SC2 Ultralisk. Trying to do it justice.
polycounter lvl 12
I have to call it finished. It turned out OK.
I was inspired by a few of the SC2 models that were floating around Polycount recently so I decided to try and tackle my personal favorite. The Ultralisk. The goal of this project is to learn retopo, improve UV mapping, improve organic sculpting, and improve texturing.
I am mostly following this concept by Mr.Jack.
However I am incorporating some stuff from the original SC2 model such as the front legs.
This is my original zbrush model. I blocked out the shapes in Maya then reworked them in zbursh using dynamesh. I started messing around with how I wanted the skin to look.
I took that into 3D coat and retopo it. I am pretty happy with the results considering this is the first time I have retopoed anything. Then I went into Maya to add the spikes and teeth where I needed them, and UV mapped it.
These are the results for that.
The tris count is 23,438 including teeth and spikes.
The UV map looks like this. It is mirrored over the center, and a lot of the spikes and teeth are overlapping.
Next I am going to bring all this back into zbrush and get all the detail going from the concept art. Any suggestions, feedback, and advice would be much appreciated.
I was inspired by a few of the SC2 models that were floating around Polycount recently so I decided to try and tackle my personal favorite. The Ultralisk. The goal of this project is to learn retopo, improve UV mapping, improve organic sculpting, and improve texturing.
I am mostly following this concept by Mr.Jack.
However I am incorporating some stuff from the original SC2 model such as the front legs.
This is my original zbrush model. I blocked out the shapes in Maya then reworked them in zbursh using dynamesh. I started messing around with how I wanted the skin to look.
I took that into 3D coat and retopo it. I am pretty happy with the results considering this is the first time I have retopoed anything. Then I went into Maya to add the spikes and teeth where I needed them, and UV mapped it.
These are the results for that.
The tris count is 23,438 including teeth and spikes.
The UV map looks like this. It is mirrored over the center, and a lot of the spikes and teeth are overlapping.
Next I am going to bring all this back into zbrush and get all the detail going from the concept art. Any suggestions, feedback, and advice would be much appreciated.
Replies
Also does anybody know how to get some decent renders with BPR in zbrush?
I think the sculpt is nearly done, I just have some tweaking to do on some parts. Any feedback would be appreciated.
Check out this vid tut. Its fantastic for trying to sculpt rocky organic plates. I think applying some of these methods to your sculpting would great!
Keep pushing and it will look fantastic!!
if i were you go back to an earlier stage and figure out the softer forms of the flesh and the harder angular forms of the shell. good luck
I completely agree, I went back to try to define the armor/rocky parts, the flesh, and the bone parts. I just worked on the back leg before I go to the rest of the body to make sure it works well. I still have a lot of work to do on the flesh but I think it looks a lot more readable. Any opinions would be appreciated.
Thanks for adding nothing important to threads ever.
If you look in the original concept, the eyes are quite small compared to the size of the beast. They're that way so that the beast seems even larger since large eyes on such beasts are a bit redundant.
Vertrucio, I will take a look at the eyes, thanks for the tip.
First, none of your flesh or rocky forms look like they have any directionality to them. What that results in is something that looks more like a turtle shell and less like hard surface forms applied to an organic body. I'd really try to push that a bit more.
The other is brush intensity. I'm not too familiar with ZBrush so I could be mistaken in this assessment, but looking at Dan's mock up he has varying levels of intensity depending on his materials. I fear your flesh is beginning to look like mud.
But I don't mean to discourage you. Keep going and I anticipate more work from you, man
1. Your material definition has certainly improved but you could probably push it a little further. I think your 'bone' areas look good, but your 'flesh' areas could have a bit more wrinkles and folds. Something along these lines:
And then when you start texturing you can ramp up the spec to make it all wet and glossy looking like the concept, sort of like a salamander or frog.
2. The material you're calling 'rocky armor' kind of reminds me of crustacean or insect exoskeletons (at least in the concept). So you might look at something like
or
for inspiration for surface details.
3. In the concept there are some interesting transitions from 'flesh' to 'armor', especially around the face. I think you could define these a little more.
4. Your spikes (on the head armor/frill and the hips/shoulders) look a little out of place compared to those on the concept. I think it's because there are a lot of smaller spikes 'sprinkled' around the area in the the concept, whereas your model just has a few spikes exactly placed. They seem too 'perfect', maybe. Also, your spikes are very cylindrical at the base, whereas the ones in the concept look a little more pyramidal, which helps them read more as 'bone shards', I think.
5. His scythe-arms are reading a little funny to me, I think because he seems to have a cutting edge on the inside AND outside of the blades. It might read better if the outside was a little thicker and blunted a bit.
6. His front legs that end in spikes are a little weird, because if he is running around on them they wouldn't stay sharp - they'd be pretty much flat at the end. It might be better to have him walk on his 'knuckles' for lack of a better description, kind of like this guy:
so that the spikes stay sharp for when he has to impale a Zealot.
Good work so far dude, keep it up!
Highpoly Sculpt
Final render. Rendered in maya with mental ray, textures mostly painted in zbursh and photoshop with a couple photos sources mixed in.
Thanks for everybody who posted any helped me out. ON TO THE NEXT PROJECT!
Thanks for the feedback. I had to rush to finish it for class on Thursday so I am not even close to happy with the textures. I don't really get how spec maps work in maya, because the scythes/bone are fairly white, and the rock is pretty dark with some white speckles and edge highlights in it.
I might revisit this over Christmas break and push the textures a lot more, and render it in UDK or Marmoset(my mom is buying it for me for Christmas