Assassin (Based from Ezio)

MainManiac

Project i recently started. Ive been primarily cautious about this whole project because with the past characters ive done ive been attempting stuff that i havent done before and its completely out of my comfort zone. But thats what it takes to build up my level

My experience with ZBrush is not that great at all, which is why i posted this thread. Something about posting WiPs causes me to lose interest in projects more quickly so lets see how this turns out.

Heres the base mesh so far:



Face mesh is pretty dense, it will more that likely be replaces as soon as i get the chance to crank out a new generic head as a sculpting base.

So comments so far on the topology/form? Also, could anyone please recommend some good character sculpting matcaps. Im in dire need of some good ones that truly look like and and very nice and presentable.

Heres what i have so far in ZBrush. As you can see i have a hard time getting wrinkles to look smooth and well defined without flattening them in some way. Even though it looks bad in zbrush it probably wont show up (as) bad in a normal map, but ill keep working at it to get the best results i can.

MainManiac

Found an amazing matcap and helped me fix alot of depth errors in my folds.

For right now please ignore the hands. The way i have them in the low poly completely cancels out the high poly so the way they look now is just the subd. I will soon have a project where i will create a generic attachable hand to my style of topology that i can sculpt to my liking. (Or do it now and stop putting it off?) If im really liking this model ill go the extra mile to make it look better, considering i have enough of my break days left.


That little sticking out mesh on the chest is an eye sore. I cant figure out how to push it back under (its the collard shirt below), and ill have to fix it before i bake outside of zbrush.

.morph3us

uhm... i cant say much until now, just wanted to support you!
looks promising!

as far as matcaps go, they have a great collection over at pixologic:
http://www.pixologic.com/zbrush/downloadcenter/library/

also you need to be cautious with the edges of the cloth, they are rounded now, but edged on your lowpoly model, so either u need to do a retopo or export a higher res mesh back from zbrush

i'll overgo the hands

MainManiac

Here is an update, needs some more touchups.

JGcount

Good progress. Be careful not to make you folds too uniform. I am specifically refering to the folds on the lower part; from the belt and down.

MainManiac

Right now im uving the low poly so i can get a bake out to see what it looks like. That will help me choose what needs more work.

Cremuss

Good start.

The folds on the top part looks pretty good but looking at some pictures I think your folds on the lower part are too deep and should be wider and more subtle. There is no reason that a piece of leather that hangs down like that produces that kind of folds.
Also, we can clearly see that the leather and the belt are made of one single mesh so, be careful with the folds near the belt : Actually the belt is supposed to tighten everything and so the folds should "bump out" gradually near the belt.

Last thing, I think these hands need some work, they are almost flat :poly124:
Good luck :poly121:

MainManiac

I always thought the skirt was a silky sort of material. Thanks, will go over.

MainManiac

Went back over a few areas

tda

Don't start a lowpoly until your highpoly is done, or you at least think it is. If you just need to decide what areas of the sculpt need more work, you don't need to spend ages making a temporary lowpoly and baking it, just look at the sculpt! Having a backwards pipeline like that will only slow you down.

Right now everything looks really soft, like it's a melted plastic model mushing together. You need to more closely pay attention to the different parts of his getup and seperate them out into subtools. His red sash, undershirt & overshirt are all distinct from eachother but they are 1 seamless object on your mesh. The belts on his boots would also benefit from being subtools. You don't have to seperate them, but at the very least make them look as if they are seperated, like the reference. Even if you are changing the design, make sure to pay attention to references to establish the fundamentals of how the different pieces of his outfit fit together to make a whole.

MainManiac

Will do. I still have the mesh set up so that any changes in ZB will still show up in the low poly so i can still go back and fix everything.

Here was the bake and a basic laydown of colors. I was planning to paint the buckles in but i could probably do them in zbrush. What you said about everything looked mushed together is my main and most prominent problem in ZBrush, and it happens to everything i sculpt and i have no clue why. Its the reason i avoid zbrush with most of my work though. I had gotten Richard Smiths character tutorial and hoped that would help me, which it didnt. What a ripoff, i hate when they make videos and just add commentary about physics and they don't show you the technical aspect of it like exact brush settings, how much you should smooth etc.