Futuristic Marine
Hello Polycounters! This is my first post here, but I have been a lurker for quite some time now, and absolutely love the work that you guys do (It is definitely inspirational)!
I have entered into a character competition that my school is holding, and would love to hear some critiques from some polycounters as I work on my entry. Basically the competition requirements are that we create a character that has all the maps and polygon counts of characters in UT3. We are also required to bring our characters into UT3 or the Crytec engine. Since I have already taken a character into UT3 before, I will be going that route.
Anyways, right now I am coming up with a rough idea of what I would like to do. This is what I have come up with thus far, and I would like to hear what you guys think of the basic design before I go any further:
He is a space marine type character with a jetpack on his back.
I have entered into a character competition that my school is holding, and would love to hear some critiques from some polycounters as I work on my entry. Basically the competition requirements are that we create a character that has all the maps and polygon counts of characters in UT3. We are also required to bring our characters into UT3 or the Crytec engine. Since I have already taken a character into UT3 before, I will be going that route.
Anyways, right now I am coming up with a rough idea of what I would like to do. This is what I have come up with thus far, and I would like to hear what you guys think of the basic design before I go any further:
He is a space marine type character with a jetpack on his back.
Replies
Ya, I was afraid of that. I guess I just needed to hear someone else say it in order to convince myself that I needed to go back to the drawing board. I think my main problem is that I am not confident enough in my work and I just keep my designs too simple and not unique. I'll come back with hopefully something not so overdone.
Thank you!
- Dave
- but not so clich
I think you should start your designs with interesting silhouettes and then try to make sense of them afterwards. Also try playing with asymmetrical designs they're normally more interesting. Thinking up a back story and a motive for characters usually helps with the designs.
Daveo ignore all the "oh this is really similar to (insert random game name) and just do the thing.
Also, the gun in your concept is super tiny
Well while we're talking realism, any conventional firearm should work perfectly fine in a vacuum. The biggest issue would probably be regulating the temperature of the weapon.
Personally i think master chief looks like he should be riding a dirt bike or playing paintball.
I decided to continue with the design, but fix a few things. I still need to work on making it not so symmetrical, and add some details to the armor. Do people usual draw out most of the details in their concepts or just the basic ideas and shapes?
I am not intentionally trying to rip off anybody's design, so I am sorry if it looks like yours buddikaman (although I am not seeing all that many similarities).
Anyways I got a start on the turnarounds which are required for the competition. I still need to come up with something to make the right side unique from the left, but I'll sketch some more and figure it out.
Justin_Meisse - I really liked your suggestion about making it more realistic. I actually sketched out a few designs, but I wasn't happy with any of them so I ended up scrapping the idea. Maybe for my next model I will revisit the idea since I have a bunch of reference images now.
This is more about learning for me than winning the competition. I have never done normal maps before, and have used Zbrush very little which is how I will be generating them. So I think this design will be good to learn with.
Here is what I have at this point:
3d.sk is a good site to find images.
Hey jack ass, I was just giving the kid a reference model to look at. Did i ever imply he was trying to copy mine? Did I ever suggest he shouldnt follow through on his concept? I was simply showing him a model that was done in a similiar style for reference purposes. Way to jump the gun.
Scott Petty
Environment Artist
www.Buddikaman.com
I finished up my concept:
And I have started a mesh in 3ds max 9. I will be taking this into zbrush for details and a normal map (something I have never done before)
Jumping the gun or not, it did come across that way. I don't think anyone in this thread interpreted it the way you meant it, and it seemed pretty douchy, given your models' similarity to so many other designs.
No harm done, though, just remember that if a lot of people interpret your post in a certain way, it's probably confusing.
http://www.netjak.com/review.php/1400
ADDED: ALOT! lol
Looks good though
It is applied as a Normal Bump (I think that is what Max calls it). Is there a better way to show a normal map in Max 9?
Also here is a start on the texture (upper half of the chest). Texturing is one of my weak skills, so any input as I go along would be much appreciated:
Everything south of the knees might need to be re-thought. The overall shape is very undefined and pretty nonfunctional. They remind me of the snow boots Napoleon wears in Napoleon Dynamite. Or the faux boots that come in kiddie Halloween costumes, the ones that fit over the shoes and don't have a sole. (oh gawd take me now for what I'm about to mention) They remind me of Dragon Ball Z character feet... damn I hate that crap...
Feet and boots can really sell a character, dig up some boot ref, and really set out to design some great boots. Define the foot arch, separate the heel from the rest of the sole.
I did some tests with the character in game and here is what came from that:
I did make my normals more pronounced using overlays in photoshop, but since they are normals that were generated from a displacement map, they are not true normals I guess (the above shots show the original normal map, not the fixed). I have been struggleing to get normals that I can at least fix up in photoshop to be generated in Zmapper, xNormal, or 3ds Max. Sadly nothing has worked yet there.
I also got started on a platform for my 360 turnaround that is required, and began to setup some lights (still needs some work and AO).
Here is what I have:
It is skinned to the UT male rig. No custom animations as I have no idea where to even begin with that.