My final module for my university degree is a self managed project for which we will produce a high quality piece that demonstrates our skills to the best of our ability. We are allowed to choose the piece to work from and the media in which to create it, with regular feedback from our tutors to monitor our progress.
Current Progress:
In my last entry I had finished the high poly detail for the staff accessory for the character and was working to increase the overall detail of the character.
Concept Art
This week I have completed the sculpting of the majority of the items of the concept in ZBrush and have started to retopologise the character in Maya to create the low poly mesh which I will use to bake the detail onto in Substance Painter.
Character High Poly ZBrush Model
There were a lot of items that I completed this week to start work on creating the low poly such as creating a base for the character to stand on and attaching all the accessories to the character with the various straps that bind all the items together.
Tattered Cape
The cape was more difficult to create than I had planned as I needed to cut holes in the geometry and seal the edges of the cuts without sealing the holes back up. One of the techniques to do this would be to dynamesh the object however this closed up many of the smaller holes so instead I used the bridge tool for the smaller sections.
I was debating attempting to create the cape and skirts in Marvelous Designer, however I have no experience of the software and struggled creating the desired tattered effect. One of the benefits to using Marvelous Designer is that it can more realistically create a natural flow to the clothing which would better shape around the character so I plan on gaining more experience with this in the future.
Head Skull
The head skull is largely human in shape, although bigger with a heavier brow and an elongated jaw which protrudes much further than a normal human. I found this to be really interesting to sculpt due to the harsh lines around the nasal cavity and I used some damage alphas to create a porous and chipped appearance which makes the object appear rather sinister.
Hand with scars
The hand displayed in the concept is quite gnarled and torn up with old scars from various rituals. I was unsure at the precise age range of the character in the concept however the hand and the wrinkles around the face seemed to indicate an older man who still maintained a lean body. This gave me the idea to emphasise the ageing of the hands as though the shaman pays a price performing the many rituals for his people so I made the tendons on the hands pop out with the skin bunching up, stretched against the bones.
Hand Tendons
I looked at a lot of pictures of the hands of elderly people and found that the thing they most had in common was that the skin over the knuckles stood out from the bone as if swollen and the back of the hand would have the tendons stand out over the bone creating a withered effect.
Skirts and Accessories
The layered skirts all have a different material on them in the concept so I used different alphas to create the appearance of a woven fabric under skirt and then two leather skirts which could have been from different animals which adds a lot of variety to the texture.
The other accessories helped bring the character together by adding the smaller details such as the straps holding all the items together and the fabric belt and stone buckle. I'm looking forwards to texturing these items as I think the colours will contrast really well and it will give me more experience in material creation.
Next Stage:
I am currently working to retopologise everything that I have created so far and do a series of bake tests to see how the detail is captured for the many items and start work on refining the materials that I have started to create.
