3D-I Assignment 3; Part 2

A few weeks have passed and it’s time for another update on the current character modeling assignment. Since it’s been a while since the last update, I’ve done quite a lot. So here’s a summary.

As I find the head and face the most important and noteworthy about this model, this is where I started. The rest was so simplistic that I felt that could come later on. The way I like to model faces is that I start by creating separate loops around the eyes and the mouth and then connect them as I go. Modeling from a cube is just something I have never been able to get my head around, it’s easier I find to start with the most important edge loops and then go from there. I also started to block in the hair.

Once I was at an acceptable, although not finished, with the head I started to block out the basic shapes for the rest of the body.

As appointed by my employing student, although there is no body nor hands showing on the concept, he does in fact have it and it should be modeled as well. I decided that he should have a sort of long jacket, underneath his poncho. However, once I’d finished this, the teacher said that this was not necessary as it didn’t show on the concept, and since we only had 3000 polys at our disposal, she recommended that I get rid of the body/arms and spend those extra polys somewhere else.

I used them to add more definition to the hair, adding some extra strands, the face, redoing the topology with more polys and also added better defined knees. I also added a bevel to the gold collar to give it a more rigid look.

As recommended by the teacher, I reevaluated how I made the eyes (now that I look at them, they look obviously wrong, oh how blind you can get). I gave them a more almond shaped look, added the opening for the tear canal, at the same time as I tried to keep them rather cartoony.

At this point I felt that I was finished enough to start the UV-map. Just like last time I won’t bother you with any details with this, other than that it was obviously easier to do this, compared to the vehicle, due to it having a lot less parts. This is how it turned out:

Once the UV-map was done, I brought it into Mudbox to do the textures. I started by blocking out the plain colors. After that I mapped out where the details would be with a thin brush, this was just so I would get a sense of what I was going for before I did the actual painting. I like to work in layers, from big to small, so I continued at this point by grabbing the airbrush and did some basic shading and highlighting. Then I went into more detail, using the map I did earlier, and started to define these, alternating between drawing and shading. This is where I am right now. What follows now is to finish up all the details and do the eyes!

Until next post, whenever that is, let’s soar! // Sky