Character Critique
Please critique my stuff with Final Fantasy / Aion standards. I want to be on par with them.
**** CRITIQUES ARE PREFERRED ****, Thank You!
First Problem...
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One thing that was annoying me was the boots. Some weird reason her left boot kept getting it's normals flipped.
- I tried duplicating the boot in Maya, it worked, but when I combined the meshes together, the left boot Normals flipped.
- Then I tried 3ds Max and used the symmetry modifier, still didn't work.
- I left the idea of combining the boots together, when I posed her in Zbrush, and Imported it back to Maya, the boot normals flipped again!
- Any reason why the boot normals would flip?
Second Problem...
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My platform looks utterly ridiculous, is there a way to model grass effectively?
**** CRITIQUES ARE PREFERRED ****, Thank You!
First Problem...
_______________________________________________________________
One thing that was annoying me was the boots. Some weird reason her left boot kept getting it's normals flipped.
- I tried duplicating the boot in Maya, it worked, but when I combined the meshes together, the left boot Normals flipped.
- Then I tried 3ds Max and used the symmetry modifier, still didn't work.
- I left the idea of combining the boots together, when I posed her in Zbrush, and Imported it back to Maya, the boot normals flipped again!
- Any reason why the boot normals would flip?
Second Problem...
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My platform looks utterly ridiculous, is there a way to model grass effectively?
Replies
http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?t=559283
They seem to think on there it is a problem with Mental Ray and shared UV space rather than a problem with Maya. So if you are getting the problem with Max too that could be the case.
It would be interesting for you to bring her into Unreal to see if the normal maps are still missed up.
She feels really plastic right now. Fix that by adding hues of reds and oranges around more flushed areas of her face.
She also has a bit of an odd shape to her head. It seems like her eyes are actually coming out of her head instead of being inset into it.
As for poly flow, you have quite a lot more density in her legs than anywhere else. Personally, I think you could cut her tris by nearly half and still have the same result. And especially when it comes to mmos, I'd be careful about having an overly high-poly character.
Still though, I think your biggest issue is texture. The diffuse feels overly plain, while your spec is overly grunged.
As for grass, worry less about covering the ground with alpha cards and get a good, solid grass texture to start with. Then use just a few alphas to emphasize its shape.
Also, I have to ask, why is her eye taking up so much room on the texture sheet? It is the same size as her vest and gloves. If you wanted to keep it closer to the resolution of the head textures, it still looks like you had room to put it on your head texture sheet. Then you could have had more space to make the body textures a little larger.
Also, I'm not a fan of the all brown outfit. It looks muddy and it is hard to tell what is going on. You left out the trim and laces from your concept that would have helped break it up into more easily identifiable parts. If you look at Aion and Final Fantasy characters, they always have a lot of color in their clothing, and though the outfits can be busy, you are never left wondering WHAT they are wearing or how it fits together.
For the grass base, yes, it looks awful. Just make a grass texture and put it on a the ground, then make a texture that is clumps of grass and put it on alpha planes stuck up from the ground. Right now the base looks like shag carpet gone wild.
The presentation of the model is hurting it as well. Rendering on a black background is doing you no favors and obscuring the form and silhouette of your model. It may be supposed to represent night, but remember you are showing off a model, not a scene. You just don't have sufficient lighting or rim light on your model to show it against such a dark background.
I'm not sure about the boots issue. Did you try going Edit Polygons -> Normals -> Reverse in Maya with the boot faces selected? That should fix them if they are turned inside out.
This doesn't resemble anything like FF, or Aion, because the design is completely off. The proportions are completely off. And colours.... there really isn't anything that makes this character look like either of those games.
Starting with just the head:
They're all supposed to have big eyes, with a very heavy upper eyelash. The facial structure seems off, there's almost no lips in your models...
At this point if Final Fantasy/Aion was your goal it really doesn't seem like you researched the style at all.
Here's some making of type videos for FF12:
(you can see the lightning geometry around 4:30)
[ame]
Anyways, I'll reserve further comments till we see closeups, but yeah, it's way off.
Here is some examples where the people who model the characters from concept art based everything off it down to their original palette with some extra details just added
First step, get an untextured, unposed version of the model on a 50% grey backdrop and take some screengrabs, with wires in black turned on and off. We'll need to see front and side views of both the entire model and the face and any other angles that you think are likely to be useful in critiquing.
Ok, based on what I can see now, I'd start by attaching the legs to the body. There's a bit of work to be done in that area and it'll be easier if you're working with one big chunk. It'll also likely be better when it comes to rigging and so forth later and won't limit the camera angles you can show the character from.
It'd be worth getting yourself some good anatomical diagrams or photos and take particular note of how the legs join the torso and at what height the groin is. Your model improves on your concept significantly in that respect, but it's still not correct. Bring the groin down quite a bit.
The arms are a bit short and hands too small. The tips of the fingers should fall around about the middle of the thigh when hanging down. If you grab the entire forearm and hand and scale them up a bit, you'll probably get close, though you'll likely still need to enlarge the hands a bit.
The knee geometry needs to be reworked. You're unlikely to be able to get a decent rig with the geo you've got there now. You'll also need to shift the knees down when you reposition the groin.
The feet are a bit difficult to see buried in the grass, but they appear to be a bit on the short side.
The face looks a little peculiar, though it'd be helpful to get a closer up shot to actually critique it. For what it's worth though, I think it's got far more personality than any of the shots that Jacque posted.
Once you've done some work on the model, we can have a look at the textures. They're a bit dirty and underdetailed in places.
You've got the beginnings of a good character here. The design of the costume is quite nice. You just need to run through and get the anatomy and geometry working before you get too far ahead of yourself.
*******I SERIOUSLY REALLY APPRECIATE YOUR CRITIQUES******, I really do because the people in class are always too polite to give real critiques.