the 'beauty shot' though erm, I sort of like the viewport render of it more :S

Austin

It looks awesome, the only thing I can say is that the eye looks sort of flat, the texture is great, but the real 3D value isn't there. But seriously awesome work.

capone

Thanks. You mean the piece around the eye don't you? Yeah one of my biggest mistakes was trying to create mechanical surfaces in zbrush. Next time will keep mechanical shapes within max.

The Ben

I really love this concept. Good stuff.

Hito

looks great, the little details really sells the character

Pedro Amorim

Hey man, this is really cool.
Its one of those things that you dont think it could work when you start seeing the model being made, but somehow you managed to make it work. The texture work along with the normals and spec make this a very nice piece. Congrats.

Ruz

looks prety good, though i think you ould have paid more attention the folds of his garment and I would have built up the mechanical details in max first as is mentioned in some other posts. so yah pretty nice overall, but I think you could still improve it some more