Abyssian Brute WIP
polycounter lvl 14
So I've recently started a new project for school and I'm hoping for some critique as I go along. The class its for is a giant collaboration effort and the character I've been assigned is essentially a cave-dwelling giant troll/ogre thing.
Here is the concept i'll be working loosely from. You can see that there are two different iterations of this guy which stems from the conceptual responsibilities changing hands. Such is life. But really the only things set in stone about him are that he has to have some form of horns, and be a big scary mofo, so that grants me a nice opportunity to elaborate a bit on his design.
Anyway, here is a look at my first pass at the proportions. Let me know what you think.
heres a quick turn around of it in its current state too. Pardon the plug at the end, it was for my blog![:\](https://polycount.com/plugins/emojiextender/emoji/twitter/confused.png ":\")
[ame]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x7l86l79k0U[/ame]
I know this isn't much to really go on just yet, but i wanted to start getting feedback from the very beginning, so if this inspires any thoughts, let me hear it.
Next step is to get all his accessories blocked out. heres a very rough paintover of my intentions.
The green stuff on his head is supposed to represent 3 horns which are rooted amongst some braided cord of hair, and the extensions up from the gauntlets i plan on being deer skulls with antlers, or something similar. Everything else is pretty much consistent with the concept.
But anyway, sorry for all the words, and thanks for looking! :thumbup:
Here is the concept i'll be working loosely from. You can see that there are two different iterations of this guy which stems from the conceptual responsibilities changing hands. Such is life. But really the only things set in stone about him are that he has to have some form of horns, and be a big scary mofo, so that grants me a nice opportunity to elaborate a bit on his design.
Anyway, here is a look at my first pass at the proportions. Let me know what you think.
heres a quick turn around of it in its current state too. Pardon the plug at the end, it was for my blog
[ame]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x7l86l79k0U[/ame]I know this isn't much to really go on just yet, but i wanted to start getting feedback from the very beginning, so if this inspires any thoughts, let me hear it.
Next step is to get all his accessories blocked out. heres a very rough paintover of my intentions.
The green stuff on his head is supposed to represent 3 horns which are rooted amongst some braided cord of hair, and the extensions up from the gauntlets i plan on being deer skulls with antlers, or something similar. Everything else is pretty much consistent with the concept.
But anyway, sorry for all the words, and thanks for looking! :thumbup:
Replies
Anyway, I know you didn't do the concept, but I've never understood how these guys are so tall and jacked. I'd expect them to be much leaner and more....compact? Even the people living on the surface of Africa don't look that healthy, so I wouldn't expect those living underground to.
Your proportions look fine, I just suggest this because of the bigger and meaner impression it would give.
I was thinking of giving him some patches of baggy or loose skin which I think might go a ways to help pull his physique out of the heavens. I would like to get away from how bubbly some of his muscles look and ground it a little bit more in reality. I guess thats what I'm trying to do with the thing as a whole. Kinda like this, but not as extreme:
I really like the way the skin bunches up while the mass underneath is still clearly visible. Very similar reptilian skin.
To elaborate on the backstory further for those who don't get what Sean was referring to, these things are supposed to be an alternate branch of the human evolutionary path - one which happened to dwell in caves and sprout horn-like masses. Its weird, I agree. But anyway, so that could explain their musculature, if they branched off in a similar way that Neanderthal did. Maybe? Idk. I think I'm going to try and work in some more ape-like features to help sell that premise.
Thanks for the comment tho.
@LateWhiteRabbit - I agree, right now he doesn't look particularly different than your average buff guy. Thanks for pointing that out.
@Goraaz - Thanks for the advice, I'll do that.
here is the current iteration of the basemesh
and here is a comparison between the new and the old...
I tried to relax the pose, but I'm not sure if what I have done is beneficial or not. I don't have much experience rigging or animating, so if something would be problematic, please let me know.
But other than that. I shrank the head, enlarged the hands, bulged the gut a bit, bulked up the arms and upper legs, and widened everything as a whole.
I started to block out the clothes in Max, and heres the little bit that I've done so far...
As always, thanks for the feedback. I'll continue working on all of his clothing and accessories, and I'll post whenever I get those fleshed out.
Thanks!
first, the proportions of the legs are off, both in relation to themselves and with the rest of the body. The femur should be a little longer than the lower leg (currently they're about the same length), and the total leg length should equal half the body's height. Currently about 2/3's of your model's height is in the legs, which is a pretty extreme ratio.
This isn't to say that you can't have modified body proportions, but it's important to know how you're changing them to convey the proper message about the character.
Much of the problem right now is that you've exaggerated proportions in ways that don't make sense. The aforementioned upper-lower leg proportion is a big part of that-- in nearly all appendages, bones that are proximal to the center mass will be longer and larger. This is because those segments have to support themselves in addition to the subsequent extensions from said appendage. Just look at the hand or a horse's legs, or even an excavator. Same goes for the humerus; it needs to be longer than the forearm, when you currently have it about the same length.
I made a little diagram a made to show what i'm talking about [NSFW--dongs]
also on that note you have the low legs straddled like a fat man. Curve them in a little. And while I'm thinking about it, get rid of the gorilla toe-- it's out of place and detracting from the overall concept. If you want to do something like that with the feet then you need to develop that trend more over the entire body.
Another issue is that your brute is looking dopey rather than imposing-- giant hands and feet with a tiny head will do that if you're not careful, especially when the torso is so small compared to the rest of the body.
If you want to make the overall proportion work as a concept-- short torso with long appendages-- then you need to either slim down the arms and legs or bulk up the torso; otherwise just make the whole thing larger and more proportionate to the limbs. If you've ever boxed you'll know that most of the power in a blow comes from the torso, not the arm. Same goes for pitching-- all that speed comes from whipping the torso. My point here is that the torso you've got currently doesn't look like it can properly drive those arms and legs.
Take a look at gorillas for example. They have these big, powerful arms, yet have an accordingly large torso to support and drive them. I mean look the back on this guy. See what I mean?
A final note is that you might consider playing around with the hip / shoulder ratio. Right now you've got the triangular superman build-- extremely broad shoulders with narrow hips. Consider doing a more even ratio, as widening those hips will make him look slower but much sturdier and brutish. Just depends on what you're going for with the concept.
Ok, that's enough. Good luck with this Robat, I look forward to seeing what you do next.
[ame]
but man-love aside, I took another break from the clothes to go back into zbrush and attempt to implement those suggestions you've given.
I didn't feel like i had a very productive hour when i sat down today. I tried a bunch of different things out with the feedback you gave, and this is what I eventually settled on. I hope its more of what you were describing.
One thing I didn't really fully understand from your comment was what you meant by "curving the legs in a little," so I rotated the ankles in some, and the let the legs hang straighter down after I widened the hips. But I'm sure thats not what you were talking about, so sorry for not catching that.
[ame]
I've gotten everything blocked out and in to Zbrush. Again, not a monumental update, but a bit of a milestone I guess.
The skull on the right bracer is intended to one of a Red Hartebeest. I think hartebeest antlers are pretty slick.
Finally at the point where I can start subdividing. Thanks for all the help so far!
[ame]
I've made a sculpting pass at most of the armor elements and next I'm going to tighten up the anatomy on this higher subdiv and then continue on with the detailing. I still need to sink the straps into him as well, but i wanna wait as long as i can before turning off symmetry.
Thanks! look forward to your comments!
trying to get in the habit of presenting my stuff in a way other than just a default render.
But I've started to detail the face and other than breaking up some symmetry, I think I'm going to call the body done. It was definitely an awesome learning experience, this being the 5th iteration, and one that I'm finally fairly pleased with, not for long though I'm sure.
But as always, any comments or crits are greatly apreciated!
The current low sits at 15,222 tris, and I've some serious optimization left to go. My target is 14k. I've got two 1024's applied with most of the organic elements contained in one map, and all of the clothing elements/ things in need of an alpha in the other map.
Edit: I've also decided to have a go at the BRAWL, so I'll be somewhat juggling this project with that, which is probably a good thing because I think my eyes might need a break from this dude.