Mech Character / Steam Pirate / Pose

I have gotten a lot done and have some characters to show and some updates as well. So this is a big one.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

My hardsurface/Metal Gear Character is done. I wanted to do something with hardsurface and I really haven't done any before. I looked at the Metal Gear Series for an idea. Its not purely hardsurface, more that it has hardsurface componets and a tech style body.

Ref sheet

I found everything thing I could (toys, art, screenshots) and some more concepts and art from the previous games at http://www.creativeuncut.com/


Concept

I roughed out an idea of the character nothing amazing just need to have a blueprint
I started in Zbrush with this model and then I used Softimage for retopologizing. I find that Softimage has the most effective tools for modeling and polygon sculpting. I save so much time on retopologizing in Softimage compared to working in Maya.

WIP

I used Fibermesh to make the hair and I was able to then double it for textures on the face and the low polygon hair.

Final Zbrush model
 

Low Texture version

Low wireframe

I used the tech blades made by z-design and turned them into 3D models. I did have them as a texture and used alphas and so on but my little computer had a heart attack trying to do all that so I just made things easier and rendered them out in layers.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This other character was done for multiple reasons.
1. I wanted to work on my lower edge flow and perfect some of my lower modeling
2. I wanted to try some clothing
3 and finally I wanted to do an older character with wounds.

So I started find some reference and did some sketches. I wanted to do a Steam punk kind of Pirate woman but it turned into more of a Victorian bad ass/angry woman.


Concept

Ref

I started modeling her in Maya, got the jacket and frills on the shirt done in Softimage and jumped to Zbrush. At this Point I was jumping from the low Zbrush and the low model. I had the UV's set before going into Zbrush to save me some possible pain.

WIP 1

WIP 2

I wanted her wounds to be on her face and look like an Octopus attack and have some cuts and so on. I had a hell of a time trying to find fresh squid/octopus attacks. I found some but than I looked at the marks Leeches leave, similar circle mouth marks I had in mind, and found some great references.

 

Zbrush Polypaint

The Pocket and belts are 50% from the Zbursh tool and 50 what I had modeled before hand. I have her posed, lit and rendered.

Low Model Textured

Low Wireframe

 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I am really close to having my newest reel done Just a few more things to render and pose the pirate woman and I will be golden.

 

I finished the PolySculpt class at CG Society and was glad I did. I had only used Maya to animate and do particle effects in and only a little bit of modeling. So that was a great help. I am now taking a Hardsurface modeling class and getting some more modeling tips in Maya and Zbrush.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 Looking at my Reel I have about 7 characters and everything is looking good but I had to change the pose of Rosa or Hester

They basically have the same pose, So I wanted to change one of them. I have Rosa re-posed and I have an idea for Hester. I will pose Hester and see how the two look.

This is Rosa's new pose I used a stock image from http://faestock.deviantart.com/  as a base pose. I like it but I am not going to say 'yeah' yet till I see how Hester's re-pose comes out; might keep both will see.

http://faestock.deviantart.com/art/Valentine19-367363261

 

Hester still got it; granted it died along the road ages ago. I might keep this pose; I seem to have this sexy pose thing going on today. Rosa looks like a gypsy and Hester is out man hunting(scaring) 

Characters and Creatures

I have been doing more sketching and drawing and found an interesting suggestion. Close your eyes and let you hand wander on the page and then make that scribble into something. I treat my scribbles as silhouettes for the characters I see

I think I will take one of these little guys and do some speed Sculpting. These are only a few of the batch I have done. I am really looking at hardsurafce design and was inspired by Metal Gear Rising style but more on that later

 The Deity is okay so far, I don't know what but the Fibers don't seem to render properly and I think it looks wrong.

The Post Apocalypse scene is coming and going I have the scene laid out but I am not sure if I am will add the flying version of the creature. The scene seems to crowded as it is. Maybe a dead one in the sand to break up the sand behind the character.





Rosa's new pose is coming along I am not sure if it exactly what I had in mind. I wanted to do a new pose but I think this is just one those things that I did because I like posing a character and seeing the personality come out.






 

I have been looking at Metal Gear Rising and I love the style, the metallic anatomy of the characters. I really need to do some hardsurface work and I think I have a decent concept in mind. I looked through all of the concept art I could find of the Metal Gear Series. One of the sites I visit is http://www.creativeuncut.com/, it has all kinds of production art and concepts of games and character designs. And I have been analyzing the concepts and working them out.

Still in heavy WIP but I have high hopes, semi good start. I am jumping from Zbrush to XSI

I am working on the Pieta again and I am working on Mary, and lord the wrinkles and folds are painful but it has been fun. Fold-Zilla and Wrinkle-Soruas I have taken to calling her.

Here are some of the things I have been doing for my modeling class at CG Society.













I have seen a lot of amazing movies recently, I saw Rise of the Guardians and it was not what I thought it would be. There was a ton of action and interesting effects. I loved the way they made Jack Frost's ice act like lighting; fascinating idea to make the Tooth Fairy a humming bird. Les Miserables was interesting, I have never seen it before and it was well done. I feel like every Disney female character song came from Les Mis. Interesting Cinematography making everyone be off center and super focused.

Post Apoc / Sketches / YJ GLTAS Animatics

 So here is where my Post Apocalypse character is for the CG hub Challenge is so far. I wanted to do something with a semi real twist. I thought what would I take with me in my house to start with and I wanted to get away from the classic gas mask military look. I looked at a lot of sport gear and amour.

My character turned into an escaped prisoner, I didn't him to have a gun because as cool as that would look you still need bullets. I am having fun making a grimmer character. I wanted to make him super detailed and yet simple at the same time. The swords are Thai E-nep Knives, I was inspire by Black Lagoon character Shenwa and Kratos from God of War.

 

A good start just down to working on the shapes and cleaning up.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

CG Society Classes started and it seems really nice, great feed back and interesting instructors. Its really nice that they aren't heavy and don't have to be on this time to this time and so on. It's designed for people who are still working and I think that is wonderful. I would love to take more classes if they are as good as this one is. I am really excited about what is to come for the next 7 weeks. 

 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 So I finished the Djinn character, now I need to rig him. I am debating whether I should rig him myself or ask someone to rig him and then I can animate him. I don't want the Djinn and Rosa on the same reel, it seem kind of redundant to me. Having someone do the rig show I made a model and someone can rig it (Team work yeah) and then I can animate it OR do all of it myself and show I understand and can do most of the parts (Also yeah).

I am working on a lot of personal projects: I want to build more of an environment for Rosa, something besides the chair and plain floor, I reposed the Deity and am working on cleaning and making the environment, I also have another character planned and working on my sketching skills and just drawing in general.

 

 These are two characters I have in mind. Both have some armor and hard surface components I need to practice on.

Some sketches I did while watching Young Justice and Green Lantern The Animated Series.


I love Brett Booth's work/style, he works on the Teen Titans New 52. I might sit and work on Red Robin again and redo him; if I can get a good rig for the Djinn going then I can have that as a body base template and just add bones as needs be.
 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I found some animatics of Green Lantern and Young Justice (Both so cool).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XptTX3f4K9s&feature=share

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7S7ioz589s

I love seeing these, I wonder what a script looks like as in how they write the action scenes. I love going through and seeing the notes and everything.

Now I want to see a previz of the Green Lantern animatic, I saw the episode and it was interesting, I wonder if they were planning on doing an episode when Sinestro turned to fear. Also did anyone else notice the black ring book in the science directors room sucks that the series MAYBE not completed.

http://savetheheroes.com/

I am thinking about sending a death box, like have Zatanna bow tie with a bullet hole in it and some pieces of everyone on the team and have them broken and then have a little blue something in there that says please bring back the show, kind of like Pandora's box and a tiny thing of hope.  

Creature WIP / Pin Up Girl

Concept

 

I am trying to move away from the humanoid figure for a creature and focus more on animal in general. Octopus/Squids seem to on my mind, so I combined a bat/flying fox with an octopus, the backward legs were for an idea for an alien I was thinking about doing but that was based on a humanoid as well.

 

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

CG Hub has challenges for characters and this time it was doing a pin up girl. I didn't see it till last week but I tried to make a character.

Concept

 Lauren Bacall is one of my favorite old movie actress. I wanted to get her smokey look and  make a woman who can set you on fire and enjoy watching you burn.

I was inspired by the song (I Always Kill) The Things I Love - L.A. Noire Soundtrack. I also looked at Jessica Rabbit from Who Framed Roger Rabbit.  

 

 

WIPS

 I did some one day sketch and scuplts.
This is based on the statue of Saint Bartholomew, there is a "skinned" statue of him in Duomo, Milan Cathedra. I tried to do the muscle fibers and thought of the Hermit Tarot card for a base idea.

 This a character I was thinking about making, something with a traditional Japanese theater sense.

 I wanted to combine a Jellyfish and an Octopus, I need to redo the paint what not. I made the blue area of her body see through. I need to make some fish to put in her still.






I am working on some animation and more HDR scenes. Like Hester's death and doing something with Rosa and the Djinn. I am going to attempt to make the Djinn do some kick boxing or something. I just need to go refrence hunting to find the best video to use. I think I might make a Green Lantern character in the animated series style; sense that won't be around. I was thinking about the woman from the indigo tribe. I need to sit and figure out how to make her glow, it would be a good challenge and add to my stylized modeling set. And I have some idea for Hush in the Beware the Batman style.   

Works In Progress

For the Train your brain contest I am this far. I need to paint, light, finish sculpting the fabric and my favorite/painful part is to pose him. I have a base I am also working on, the pedestal for him to stand/sit on.

I am also getting a little better in photoshop and am in the middle of this picture. This was the idea I had and was thinking about doing a oil paint of. I may still do an oil painting but I figured it would be more constructive to work with photoshop some more. I have been looking at Gilles Beloeil's work, he worked on the Assassin's Creed games and his work is astounding.

Train Your Brain Contest: Clockwork Man WIP

I working on a model for the Train your Brain contest on DeviantArt. I am going to submit for the Entertainment 3D category. 

I am working on an old concept I did; a clockwork person/angel. In high school for my AP art class we had to come up with a concept and use that 1 concept in 6 different pieces of art. If I remember correctly I was planning on redoing old paintings of angels and doing them with this robotic theme. I did not do this concept instead I did a Tarot Card Circus theme with oil paints.

Anyway; I am at that stage in the sculpt where I haven't really dedicated myself to the work yet. Its at that starting point and I need to sit down and concept the body. I am studying a lot of machinery, clocks, old windup dolls and am working on a Clockwork skeleton that will be seen through out the body, like the neck area and the eyes.   This will be a project where I am going to jump from program to program. I am modeling the outer shell in Zbrush and the cogs and inner workings in Softimage.

The due date is Dec 3rd for the contest, so I really want to make this piece look as good as I can. I sculpted the head to see if I could match my concept and I think its okay. If the sculpt didn't turn out well then I wasn't going to bother. I am glad my skills have improved to the point where I can feel confident I can make this piece look really well.

So I will be working on this with all the spare time I have.

-----------

With this Clockwork man I have a robotic/hard surface character. So I was thinking about doing an anime style character to model or a really cartoony character. I think I need to do both;do something outside my comfort zone and muddle through it. I mean Batman was a great stylized character but I would not call him cartoony.
 

Quick Update: Finished Dragon / Batman Painted

I got the Chinese Dragon finished, I am really glad the cards we had were blue, they are a nice offset with his red skin. This turned out really well. Adding the smoke was kind of hard but it really helps. I tried doing some depth and focus but it kind of turned into messy blur and really hurt to look at.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The I finished painting the Batman model. I am in the middle of the doing a quick rig in Softimage to get some poses in.

The concept was done by http://danielaraya.deviantart.com/