ZBRUSH - BASE MESH CREATURE

My second experience of using Zbrush was using the base mesh method, this method is easier than other methods as you have a frame to use and build upon however because of this it is slightly less creative"you cant create a tank from a base mesh of a head" was what stuck in my mind. In this session we started off with the base mesh of a humanoid bust, and slowly started molding it using similar tools to Mudbox, however the detail seems to be much greater, and once a stage is done I would subdivide and work in more detail.

I started off by pulling out the jaw and forehead showing more of a skeletal structure, I pulled out and pointed the ears and added some muscularity to the neck, before I knew it I realised I had subconsciously started to mold some form of "Orc". I liked this idea so continued molding now with this in mind, slightly misshaping the ears more, pulling out the brow and pinching together the nose. 

ORC 1.

ORC 2.

I also pulled in the under chin section to define the jawline, as well as pulling the chin out, I bulked up the back of the neck as well by this stage. I now looked at the model so far and realised I wanted to make it less generic and cut more greatly into it. 

ORC STAGE 2.

ORC STAGE 2.1

After subdividing I pulled the earlobes down and out as well as cutting into the ears, I pulled out the crown of the brow and forehead and added wrinkles, I pulled the cheeks in and the brow further in to give a more daunting look. this work i had done caused the bridge of the nose to be pushed back, creating an odd profile, I decided I would fix this in the next stage before subdividing. 

ORC FINAL 1.

ORC FINAL 2.

At first glance the front view of this stage looks largely the same, however after pulling out the bridge of the nose to create the flat front that is familiar in orcs, I subdivided and started to work on fine details, I cut into the ears more but this time turning of the mirror tool to make the character less symmetrical, I also took a chunk out of the orcs left ear, I also added a scar over the lip, left eye and next to the right eye, as well as larger ones on the shoulder and torso. These small details helped give the Orc bust character and would help tell a story if this was produced for a game or film. 

I enjoyed this technique and took to it rather quickly, I think it could come in very useful for humanoid character design. 

ZBRUSH - ZSHPERES CREATURE

As an upgrade from last years software I have now started working in Zbrush, it is a very new program to me and I am still getting to grips with it, however I can already see how expansive and open to creativity it is. There are many different techniques available to be used when using Zbrush, some are more effective and creative than others. My first experience using Zbrush was using the technique Zspheres, which is basically a technique of building a shape or creature from spheres and the smoothing them over, eventually molding on top of. This technique is so highly creative that you don't even need an idea of what you want to build to start with, you can just let your imagination flow and as long as you have a basic grasp of anatomy produce a somewhat realistic creature or being. Due to my work last year on life drawing and anatomy I was able to do this.

ZSPHERE CREATURE 1.

I wanted to create something that could actually be scary, I found that spending a lot of times working on the fingers helped achieve this effect. Its all good and well creating a completely alien creature but if it isn't realistic or somewhat believable then it just isn't scary. The most effective way of creating a creature is by using basic humanoid or animal anatomy as a basis and then morphing and adjusting it, using recognisable shapes out of context to slightly confuse and hopefully scare the viewer / player. I believe I have done this to a decent extent, the spindly fingers and misshapen limbs help with that greatly.

ZSPHERE CREATURE 2.

THE RETURN : SUMMER PROJECT : BASIC CONCEPT WORK

As I return to writing after summer I must apologies for not updating regularly. I had planned to update my work produced over summer fairly regularly, but due to unforeseen issues involving a faulty graphics card, broken engine and empty wallet I have been unable to produce the amount of work I had intended let alone update it here. I have been set a summer project that due to these issues I have been unable to complete, I have however got the work I produced before the issues and since they were fixed a few days ago.

Our Project was to produce a character that had to represent a cyborg humanoid. The character had to be at least 20% human / 20% Cyborg and not fully human or robotic, the production of this character was to include a detailed back story, concept art, modelling and rigging, due to my issues I was unable to get to this later stages however the start of my workflow is present and is as follows. 

I first decided to write a backstory, I took a while to think one up making notes and drawing sketches of ideas on paper lying around, I wanted a game that i want to be built, something I feel I would want to play if it was made by a Triple A company, I soon decided on a version of a post apocalyptic game, I took inspiration for a story and theme from games already in existence, films, books and anything else I had stored in my brain in the genre. Games such as Borderlands and Rage and Films like The Book of Eli and Mad Max. These gave me a very strong idea of the look of the game and also a story. 

I decided to Produce Information sheets on the character/ characters and important features in the game, these two explain the setting of the game rather well in my opinion. The game name is "The Saved" which also happens to be the name of the type of character you are. 

THE SAVED INFO SHEET.

VICTORY INDUSTRIES INFO SHEET.

These info sheets would be present throughout the game to go back and read, much like the archives in the Assassins Creed Games. Next I decided to think about my main character and the look of the saved. I first decided to produce a quick mood board to get some ideas for shapes and forms that already exist, this was useful to show me what I could do but also to show me what had already been done and insure I didn't produce something exactly the same.

THE SAVED MOOD BOARD.

This gave me an idea for shapes and now I moved onto producing silhouettes.

THE SAVED SILHOUETTES 1.

THE SAVED SILHOUETTES 2.

I chose one to work with and produced some sketches of ideas for limbs etc (the chosen silhouette is in the bottom left corner).

THE SAVED SKETCHES.

These sketches gave me a platform to build from, I wasn't sure about the final silhouette being the final one yet but I decided to try drawing up dome head options for this silhouette. 

HEAD OPTIONS 1.

These were fun to do and gave me options but I decided that I did want to change the silhouette, I used the original one and tweaked it, coming up with these two options. 

FINAL SILHOUETTE 1.

FINAL SILHOUETTE 2.

I was much happier with these slight changes and the different head shape. I now drew some head options for this silhouette. 

HEAD OPTIONS 2.

Again I was much happier with this result and was looking forward to the rest of the project, unluckily this is when my problems occurred, now that they are fixed I was hoping to pick up where I left off however other new work has taken president over this project, hopefully when other work dies down I can come back to this. 

MUDBOX : HUMANOID CREATURE HEAD

So this week I had my first crack at Mudbox. I had the task of taking the basic humanoid head model provided by Mudbox and sculpting it into a creature head. this task was based on pure creativity and therefore I sculpted the form straight from thought rather than researching as to get use to the program. when designing a character for a more specific brief or to a concept artists designs then obviously source would be used. 

I first worked on pulling out basic features from the model using the grab tool, after mirroring the tool of course I concentrated on the ears, chin/beard, brow and crown, I also added some definition to the upper lip and neck. This is the result of using the grab tool as well as the sculpt tool.

HEAD 1.

HEAD 1.1.

HEAD 1.2.

I was happy with this shape so added another layer and subdivided the divisions to give me more detail to work with. Using mainly the sculpt tool I worked on the shape and details of the ears as well as simple details of the face and beard, I also worked on the brow of the face as well as pulling out the bust to create a start of armor. 

HEAD 2.

HEAD 2.1.

HEAD 2.2. 

HEAD 2.3.

I now took to working on the nose, defining the back and some other small details after again adding a new layer and subdividing. I used a combination of mainly the sculpt and foamy tools. 

HEAD 3.

HEAD 3.1.

HEAD 3.2.

HEAD 3.3.

After this layer I created a layer to mainly work on the armor and its definition using the, flatten, grab and sculpt tools. 

HEAD 4.

HEAD 4.1.

After this stage I decided to make a couple of layers for different "Classes" of this character, therefore this would be the basic character and each of these layers can be turned on separately to show different classes. 

HEAD WARRIOR.

HEAD WARRIOR 2.

HEAD WARRIOR 3.

HEAD ELDER.

HEAD ELDER 2.

HEAD ELDER 3.

 

PHOTOSHOP : VAMPIRE

In one of our sessions we were given a vampire and tasked with painting over it and adding textures to change its look, the original was just a plain white model over a black background, I first got a rusted kind of texture and placed it over parts of the vampires stomach, I found this worked well for a rough skin look, I then added a leaf texture over the shoulder and chest to create veins, I started cutting and moving it to follow the shape of the body. I got to this point before moving on to other work. 

VAMPIRE.

MAYA : CHARACTER

Following on from the T-Rex assignment we were tasked with modelling a character based on a side and front image, we would do this by extruding edges and moving the vertices to to portray the form. 
I found this difficult at the start with regards of how to approach the shapes but once I got into it I enjoyed it. 

CHARACTER MODEL 1.

I started off with a mirrored cube and added edge loops to form the shoes. I then created a edge making the shape of the leg and continued to extrude it up and out using the front and side views.

CHARACTER MODEL 2.

I continued up and made the trousers, I had to rotated the edges to make a curved top, I then deleted faces and used that edge to carry on with the body.

CHARACTER MODEL 3.

I did the same for the top of the torso, I also deleted faces where the arms are and moved the vertices to form a more circular shape. 

CHARACTER MODEL 4.

CHARACTER MODEL 5.

I continued with the arms and got to this point. 

CHARACTER MODEL 6.

For the head I created a cube at the right size and then smoothed it to create a sphere. I then grabbed vertices and moved them in the side view to create the nose and mouth. This type of modelling started picking up pace as I got into it and I will also have to finish this with the Neck and Head however I am happy with it so far. 

MAYA : T - REX

Earlier in the year we had a assignment to model a T-Rex using the method of box modelling, (modelling by extruding faces from a polygon primitive and moving vertices using a side and / or front view to create a low poly shape. 

I started this project but had problems with Maya and was unable to complete it however I did gain from it the knowledge of box modelling which I have used since to great effectiveness.

T - REX HEAD.

T - REX HEAD 2.

T - REX HEAD 3.

I Think what I have so far shows the form and shape well and is easily recognizable, I want to carry on and finish this piece soon as I found it enjoyable and informative. 

GAME : MAYA : WATCH TOWER

Today I made a simple Watch tower that will be duplicated and used in our game as a reference for the end point of the game. flying between these two towers will signify entering the safe zone and will set the game to the end screen. I tried to model this as simply and "low cost" as possible whilst still looking good enough for our game.

WATCH TOWER MODEL.

This is the plain model of the tower, it is simple and obvious what it is so works as a model for our game. however for the game i needed to add some basic materials to it to make it ready to go straight into the game.

WATCH TOWER TURRET 1.

WATCH TOWER TURRET 2.

First I focused on the turret of the tower, I made three materials, A shiny steel looking material, a darker iron or carbon looking material and a golden material as our end goal is a golden city, I applied these to parts of the turret and was happy. 

FINAL WATCH TOWER 1.

FINAL WATCH TOWER 2.

FINAL WATCH TOWER 3.

FINAL WATCH TOWER 4.

I applied these materials to the rest of the tower and this is the result. I am happy with this model as I produced it in a reasonable amount of time (1 and a half hours) and it has been done economical.